Top 7 New Years Resolutions for Manufacturers

Here are the Top 7 New Years Resolutions for Manufacturers I hear regularly – but you need to start now if any of them are on your list for 2025!  

·         Get started with digital transformation.

·         Adopt more entrepreneurial thinking. Join a CEO group.

·         Build a better workplace culture.

·         Implement Lean practices.

·         Leverage AI technologies.

·         Measure machine, process and operational performance empirically.

·         Diversify the customer base. (Acquire new customers).

Read them all or jump ahead to the ones you are most interested in and be sure to read the suggestions on how you can get started.

1. Get started with “digital transformation”. 

Many manufacturers have been well intended on adopting new technologies on their plant floor, but many have been unable to get a start – a kind of paralysis by analysis. A big reason for that is the technology industry itself - all the programs and consultants that (speaking candidly) keep things more confusing than they need to be and keep getting in the way. Over the last decade, manufacturers have heard many new terms like “smart manufacturing”, “Industry 4.0”, “digital twins”, and now “digital transformation”. Manufacturers are pragmatic people. They aren’t looking for complex or sophisticated solutions, they are looking for simple and effective ones that deliver positive results not just this year, but this month, this week, this shift. “Digital transformation” can be applied to a wide range of applications on the plant floor and the technology to do it doesn’t have to be confusing and complex. In 2025, many manufacturers are resolved to just get started, following their business and operational instincts, rather than waiting for a grant to be announced or approved, or trying to understand all the constantly changing technology jargon.

Suggestions: check out our team to see if we can help research, identify, plan or execute and gain traction. Think big. Start small. Move fast. We can help.

2. Adopt more entrepreneurial thinking. 

This one is clearly my favourite. Most manufacturers are very inventive people. The last few years have presented many manufacturers with challenges they haven’t faced before, and their sense is that 2025 and beyond will hold even more challenges. Many of the company leaders are looking beyond the basics of improving things and processes that are or used to work; they are also looking at new ways to lead, new ways to acquire new customers, new ways to market, and new ways to develop their people. They are looking at looking at courses, development programs and coaches for themselves and their people and joining CEO peer-to-peer and networking groups.

Suggestions: Consider joining Innovators Alliance, a peer-to-peer network for CEOs of small and medium size businesses in Ontario. Check out “EOS”, “BOS” and “Future Focus” for structured approaches. Ask us at TPI-3 for an introduction. Consider TPI-3 for “entrepreneurial coaching”, management consulting, or fractional executive help.

3. Build a better workplace culture.

Many manufacturers have been struggling with labour shortages but in recent years, there has been a growing understanding of the importance of a healthy and more positive company culture. The companies with the best working cultures keep their good people longer, and when the do have to recruit, they have an easier time filling open positions. A positive workplace culture has everyone pulling in the same direction, from the office to the plant floor, from management and engineering to sales. Everyone likes to be part of a winning team, and teams with a sense of day to day as well as big picture purpose attracts top performers.

Suggestions: Consider hiring a consultant or coach to help you articulate your company’s vision and purpose in a way that’s genuine and sticks. Investigate new approaches to engaging your people finding the value and meaning their roles. Find out what’s important to them in their jobs and in their lives. Ask us if you’d like a referral to someone or a team that can help get you or your company on a good path, or if one of our people could assist or mentor your team.       

4. Implement Lean practices.

Lean has been practiced in many manufacturing operations for a long time, but up to recently, many custom job-shop or build to order or engineer to order manufacturers have thought that Lean practices don’t fit their operations. There may be some specific reasons for the hesitancy to adopt it in your operation, or perhaps an earlier initiative failed to get traction, but if you’re reading this, it means you do recognize the importance of getting things out on time, without stress, and with the highest quality, and your company needs to make improvements in at least one of those key areas.

Suggestions: If this is you or your company, let us help see how Lean can be applied to your process and operation without feeling like you are being transformed into an auto parts manufacturing company when that’s not what you are. Our people specialize in applying Lean principals to develop processes and mindsets that fit the operation and achieve the objectives, rather than the other way around. Also, check out our blog page as there are numerous blogs on how better planning delivers the fastest ROI by eliminating all the unnecessary wait time (no capex required!), how dashboards put everyone on the same page (and on the right tasks), and how proper time measurement makes it real for everyone in real time.

5. Leverage “AI” technologies in administration, marketing, and other areas.

There is a strong interest in manufacturing to explore what AI can do to eliminate and reduce low value activities and free up people for higher value activities. Higher value activities are not only more important for the company, it also improves the level of satisfaction from the people doing the work. Whereas many other technology ‘initiatives’ seem driven by industry experts, technology companies or outside influences, the desire to investigate and find ways to adopt AI is driven internally by people within the company that have noticed or heard about exciting things happening within their companies in other departments, or in their supply chain, or by other manufacturers in their network. This is a sure sign that AI is going to be adopted far faster than all the previous technology movements that were supposed to transform manufacturing but faced hesitancy at every turn or required outside stimulus to make happen. There is a big internal appetite for AI technologies that is driving it.

Suggestions: to borrow a phrase, “Think big. Start small. Move fast”. Our team can help set out a long-term strategy and objective, find the quick, low hanging fruit, and help your team execute and grow in their confidence of applying AI. Check out our blogs on what are good places to consider applying it, what are less beneficial areas, and what are some of the big picture considerations.    

6. Get empirical data on everything (machines, processes, products) in real-time.

This is probably the easiest of all the resolutions. It could also be considered as the first step to many of the other 5 on the list. So, why haven’t many done it yet? It may have been presented as expensive. It shouldn’t be. It may have been presented as complicated, requiring machine upgrades, are requiring skills that the company didn’t yet have. Not true – it doesn’t have to be. In fact, empirical measurement of machine and process performance can be done for around $2500 per machine – uptime, downtime, downtime reasons, real-time dashboards and even notifications for breakdowns, material or help. It gets a bit more complicated when you want to connect it with legacy accounting and plant systems, but the first step – getting the critical empirical performance information on your machines and processes in real time is not.

Suggestions: If you haven’t done it yet and want to do it, ask us how. We not only have the people that have done it in hundreds of plants, but we also work with technology vendors that have effective and practical solutions. We ensure that you get what you need, to do what you need done in the near term, in a way and format that delivers immediate results and fits your longer term digital, AI technology, and workplace culture development objectives.      

7. Diversify your customer base. (New customer acquisition. Improved Marketing).

In stable times and good times, the role of the sales team is more about relationship management, taking care of the 6 to 10 primary customers that the company services. There is little need to diversify. However, when one or two of the primary accounts slow down and there’s a big shift or downturn in your primary customers’ marketplace, knees start to get wobbly and suddenly there’s a keen awareness of the need to have a broader base of customers. Still fresh out of the pandemic years, and facing the potential delayed or downsized launch of EV related industries, and the uncertainty of tariffs, many manufacturing company owners are relying on their sales teams to do something they may not have done in years – and that is, to actively market their companies and identify and acquire new customers.

Suggestions: Check out some of the blogs on our blog page, specifically the ones about finding the easy sales, sympathy for the salesman, and effective marketing for your company. Consider hiring an entrepreneurial coach, as the entrepreneurial founder is often the best sales hope, and is a resource that shouldn’t be overlooked. (Most entrepreneurs have the ‘superpower’ described in the “what’s your superpower?” blog). There are many consultants now on the scene with tailored solutions for manufacturers. We’d be happy to offer our opinion on who to work with.   

Check out Links to TPI-3 Blogs by Topic for more suggestions on all of these resolutions.