Armoire New Look (ANL) is an innovative company that specializes in melamine processing.  In business for 5 years; ANL, is actually comprised of 28 employees and develops its market through a network of dynamic and professional franchisees.  Day after day, the company suggests an outstanding client service as well as a guaranteed product.  After a successful expansion, the next goal of the company is to sell processing plants in a broader geographic area, that is, in North America (United States, Canada) and even in Europe.

Structuring the organization growth (Interview - February 26th, 2009)

Dany Frankow, founding president and ANL’s Chief Financial Officer agreed to trace the history of events with Taktika.

What were the contexts and the issues set at the beginning of the project?

"Armoire New Look needed to document its know-how while being in line with quality principles and steady improvement for its operations in the plant and on work sites.  The growth prediction was such that the business model with craftsman format had to evolve over time towards a proper industrial plan in order to offer in the medium term a sufficient production capacity."

What were the targeted goals for this project?

"By issuing such a mandate to Taktika Management, ANL wanted to benefit from a multidisciplinary expertise with modern and efficient tools as well as to take an objective and professional look which would complete its core competencies.

The goal was to encourage a mature evolution of the organization on managing its business processes as well as on directing its quality and know-how while supporting an optimal transfer of the expertise via a coaching and training system given to an internal representative who can operate independently."

What was your approach to implement this project?

"To ensure the success of the project, we tried to involve all members of the business such as: the production manager, the sales manager, the Human resources and the operators.  In addition, many meetings and brainstorming sessions have been organized between Taktika and ANL. Taktika appeared to be listening carefully to our needs.  At the same time, we were developing our franchisee network, but it appeared to us that it was important to achieve both projects at the same time as the two projects were central to the business growth."

What can you say about the relationship between ANL members and Taktika members throughout the project?

"As I have noted already, Taktika’s consultants appeared to be listening carefully to all ANL’s members.  As for the employees, we have tried with Taktika’s help to let them understand properly the mandate in question as well as its issues in order to benefit from the best possible collaboration without disrupting the workplace production and atmosphere."

Why was Taktika Management chosen?

"I have heard about Taktika through a person who was part of my network of people that I developed over the years. So, I contacted immediately Taktika’s advisors and I have been lured by all the possibilities that Taktika could offer to my business enterprise."

Would you advise other enterprises to follow the same approach?

"I say yes, without any hesitation.  But we have to be aware that all this means working in close co-operation with the  consultants, the management and to a greater extent with  all the employees who have any information that could help the consultants in their work as they need resources to understand the occupation as well as the business’ operations.  For a business that wants to grow, the process approach seems to me unavoidable, as much unavoidable as could be, for instance, a financial planner.  It is an approach that takes time so we have to be patient but the results were being felt right from the first quarter."

How was the project conducted? Can you make a brief review?

"During the first quarter, the first step for Taktika’s consultants was to get familiar with the business enterprise, its occupation and its operation.

During the second quarter, we adopted gradually management processes and a number of cartographies have already been done.  It took several weeks for ANL’s employees to be aware of the importance of the project, but they finally understood that it was a key issue for ANL.  At the end of the second quarter, we could already notice some good result coming out of it.

During the third quarter, a second version of each cartography has been done and all the processes were cartographed.

During the last three months, I have noticed a significant improvement of the project as  the processes are getting clearer, the employees are more co-operative and the production cards are carefully filled out; all this makes the work of Taktika’s consultants easier."

How do you assess the benefits of this project to the business enterprise?

"We often see business enterprises which are growing so fast to go bankrupt because of an ill-defined management system. Taktika helped us to avoid making the same mistake. In some of the decision-making processes, as for instance in the case of moving the production in a new plan, Taktika’s consultants helped us to assess the risks in order to make the right choice."

What are the major benefits provided to your clients?

"This project has enabled us today to suggest higher quality products to our clients through a better production planning. This helped us also to avoid a few problems such as the lack of spare parts in the orders which used to happen before implementing the process approach.  Finally, from the perspective of the clients’ vision concerning ANL, this gives us a better image with the involvement of software quality professionals."

Can you already consider a logical progression of the project?

"When a business enterprise adopts this management method, its growth will evolve in a structural way.  With Taktika, we have built the foundations to grow in a healthy manner. Then, it becomes difficult to do without that kind of service and I am convinced that we will continue in the future to seek a sustaining support from Taktika’s consultants.  The types of needs and missions can obviously change, but the support approach remains the same and helps us to build on the success of the project."