Outcomes
The engagement delivered clearly defined and quantified improvement potentials for each operational unit across the site — with benefit realisation targets and KPIs established to underpin accountability going forward. A new, differentiated planning methodology was implemented, enabling inventory levels for scheduled and unscheduled maintenance articles to be managed separately for the first time — directly reducing stock levels. The central stores function was strengthened to enable more proactive, effective management of common parts across the site. With the project ongoing at the time of writing, the expected fee payback for the client was 10 to 1 within twelve months.
Background
Inventory had been growing steadily, but the underlying causes had never been properly diagnosed. Across more than ten operational units on the site, material planners were each working to their own individual practices — with no unified process, no shared methodology, and no common set of KPIs to manage performance against. Accountability for inventory levels was effectively absent.
Compounding this was a lack of differentiation between planning for articles used in planned maintenance versus unplanned maintenance — a distinction that matters significantly for determining appropriate stock levels, and whose absence was contributing directly to inflated inventory across the site. The result was working capital tied up in stock that, in many cases, the business could not properly account for or justify.
Curzon Approach
Curzon began by establishing the size of the prize — quantifying the addressable improvement potential across the site using an 80/20 approach to focus effort where it would have the greatest impact. This gave the client a clear, evidence-based view of what was achievable and formed the basis of a structured implementation plan.
A unified maintenance spares planning process was developed and implemented across the site — replacing the patchwork of individual practices with a single, coherent methodology. Critically, this process differentiated between planned and unplanned maintenance articles, allowing stock levels to be set with genuine precision rather than as a blunt hedge against uncertainty.
To manage the risk of site-wide rollout, Curzon piloted the new processes and management approach in two units first — validating the methodology and refining it before scaling. KPIs were defined and implemented to give operational units the visibility and accountability they had previously lacked, and a centralised planning function was established for freely available articles used across multiple plants.
Underpinning all of this was a shift from reactive order processing to proactive inventory management — embedding a continuous improvement mindset that would sustain the gains beyond the life of the project itself.
