WaG! 2

Well, will you look at that? It's already time for another WaG! (What a Gem!) installment. I'll keep this vague and generic, and again place it in the context of the food industry. Suppose your chef is looking through the fridge and he sees a container full of Morel mushrooms, and then proclaims "I'm going to make a new entree using these Morels and add it to the menu!" Some would think that would be a good idea. Some would argue that it would be a good idea to make it a special for the day (to use up that extra stock), but not adding it permanently to the menu.

I would be one to argue against adding it to the daily menu. The problem with creating new products (new entree) with the sole purpose of consuming excess inventory (the Morels) is two fold. 1) You are only concerned about using the inventory, and are not giving any thought to continued sources of supply or quality specifications. 2) If you build and sell something, a customer is going to want more of them sooner or later, see Point 1. Let's suppose our chef creates an entree based off a similar entree, and only replaces Truffles with the Morels. The taste is different, and customers like it a lot. Suppose the inventory of the Morels lasts the chef several days, enough for buzz of the new entree to spread far and wide. The chef is now happy that the Morels are out of the fridge and he has more room for other ingredients, and is unaware of the popularity of his new entree.

The following week, huge parties (new customers) make reservations with the hopes of trying the new entree they have heard so much about. The orders begin to make their way into the kitchen, and now the chef is screwed because he no longer has the Morels on hand. He could try to substitute Truffles, but the customers might not like that. He could jump on the phone and call someone to get more Morels in the kitchen, but he'd only put himself in a bigger bind because he has no idea of the quality that will be delivered, or how soon they could arrive.

What a Gem!

I'm starting a new blog feature called What a Gem! What a Gem! (WaG! ?) will document all the great quotes and quips I hear throughout the day. These may be by people I work with or people that I hear out on the town. I'm sure if you keep your ears open, you'll hear a few gems of your own. So here's the first one:

I was speaking with a manufacturing engineer about a purchased part that needs to be reworked to add holes, he said, "I don't think it needs a new part number. It's not like we're going to buy it under one number then rework and stock as another. We know what we have."

The WaG! aspect of this conversation is, Yes, one should purchase something under one part number, then stock it as a new number if it is reworked and stocked. Suppose you buy a zucchini, and the whole zucchini has a part number of ZCH0123, then you slice it and put it in a container. Now if you need some zucchini and ask someone to get it, they'll grab that container of the sliced zucchini, and you might get lucky in that you wanted the sliced version, but it was only luck.

Now let's expand on this analogy. Suppose you have sliced and diced zucchini in the fridge, in addition to the whole zucchini. Now you ask for "some zucchini" and get the wrong ingredients that you needed. You correct and indicate that you need the diced zucchini. Your assistant has to open all the containers to find the right one. If the whole zucchini was ZCH0123, the sliced ones were stored as ZCH0124, and the diced were ZCH0125, you wouldn't have any troubles getting exactly what you need.