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Currently, tools exist which allow us to adequately manage all the processes of the natural stone industry, however we must be aware of the fact that any generic software can not fully achieve the desired results.
Factors to consider:
- An effective application for companies within this sector must be designed exclusively for them. The supplier should provide proof of their experience within the sector, and give references of companies where implementations have been achieved successfully. If a considerable number of companies use a particular technology for their management on a daily basis, it is highly unlikely that all have made a bad choice.
A standard software would require many modifications for it to adapt to the special characteristics of this type of industry; this is why it is so important for the software supplier to have a knowledge of the sector as extensive as yours, and to know what you are talking about.
- Management software must be continually updated so as to keep abreast of new requirements of the market, and to make use of the latest and best innovations in software technology, bearing in mind the importance of them being 鈥渦ser-friendly鈥�, and most importantly, of them offering practical solutions with regard to increasing both productivity and the efficiency of the company.
- It is a totally false myth to suggest that technology is only relevant for large companies. Within the marble and granite industry, no matter the size of the company, efficient and reliable data is essential for its successful management. Differences lie only in production volume, and the power and price of relevant machinery, this depending on the size and consequently the necessities of each industry.
Advantages and uses of software designed specifically for the stone industry sector:
Management software adapted specifically for the natural stone industry should have the following characteristics:
- Process history: from the mining of a block in the quarry, transport, situation on the factory, transformation, finish and finally its distribution, the product should be totally identifiable. Thus from the invoice for a work top, we should be able to trace the origin of the block and its passage through all production processes, allowing us to control stock.
- Measurements: monitoring of measurements is fundamental to our knowledge of the profitability of the materials and possible production problems. Measurements should be controlled in all of the processes, thus enabling us to detect possible losses in the production lines.
- Processes: each process involved in the transformation of the material results in an additional cost to the final product. Through a comprehensive control of this we can obtain information vital to our knowledge of costs and consumption, output capacities and contributing margins, all of which are key to an efficient management.
- Dynamism: software designed for a specific sector should integrate all the functions and tricks that facilitate day-to-day operations, saving time and thereby improving productivity, as in the knowledge of prices for particular clients, or the management of agents and commission levels.
- Flexibility: the software should never put restrictions on work, neither in normal nor abnormal situations. The small daily problems of the sector should be known and an analysis of the problems of each particular company undertaken, so that maximum help can be given to each task that will be undertaken.
鈥� A management software specific to the natural stone industry is a tool that helps control the processes of these companies, thereby achieving more efficient management and helping the daily work of its employees.鈥�
Mª Jos茅 Munera Cifuentes, Marketing Director of Totware Novelda, SL.
Photos: courtesy of the Totware company.
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