Management to Enhance Role Awareness at the Worksite
Hello, I’m Ichiki of Sync Logistics.
In this issue, I would like to share the importance of instilling an awareness of “roles” and “responsibilities” in on-site management.
■Making each individual aware of their “role” and “responsibility”.
I have been involved in setting up ship-loading operations all over the country. Through managing and inspecting various sites, I have strongly felt the importance of making each staff member aware of their “role” and “responsibility”.
In the task of ship-loading, it is crucial to load quickly and abundantly, but it is even more important to be conscious of delivering important vehicles to the end-users. When staff members embrace their role of delivering to customers, the way they approach each task changes. For example, they become more diligent in preventing damage and cargo collapse, ensuring that the vehicles are delivered in good condition, and they start to consider the work environment and team role distribution more carefully.
Moreover, clarifying responsibilities is essential in maintaining service quality. When multiple people are involved in the work, role division and quality standards can become ambiguous, making it easier for mistakes such as omissions in the work to occur.
■How Do We Manage? Examples of Our Initiatives
We believe that enhancing the awareness of roles and responsibilities among our site staff can also be achieved through proper management, not merely by preaching a philosophy of “change your own mindset.”
Our company operates several yards across the country, and although this involves trial and error, we are making efforts to strengthen on-site management. I would like to share a recent example of what we have implemented for your reference.
Utilizing On-Site Feedback for Improvement: We have conducted one-on-one interviews and web surveys targeting on-site staff to collect various opinions about the workplace environment and areas needing improvement. We categorize this feedback to immediately implement feasible improvements and systematically address issues that cannot be resolved quickly by setting specific deadlines.
⇒ Seeing individual opinions reflected in improvements fosters a positive mindset that “we can change the way we work and our work environment ourselves.”
Learning from Excellent Sites: We have staff visit our top-performing yards for a few days to share expertise and practices.
⇒ Through hands-on training, they come to understand the differences from their own sites, which fosters a mindset of embracing and implementing good practices.
Appointing Leaders by Container: We have started appointing leaders responsible for each container among the operatives involved in the vanning process.
⇒ By clarifying responsibilities associated with quality control, we enhance both the work process and the quality of communication.
At sites where we have intensively implemented such measures for about two to three weeks, we have truly observed that improvements are progressing rapidly.
The above are merely examples, and the necessary actions may vary depending on the situation at each site. In some cases, it might be necessary to teach the methods and mindset from scratch.
■Realizing and Integrating Action
There are various approaches to enhancing on-site awareness, but what I particularly emphasize is conveying the purpose and role of logistics work to each individual. This is not a one-time task; it requires persistent reminders until they fully realize and incorporate these principles into their actions. Persistence is necessary, but I believe that by keeping on-site managers at the core of this process, we can change each individual’s awareness and behavior.
My role is to create a management system that fosters a positive cycle on the site. We will continue to refine our sites through various initiatives and support the maximization of export volumes with stable quality.
Thank you for reading through to the end.
