-
- News
- Books
Featured Books
- smt007 Magazine
Latest Issues
Current IssueIPC APEX EXPO 2024 Pre-show
This month’s issue devotes its pages to a comprehensive preview of the IPC APEX EXPO 2024 event. Whether your role is technical or business, if you're new-to-the-industry or seasoned veteran, you'll find value throughout this program.
Boost Your Sales
Every part of your business can be evaluated as a process, including your sales funnel. Optimizing your selling process requires a coordinated effort between marketing and sales. In this issue, industry experts in marketing and sales offer their best advice on how to boost your sales efforts.
The Cost of Rework
In this issue, we investigate rework's current state of the art. What are the root causes and how are they resolved? What is the financial impact of rework, and is it possible to eliminate it entirely without sacrificing your yields?
- Articles
- Columns
Search Console
- Links
- Events
||| MENU - smt007 Magazine
How to Build Up Trust in a Manufacturing Outsourcing Relationship
December 29, 2016 | Neil Sharp, JJS ManufacturingEstimated reading time: 3 minutes
"Trust is like blood pressure. It's silent, vital to good health, and if abused it can be deadly." - Frank Sonnenberg, Thought Leader
From the romantic variety to the most formal, trust is the bedrock of all successful relationships. And an outsourcing relationship is no different. When you, as an original equipment manufacturer (OEM), entrust part or all of your manufacturing operation to an electronics manufacturing services (EMS) provider, you want to know that this fundamental aspect of your business is in safe and capable hands.
Clearly, it takes time to establish trust, so how can you build it up into a strong and permanent structure?
Communicate Clearly
What do you want from the outsourcing relationship? This may seem like an obvious question, but it can be easy to lose sight of your long-term business objectives when you're caught up in day-to-day operations. From the outset, you should seek to ensure that you and your EMS partner are on the same page; that you both understand exactly what it is you want to achieve. Establish clear goals and define how you will measure your progress towards these.
Additionally, make sure that you know exactly how much responsibility you are handing over and where the buck stops, so-to-speak. Is your EMS provider simply in charge of assembling your box build product, for example, or are they also responsible for testing and shipping your product?
It's hard to maintain a good relationship with minimal contact, so take the time to catch-up with your partner regularly, including through face-to-face meetings. This approach will ensure that you remain on track and provide the opportunity to work through any issues that might arise.
Let Your Partner Take the Lead
While it's vital to work closely with your EMS provider, there also comes a point when you simply have to step back and let them do what they do best. Furthermore, you may find that conceding more accountability to your partner brings added benefits.
For instance, it often makes more sense for your partner to choose suppliers on your behalf – after all, it's counterproductive to have two separate supply chains. The best EMS providers will have a valuable list of contacts at their disposal and will be able to identify the best suppliers for your needs. Additionally, they will be able to demonstrate that they vet these suppliers on a regular basis, using objective measures, related to quality, delivery, cost, and other factors.
You might also find that your EMS partner can provide invaluable advice in areas such as product development, test solutions and global operational processes. Their knowledge and experience can help you to develop your business in new directions, which you may not previously have considered.
Let Go of Your Fear
The thing with building up trust is that you first have to make yourself vulnerable; you have to give your chosen EMS supplier a chance to prove that they are trustworthy. This can feel a bit daunting, but if you've taken the time to research and assess your partner before signing on the dotted line, then you should feel confident in taking this step.
If you're still unsure, ask yourself: do you have any outstanding questions about your EMS provider's competencies or processes? Have you visited their shop floor, to see their operation in action and to speak to the people on the front line? Have you met all members of the senior management team? Have you spoken to some of your EMS supplier's current customers?
If the answer to these questions is yes – and you are pleased by what you've discovered, then there's little reason to be fearful.
Trust underpins a successful manufacturing outsourcing relationship – without it, nothing can be achieved. While trust grows organically over time, it requires a leap of faith to kick-start this process. However, if you have selected a partner based on thorough research, carried out all the appropriate checks, and asked all the right questions, then you have cultivated the soil for trust to grow and thrive. Nurture your relationship, have confidence in your EMS partner's capabilities and expertise and, above all, reap the benefits of your outsourcing venture.
The post originally appeared on the JJS Manufacturing blog which can be found here.
Suggested Items
Electronic Components Market Update
10/04/2018 | Daniella Baldock, JJS ManufacturingUnfortunately, there is still no end in sight to the electronic component shortage, and some lead-times are being quoted with 2019 and even 2020 delivery dates! So if you are working with an EMS provider, it remains vital that you communicate and share forecast information with them. You may also want to start looking at the option of fitting, or designing in, smaller components to your PCB assemblies.
What SMT Component Shortages Mean for Design and Manufacturing Engineers
09/13/2018 | Russell Poppe, JJS ManufacturingMuch has been written about the increasing shortages of electronic components such as MLCCs, chip resistors and other semiconductor devices. And the manufacturing industry is now seeing price increases and greatly extended lead times. It seems the situation is likely to get rapidly worse rather than better. What can we do? Read on.
5 Supply Chain Questions to Ask Your Assembly Partner
08/16/2018 | Neil Sharp, JJS ManufacturingA key question for any OEM who may be considering outsourcing production is whether to maintain its existing supply chain or to hand those crucial purchasing decisions over to its assembly partner. This article highlights five questions to ask a potential assembly partner before handing over the responsibility for your supply chain management.
How Investment in Staff Well-Being Impacts Manufacturing Productivity
08/09/2018 | Sue Poole, JJS ManufacturingAs manufacturers seek to address the challenges of increasing efficiency, there's a greater emphasis on the value of high-performance working practices such as Lean manufacturing. But the emphasis on continual quality improvement processes can also have an indirect effect on employee health and well-being. Here's why manufacturers should invest in the well-being of its employees.
Overcoming Growth Challenges
07/19/2018 | Neil Sharp, JJS ManufacturingGrowth is usually seen by manufacturers as a good thing—a sign of success and a result of hard work. But if this growth isn’t planned for, or the manufacturer can’t react in time, growth can cause the same devastating results as if the business was in decline. This article looks at seven common areas that can cause manufacturers a headache when their business is growing, along with solutions to help ease the pain.