If the time has come for a revamp of your packaging systems, you may be weighing the pros and cons of outsourcing. Bringing in consultants, especially for the first time, has its own set of considerations. Yet finding the ideal partner can raise your package engineering game quickly and help you realize gains that much sooner.
If you’re struggling to balance your packaging investments and satisfy competing demands, you’re not alone. With all the details to consider, you may be wondering how to bring together the resources to make it happen. Today, companies are increasingly considering an alternative investment strategy: hiring a specialized packaging engineering firm like Chainalytics to help develop these capabilities on your team or own them entirely. If you’re evaluating this “make vs. buy” decision, there are several considerations to factor in when selecting your partner.
When to reach out and when to leverage internal resources
Outsourcing has become a standard business practice for many world-class organizations and particularly when it comes to packaging. However, deciding when it’s right for your business can be complicated and fraught with doubt. When do you focus your efforts and resources on building out your internal competencies? In what cases do outsourcing or leveraging external resources – supplementing or augmenting your internal team – make the most sense?
The focus of top operational leaders is usually on building an internal team while outsourcing critical projects. They tend to bring consultants in to provide benefits such as:
- Meeting a critical business deadline by providing short-term burst capacity
- Minimizing the risk of failure on priority projects
- Leveraging proven experience
- Augmenting capabilities gaps within internal teams
- Access to best-in-class software and engineering tools
Key considerations for selecting a packaging partner
When outsourcing, you have every right to expect more. The following are some factors to evaluate when considering whether to outsource a packaging project or keep it in-house. Every team is different, and not all scenarios apply to every case, so you’ll want to consider your current team’s capabilities.
Execution
Can the consulting firm fully implement their recommended solution in addition to providing packaging expertise? Many packaging consultants often struggle to take a project from strategy through execution. The gestation period between identifying an opportunity and implementing the recommended solution can be months, which is excruciatingly long for many manufacturers and retailers. Like we’ve heard many a senior executive say after a significant strategic engagement, “I need another consultant like I need another hole in my head.”
Examine your candidate consulting firm’s capacity to support execution. This capability will play a significant factor in deciding if you’ll be able to leap from strategy to implementation with that provider.
Today, “consulting” should be more than just giving advice. Identifying gaps and opportunities in your supply chain is the “easy” work. Executing change management, project management, and implementing practical solutions – that’s where things get real. You’ll find that around 40% of strategy – and packaging strategy is no different – requires modification once put into practice. Why pay for gold-standard consulting that can be undone by one of your junior staffers during execution? That’s why implementation support is a crucial part of a consulting firm’s total service offering.
Think about it: A consultant who stays around to support the execution of their recommendation is more likely to propose a strategy that works. When you have to deliver, it disciplines you to think through the specific issues at hand. You can’t just spout esoteric techno-speak from the mountaintop – you have to make it happen. The net benefit to the customer is that recommendations are grounded in reality.
Effort
Your selected consultancy should carry the lion’s share of the weight on a project, as they are there to extend the capacity of a more-than-likely overburdened internal team. However, outsourced projects do require the devotion of additional staff time for activities like internal stewardship and contributing subject matter expertise. Demands on your staff will increase when the packaging project enters the execution phase. Also, make sure your proposed consulting firm has good documentation discipline. Proper capture of conversations for use in the immediate task and future efforts is essential.
In the end, a good outsourcing program will prove to be a force multiplier, with the resulting organizational improvements boosting your team’s effectiveness for many quarters to come.
Speed
An experienced outsourcing firm should have the capability to complete any project in less time. This isn’t their first rodeo; they should know how to do it better and faster than your internal team. Their resources, directed at the project at hand, can make steady progress without the day-to-day interruptions your team faces. Also, their business model motivates them to reach billing milestones on time. A typical in-house project will take anywhere from 150-200% longer than an outsourced one. Speed is well worth considering when a high-priority project is at stake.
Experience
The relative expertise of internal talent, when compared to what is available through a consulting firm, drives the outsourcing of many projects. Often the on-staff lead is taking on a project of a level they have never dealt with before. Taking inventory of the skill sets of internal staff and assessing their experience with comparable projects will help quantify the new skills and information your internal team needs to develop. Also, compare how many successful packaging projects a consulting firm has completed as opposed to your internal team and the firm’s team members’ experience compared to that of internal staff.
A battle-tested and proven leader is also essential. Empowered with cross-functional access, they can navigate various organizational structures, siloed communications, and other unforeseen roadblocks that can derail projects. One cannot overestimate the value a seasoned professional adds to the execution of your project.
Of equal importance is the industry working-level background of the outsourcing firm’s team. Ask yourself if they have walked in your shoes. Will they understand what you’re trying to accomplish? Can they relate to the challenges involved? Or, are you dealing with a group of “business analysts” who have never actually spent time in the trenches? An experienced team composed of seasoned practitioners are your best bet for seeing a tough assignment through.
These four areas are essential to sort through when deciding how you will accomplish a packaging system reboot and advance your business goals. Focus on selecting the right consulting partner for your business. They should be a resource you’ll be able to turn to, time and again, to help “level up” your organization.
A consultant should be a trusted partner that brings specialized knowledge and expertise to help raise your company’s efficiency and resilience. Reach out to us and see how Chainalytics will enable you to deal with the packaging issues that may be holding you back. Using one-of-a-kind tools and approaches like digital assets and managed analytics services, we consistently deliver actionable insights and measurable outcomes to our clients.
Nancy Matchey is the Vice President of Chainalytics’ Packaging Optimization consulting practice, which delivers consulting services that solve today’s most complex packaging challenges across many supply chains.
