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Other Added - Costing At No Cost
What would it take to make your business fail? What conditions could precipitate and sustain “the spiral of death”? What would complete financial collapse really look like? If your primary competitor acquired the firm, where would they strip out expenses, and what assets would they covet? These are grisly questions to consider, but sometimes we need to envision complete breakdown and failure to understand how to prevent it, and find the next level of success.Envisioning the failure of your organization is not a pleasant exercise, in fact it can be downright scary. In life, and in business, none of us like to think about potential failure, let alone describe it in gory detail and wallow in it. Yet, in a controlled environment, it will be one of the most useful and enlightening discussions a management team will ever have. Creating a vision of failure will force management to: · Critically understand, challenge and test
How to make an accurate and reliable estimate, quickly and at a reasonable cost?
We propose the ultimate answer to this question: do not estimate the material consumption: get the actual cost before cutting!
And the only way to get the data of the actual placements of parts is to perform the nesting for the whole order on the actual material batch to be cut.
This was almost impossible in the recent past, because it was a time-consuming process and required the availability of a high-performance computer with a (expensive) nesting software. In a few words, the automatic nesting for costing purposes was too expensive to be an option.
This is no more true for those companies who use the inno
You can throw out most of the management ideas you find in colleges, graduate schools, company training programs, and the like if you’ll do just one, incredibly simple thing:PAY YOUR PEOPLE EXCEPTIONALLY WELL.Management advocates have it backwards, you see.Their pet saying is that the art of management is getting average people to perform exceptionally well.What they leave off is a small tag line. Let me provide you with the entire phrase:“The art of management is getting average people to perform exceptionally well, without paying them anything extra for their productivity.”That’s truly the tacit definition of a good manager, and most of the industrial psychology, job engineering, and yes, management consulting during the past 80 years has been dedicated to this goal.“Make us more money without making us spend more money.”But, alas, human nature and life itself don’t work t
The estimation comes into play for several reasons: to prepare production budgets, for cost management and to define the prices and to make offers to customers.
Here we want to concentrate our attention on the problem of cost estimation in the cutting business.
We must make distinct considerations according to the material type to be cut.
Materials can be divided into two big categories, man-made and natural. It would be possible to make further classifications but these two are enough for our purposes.
The problem with man-made materials
As a first case, we deal with man-made materials, for which apparently the cost estimate of cutting is easy: the material is usually defect-free and comes in regular shapes, typically sheets or rolls of a standard size.
It may be simple to make a rough estimate of the quantity (and therefore the cost) of material needed to fulfil an order but it is important to consider a couple of factors:
- The final products (the cut parts) are hardly differentiated, so, for a given material, the distinguishing points of an offer for a cutting job can only be price and delivery time. Delivery time can be managed, since each company has a known average throughput and on the market there are many software products that can manage the production schedule to provide in time the parts to be shipped to the customers.
- Price is a much harder question since it is often the point on which the customer’s decisions are based. For this reason it is extremely important to have a sound basis to make a price, knowing exactly which is the cost of the material needed.
The problem with natural materials
Natural materials, such as leather or wood, are a completely different story. They come in a wide variety of sizes and shapes and can have defects and holes. Moreover, the parts to be cut often have placing constraints (orientation, quality and so on) that make much harder to figure out how they can fit on the available piece of material.
There is no way to make a reliable estimate of the quantities to be used on natural materials.
All the available methods are based on mid- and long-term statistics, that can be helpful only as far as the main features of the material are similar across different batches and the parts to be cut are similar across different articles.
But in a real production environment these conditions are rarely respected and the estimates are always prone to errors and, of course, the offers based on these estimates are wrong.
The only way to obtain a perfect estimate is to place the parts on the actual material to be cut and then calculate the actual consumption.
The ultimate question
How to make an accurate and reliable estimate, quickly and at a reasonable cost?
We propose the ultimate answer to this question: do not estimate the material consumption: get the actual cost before cutting!
And the only way to get the data of the actual placements of parts is to perform the nesting for the whole order on the actual material batch to be cut.
This was almost impossible in the recent past, because it was a time-consuming process and required the availability of a high-performance computer with a (expensive) nesting software. In a few words, the automatic nesting for costing purposes was too expensive to be an option.
This is no more true for those companies who use the innov
While referrals are one of the most important sources of new clients for therapists and coaches, how to get them seems to be something of a mystery. Below is a five-step referral strategy that can switch on your referral faucet, or turn a trickle into a steady flow.#1-Focus on Your Ideal Clients Do you want to work with men in career transition? People dealing with health issues? Families in crisis? Females with eating disorders? Newly retired individuals? You may serve a narrow niche of clientele, or a broad swath. For example, your market may be "stay-at-home mothers in their 30s who used to be corporate executives with six-figure incomes," or you may help your clients deal with an assortment of issues, such as: depression, addictions, marital issues, stress and sexual trauma. It doesn't matter for these purposes. What does matter is getting clear: Whom do you serve?#2-Discover Where They Gather Wher
It may be simple to make a rough estimate of the quantity (and therefore the cost) of material needed to fulfil an order but it is important to consider a couple of factors:
- The final products (the cut parts) are hardly differentiated, so, for a given material, the distinguishing points of an offer for a cutting job can only be price and delivery time. Delivery time can be managed, since each company has a known average throughput and on the market there are many software products that can manage the production schedule to provide in time the parts to be shipped to the customers.
- Price is a much harder question since it is often the point on which the customer’s decisions are based. For this reason it is extremely important to have a sound basis to make a price, knowing exactly which is the cost of the material needed.
The problem with natural materials
Natural materials, such as leather or wood, are a completely different story. They come in a wide variety of sizes and shapes and can have defects and holes. Moreover, the parts to be cut often have placing constraints (orientation, quality and so on) that make much harder to figure out how they can fit on the available piece of material.
There is no way to make a reliable estimate of the quantities to be used on natural materials.
All the available methods are based on mid- and long-term statistics, that can be helpful only as far as the main features of the material are similar across different batches and the parts to be cut are similar across different articles.
But in a real production environment these conditions are rarely respected and the estimates are always prone to errors and, of course, the offers based on these estimates are wrong.
The only way to obtain a perfect estimate is to place the parts on the actual material to be cut and then calculate the actual consumption.
The ultimate question
How to make an accurate and reliable estimate, quickly and at a reasonable cost?
We propose the ultimate answer to this question: do not estimate the material consumption: get the actual cost before cutting!
And the only way to get the data of the actual placements of parts is to perform the nesting for the whole order on the actual material batch to be cut.
This was almost impossible in the recent past, because it was a time-consuming process and required the availability of a high-performance computer with a (expensive) nesting software. In a few words, the automatic nesting for costing purposes was too expensive to be an option.
This is no more true for those companies who use the inno
What's easy to forget when you're looking for a new job is that you are interviewing the company as much as they are interviewing you. It's about match and exchange. Do they have what you want? Do you have what they want?If you feel desperate for a job, everything about the company, position, and people may look a lot rosier than it probably is. You're much more vulnerable taking whatever's offered rather than assessing the situation for real, personal satisfaction. The same can happen if the company is desperate for you. They may view your abilities as greater than they are, and you may end up in a spot where it's tough for you to succeed.Before any interview, do your homework. If it's a public company, check stock market performance. What's the stock price trend? Do they have a track record of hitting performance targets?Check out the company's web site for quarterly and annual reports. Even if you can't un
The problem with natural materials
Natural materials, such as leather or wood, are a completely different story. They come in a wide variety of sizes and shapes and can have defects and holes. Moreover, the parts to be cut often have placing constraints (orientation, quality and so on) that make much harder to figure out how they can fit on the available piece of material.
There is no way to make a reliable estimate of the quantities to be used on natural materials.
All the available methods are based on mid- and long-term statistics, that can be helpful only as far as the main features of the material are similar across different batches and the parts to be cut are similar across different articles.
But in a real production environment these conditions are rarely respected and the estimates are always prone to errors and, of course, the offers based on these estimates are wrong.
The only way to obtain a perfect estimate is to place the parts on the actual material to be cut and then calculate the actual consumption.
The ultimate question
How to make an accurate and reliable estimate, quickly and at a reasonable cost?
We propose the ultimate answer to this question: do not estimate the material consumption: get the actual cost before cutting!
And the only way to get the data of the actual placements of parts is to perform the nesting for the whole order on the actual material batch to be cut.
This was almost impossible in the recent past, because it was a time-consuming process and required the availability of a high-performance computer with a (expensive) nesting software. In a few words, the automatic nesting for costing purposes was too expensive to be an option.
This is no more true for those companies who use the inno
Checking the Better Business Bureau is good, but checking the person himself is better.Would you be willing to take an extra moment to check the background of your future employee? Who knows, you might discover some criminal past - people aren't always what they seem to be externally.Every serious business owner or employer uses background check services everyday, do you?If you don't then just think of all the news that we constantly hear about how a new nanny was torturing a little kid, or the caregiver who was hitting the old lady... Yes, this is very common especially when you hire somebody to work at your very own home - even the plumber, the lawn person, the roofer, the salesperson who wants you to buy something perhaps illegal and waits for your answer, or maybe even your personal trainer is a criminal and wants to kill you?You can check criminal records, the sex offender’s list, nanny screen loo
There is no way to make a reliable estimate of the quantities to be used on natural materials.
All the available methods are based on mid- and long-term statistics, that can be helpful only as far as the main features of the material are similar across different batches and the parts to be cut are similar across different articles.
But in a real production environment these conditions are rarely respected and the estimates are always prone to errors and, of course, the offers based on these estimates are wrong.
The only way to obtain a perfect estimate is to place the parts on the actual material to be cut and then calculate the actual consumption.
The ultimate question
How to make an accurate and reliable estimate, quickly and at a reasonable cost?
We propose the ultimate answer to this question: do not estimate the material consumption: get the actual cost before cutting!
And the only way to get the data of the actual placements of parts is to perform the nesting for the whole order on the actual material batch to be cut.
This was almost impossible in the recent past, because it was a time-consuming process and required the availability of a high-performance computer with a (expensive) nesting software. In a few words, the automatic nesting for costing purposes was too expensive to be an option.
This is no more true for those companies who use the inno
The recent increase in media interest in personal identity theft has provided a reminder that company identity theft at Companies House is still a major problem for UK limited companies. These companies are being encouraged to proactively take action to deal with company filing fraud at Companies House. There are over two million company records held by Companies House which currently reports that of the five hundred thousand documents filed at Companies House each month, including company accounts, approximately fifty are identified as false.Company hijacking at Companies House can involve:The company directors are changed - Fraudsters file change in company director forms 288 to notify Companies House of a change to the company's officers. These will either be stolen identities of real people or completely fictitious individuals pretending to be a company director. They will also notify Companies House that the co
How to make an accurate and reliable estimate, quickly and at a reasonable cost?
We propose the ultimate answer to this question: do not estimate the material consumption: get the actual cost before cutting!
And the only way to get the data of the actual placements of parts is to perform the nesting for the whole order on the actual material batch to be cut.
This was almost impossible in the recent past, because it was a time-consuming process and required the availability of a high-performance computer with a (expensive) nesting software. In a few words, the automatic nesting for costing purposes was too expensive to be an option.
This is no more true for those companies who use the innovative technology of CUTWEB.
CUTWEB is a web-based application that allows the management and sharing of all the data related to nesting and cutting and provides the access to an on-line nesting service that uses high-performance nesting strategies, fine-tuned for different scenarios.
A web-based application like Cutweb can be used from any (cheap) internet-connected PC and a nesting server deals with all the calculations, getting rid of the need of a in-house dedicated workstation and of the need to buy a software license for each PC that access to nesting and cutting data.
Costing with CUTWEB becomes a breeze:
- upload the parts and the material data
- upload the order
- start the nesting.
- See the actual material cost
All this can be done quickly and at a negligible cost, just a few eurocents for each test so it becomes possible to run as many tests as you need.
In a few minutes the layouts will be calculated, and you will see exactly how and where the parts will be eventually cut and get a detailed (and of course customisable) report about the nesting.
You can keep the nesting on CUTWEB as long as you wish, and when the order is confirmed by the customer, then (and only then) you download it and cut at once, since the CUTWEB setup ensures that the downloaded data are compatible with your cutting machine.
The nesting cost is just a few Eurocents, you actually pay the nesting service when you download the data needed for the cutting.
There are many benefits that you can achieve organising the work on this way can be summarised in some key points:
- you pay for the nesting service only when the order is confirmed and you download the data for actual cutting
- there is no risk to waste your money on nestings that you will not use in production
- you can prepare precise offers based upon actual material cost not estimations
- you will spend less time and money in the costing and offering process
- higher chance to gain orders owing to the more accurate offerings
- improved overall production efficiency and throughput
The advantages for the control over the material cost
The cost of material plays a capital role in the cutting business and it is crucial to keep it under strict control.
This is especially difficult when dealing with natural and irregular materials, because even the basic operations such as the measurement of the area are subject to errors.
The use of an automatic nesting service requires a tool to digitise the materials. These tools are usually a table with one or more digital cameras placed upon it. A specialised software application automatically recognises the contour points and the holes in the material and calculates the actual area and uses th
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