Consulting Meets Automation

We’re excited to bring you the fourth season of our podcast series, Enabling Automation. This monthly podcast series brings together industry leaders from across ATS Corporation to discuss the latest industry trends, new innovations and more!

In the first episode of season 4, we welcome host Ben Hope who is joined by Stan Kleinikkink. to discuss the future of AI in automation.

What we discuss:

• What does the role of consultation typically look like and what is its impact?
• What is the right time to bring in a consultant?
• Howcrucial is customer engagement when a consultant is brought in?

Host: Ben Hope, ATS Corporation (ATS Products Group)

Ben has 25 years of experience in the automation industry, spanning both technical and commercial roles. He’s seen firsthand how technology can transform every phase of the automation lifecycle, from concept to engineering to assembly,  integration, operation and service.

Guest: Johannes Schweizer, ATS Corporation (Orise)

Johannes leads a team of consultants at Orise who specialize in designing and optimizing production and logistics processes, both for new greenfield sites and for existing operations. Their focus is primarily on discrete manufacturing industries and to deliver operational excellence. Automation and digitalization have become essential parts of almost every project they do.

——Full Transcript of Enabling Automation: S4, E2—–

BH: Welcome to the Enabling Automation Podcast, the show where we bring together experts from across the ATS group of companies to explore topics that matter to anyone using automation in their business. My name is Ben Hope and I’ll be the host for today’s episode. I’ve been part of the automation industry for nearly 25 years, working in both technical and commercial roles. That’s given me a good understanding of the balance that’s required between the technology of automation and the business of automation, and in my experience, one of the biggest challenges in adopting new technologies is that implementation. Doing it takes the right expertise. How do we understand what processes are eligible for automation? How do we understand value? Where is the ROI and how long can we run this equipment? And at the end of the day, expertise can be hard to find and it can be expensive. And it can even be tough to define. Today we’re diving into the topic of consultation and how the right guidance can help uncover unknowns, clarify direction, and build a foundation for achieving your business goals effectively. Joining me in the conversation is Johannes Schweizer. Welcome, Johannes. How are you?

JS: Good. Thank you. How are you?

BH: I’m very good. Thank you. Let’s start with a quick introduction. Tell us a bit about yourself.

JS: Yeah. Hi, Ben. Thanks for having me. It’s a real pleasure to be here. I am, Johannes Schweizer, I live in Germany, close to the Dutch border, together with my wife and our three boys. Outside of work, I’m a youth basketball coach at one of Germany’s recognized talent development programs, which is both fun and a great way to learn about teamwork and leadership from a completely different perspective. Professionally, I lead a team of consultants at Orise working from our offices in Munich and Munster, and we specialize in designing and optimizing production and logistics processes, both for new greenfield sites and for existing operations. And our focus is primarily on discrete manufacturing industries and to really deliver operational excellence. Automation and digitalization have become essential parts of almost every project we do.

BH: Sounds great. Thank you for joining us today. And you’ve recently gone through a rebrand. Can you tell us what is involved and what it means for your team and your customers?

JS: Sure. Orise is a large part of the ATS Corporation, with almost 2000 people worldwide dedicated to consulting and automation and digital transformation. And over the past years, we’ve grown consistently, both organically and by bringing together around ten specialized companies from different regions and backgrounds. And we now share a customer centric strategy combining automation, data integration, visualization and AI driven analytics. And it’s all wrapped around consulting with deep domain expertise. And our new brand, Orise, is kind of a reflection of that journey. It’s about bringing all these capabilities together under one roof and to fulfill our mission, which is to unlock the full potential of our customers.

BH: Okay. Very cool. And on the topic of consultation, what does that role typically look like and how can it make a real impact on an organization?

JS: And so at it, at its core, consulting is a service role. So our job is to bring all of our knowledge and experience and energy into a project and put it fully at the service of our clients. So what does it look like in practice? Was your question. Well, most of the time it starts with really listening, understanding the current situation, observing how things are done today, analyzing the processes, the systems and the challenges. And quite often the biggest opportunities for improvement are not where people expect them to be in the beginning. So what makes the consultancy role special is the external perspective. So we bring structure and methodology, but also a neutral view. And that helps to see patterns. Others might overlook and challenge assumptions in a constructive way. But in the end, impact only happens when ideas turn into action means implement concrete measures that lead to measurable improvements, whether that’s, I don’t know, reorganizing material flows, introducing new digital tools, or automating certain processes in the right way. And that’s also how I measure myself and how I measure the success of my team.

BH: Okay. And when it comes to consultation, when is the right time for a company to bring in a consultant? Is there any criteria that can be kind of identified?

JS: Yea that there is an old joke about consultants. Maybe you’ve heard it, I don’t know. A consultant gets into a taxi and the driver asks “Where to?” and the consultant replies, “Doesn’t matter, Consultants are needed everywhere.” So. No, but seriously, this year, in my view, the right moment to bring in a consultant is usually when there’s uncertainty. So, for example, when a company needs to make an important decision, maybe around an investment, but feels unsure about the best approach. Or second, when a problem requires very specific expertise that isn’t available in-house, or when different departments need to work together in a complex cross-functional topic, and having a neutral moderator can really help create alignment and focus within the team. But sometimes it’s simply a question of resources so external consultants can provide additional capacity, qualified, motivated people to get things done faster.

BH: And I get resources are always a hard thing, but I really like the idea of the neutral moderator and having somebody kind of lead the conversation in neutral from the perspective of everyone else in the room. And kind of leading into my next question. How crucial is customer engagement throughout that process then?

JS: Yeah. As I mentioned earlier, real impact only happens when ideas are also implemented. And for implementation to succeed, the people in the organization need to be on board. And that means they have to understand the measures. But more than that, they also have to believe in them. And ideally they even hold themselves accountable for the results. And that only, in my experience, works when people are taken seriously, when their input and their perspective are really considered, and not only in implementation, but already in the first phase of the analysis and in the planning stages. I can give you an example. When I evaluate a process together with a team. We don’t just start evaluating weaknesses right away. First, I define the evaluation criteria together with the customer, and only then we do assess the process based on that shared understanding. This creates a completely different level of ownership. The same might apply in a workshop if we are working toward a goal. First, I first align with the team in a separate meeting to make sure that goal really resonates with everyone. I might then suggest a method to get there, but I explicitly invite the team to question it to propose alternatives. And that way, people are much more committed and they take really, responsibility for the outcome.

JS: So takes a bit more time upfront, of course, but in the long run it leads to better results and maybe also to more sustainable results.

BH: It’s worth it with better results. Interesting. And in my experience, one of the biggest challenges is defining those requirements. There are often a lot of variables, conflicting opinions and scope creep. As a consultant, how do you approach defining requirements and keeping the scope under control?

JS: Yeah, you’re right, understanding the starting point is really important. So that’s why in the setup phase, we don’t just talk to the management or project leaders, but we also talk to people from different departments at different levels in the company, different hierarchy levels. And we ask questions like, what are you trying to achieve? Efficiency increase? Better quality? Less human labour? Less cost? More flexibility? What are the problems or risks you see? And this should not stop after these first meetings. It’s important to keep talking and checking in with all the stakeholders during the whole project. And what is also an important point in my point of view is to keep a project on track. Choosing the right project management approach. So if the project is complex and involves many different people or departments, I really like to use agile or hybrid methods so hey can help to stay focused and to handle changes in a in a structured way. Maybe, maybe an additional thought for the analysis phase. A very powerful tool is, is visualization. So mapping out a process together, whether through business process modeling or value stream mapping, it really helps create clarity. Because when everyone can literally see what we are talking about, it becomes much easier to align expectations and to stay focused. Everybody’s then on the same page, and you know that moving forward.

BH: You mentioned agile project management and hybrid methods. Could you just describe what that means a little bit in more detail?

JS: The value of a of an agile approach is that teams can work faster and still stay flexible. So instead of planning everything upfront, the team moves in small steps and adjusts along the way. And that means that they can respond to changes quickly and deliver what customers actually need. And, how it works, basically, that the team works in short cycles. So they’re called sprints. They plan together to build something and then get feedback also involving the customer and, and keep improving during the project.

JS: And it’s all about staying adaptable and learning as you go. And the hybrid approach means to combine the classical approach with the agile elements to get somehow the best out of both worlds.

BH: Interesting. Implementing automation can also feel very overwhelming. It’s complex, it’s expensive, and it can be risky without the right focus. How do you help customers navigate that and set them up for success?

JS: First of all, we don’t approach projects like a typical equipment supplier would do. So our role as a consultant is different. We start by mapping and analyzing the current processes, and we look very closely at all relevant conditions and constraints. But we also challenge ideas and goals together with the customer. So the question is that the key question is always what does the target process look like that creates the best overall results. For example, we do think it together with logistics, not only automate the main material flow, but already plan the whole logistics and supply chain. Consider the tech times, the production sequence, the number of variants, their assembly rates and frequency, and make sure buffers are dimensioned in the right size and decide where a decoupling point should be in the process. And yeah, where does automation really make sense? In some areas we can simply organize the process in a better way. We also look at data. So where can data be generated and how it can really create value and how much flexibility is needed, for example, for future product changes or fluctuations in demand. So after having understood all of that, usually we develop different scenarios or modular concept like puzzle pieces that can be combined into a complete solution. And when we evaluate these scenarios together based on clear criteria, quantitative and qualitative of course, that allows us to give an objective recommendation to our customer, which is understandable and well-founded. And this recommendation includes operational concepts, for example, how to manage orders or how to connect different production areas, but it also includes technology recommendations for automation and digitalization.

JS: And there we make use of the huge technological expertise within ATS Corporation. So our customers can trust that we what we propose is cutting edge. It’s feasible and it’s realistically costed.

BH: So then looking at ATS and ATS group of companies, how do we leverage consultation
to deliver real value to clients? Can you share some insight into that approach?

JS: Yeah. What I really appreciate about ATS is, is the mindset of many of our colleagues around the world. So when they talk to customers, they don’t just focus on selling automation equipment, but they are trained to listen carefully. And they recognize when a customer still has open questions. For example, what should the target process really look like. How does automation fit into the bigger picture? Will this investment really pay off? Or sometimes when they are walking through a factory, they notice problems that which cannot be solved by automation alone. And that’s the moment when they are not afraid to recommend a consulting project, even though it might mean an extra step for the customer in the short term.

JS: But very often this upfront step reduces risks and saves a lot of money in the long run, because the customer can avoid mistakes, investing in the right things, or designing the solution in a way that that makes it more valuable and cost efficient, in the end. So making sure that you follow the right process from the start and kind of get all the information you need and don’t rush anything, is really the key to attaining true value on that.

BH: Interesting. If you’re new to automation, what characteristics should you look for in a consultant?

JS: Yeah. Choosing the right consultant is not an easy task because there are many out there, to be honest. And, it’s definitely a matter of trust in a relationship. So I would say makes sense to use your network to get a good recommendation and then invest some time to really find out how a consultant works and to build the needed level of trust. I would not recommend to search only for someone which did exactly the same thing in exactly the same industry already, but rather looking for someone who is able to bring the necessary expertise together. When the problems understood. And you always have  the chance to start with a small package and some will test the consultant with the first small contract. And then scale from there.

BH: Yeah, exactly. Well that brings us to the end of today’s episode. A big thank you to Johannes for sharing your insights and experiences. Do you have any closing remark or final comments that you’d like to add?

JS: Yeah, yeah. Of course. Maybe just one final thought from my slide. I think automation and digitalization offer large opportunities, but they also come with complexity and a lot of the decisions to make along the way. And what I’ve learned over the years is that it really helps to take the time upfront to understand the big picture but ask the right questions and to involve the right people early on. So every company and every project is different. There’s no one size fits all solution, but with the right collaboration and with an open mindset and a structured approach, I know it’s possible to create solutions that are both smart and sustainable for the business and also for the people working in it. It’s clear that effective consultation could be a real game changer when it comes to implementing automation successfully.

BH: For those listening, we hope today’s conversation gave you some valuable takeaways on when and how to engage with consultants and why defining requirements and staying focused on your goals is so critical. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to follow the Enabling Automation Podcast for more discussions with industry experts across the ATS group. We’ve got plenty more coming your way on how to make automation work smarter for your business. So thanks again for joining us. And until next time, take care and keep innovating.