Corbins Electric (CE) is a trusted provider of virtual construction services, fabrication services, electrical construction, and electrical services in the southeastern United States. Over the past few years CE has instilled a culture of continuous improvement, quadrupling sales in the last three years with support from Xalt mobile technology.
For those of you who are unfamiliar, Xalt is a new framework for fast-tracking Hexagon customers’ ability to harness IoT data and ultimately accelerate their digital transformation journeys. The goal of Xalt is to create Autonomous Connected Ecosystems (ACE), a state where data is connected seamlessly through the convergence of the physical world with the digital, and intelligence is built in to all processes from the core to the edge of the customer’s network.
Lean Six Sigma – Processes and Systems
Lean Six Sigma is a methodology to improve performance by removing waste and reducing variation. Continuous improvement, whatever the method or model used, must apply not only to business processes but also to the supporting systems. For example, large, complex systems like ERP, CRM, and EAM should not drive business processes — although they too often do — and a mobile solution is necessary to support a simple, desired value stream while still relying on the framework of that mission-critical system. Most importantly, that mobile solution must be able to change and sync as business processes change.
How Xalt Provides Lean Benefits at CE
CE modified its company mission statement to include actionable language championing innovation. The updated mission statement includes these commitments:
- We will promote and implement Lean construction practices.
- We will embrace and implement technology that brings sustainability to the marketplace.
- We will be a think tank, share information within the industry, and put ideas into action.
Xalt has proven to be a critical linchpin for executing this mission. Justin Martin, President of Corbins Electric, said that he and the team sat through months of software demos where they identified solutions to individual problems, but these software solutions did not provide a foundational ecosystem that would allow them to control their value streams and scale the company for growth. That search ended when they discovered Xalt’s capabilities to combine two value streams — time tracking and materials requisitions.
In the last 18 months, CE has expanded from those original two mobile value streams to over 40. The company has accomplished this primarily with existing IT resources.
In addition to the scalability they needed, CE is enjoying sustained cost savings throughout the entire organisation, allowing the company to reallocate resources and associates to support their rapid growth. It’s worth noting that reducing head count was never a consideration.
Employee teamwork and higher morale have been unexpected benefits from implementing Xalt. Mr. Martin explained how, in the past, departments and individuals would often be in conflict due to inaccurate or missing data caused by outdated, paper-based processes. Now, however, no one gets upset with their tablets and phones for enforcing best practices and supporting policies and procedures! That increase in morale shows up in employee satisfaction and retention.
And of course, this example is just one of the many potential use cases for Xalt. Visit hexagonxalt.com to learn more about the numerous capabilities of this new framework.
Kevin M Murphy
Director of Solutions Engineering, Xalt
Platform Solutions
Kevin has over 20 years of experience in building, implementing and selling enterprise software into manufacturing, retail, construction, defense and engineering industries; helping fortune 500 companies select solutions to reduce costs, increase sales and enable better decision making. He has a B.S. in computer science from the University of Dayton and has served in various positions in software development, services, product management and solutions consulting for major ERP companies such as RedPrairie Software (now JDA). Kevin, a Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, is currently Director of Solutions Engineering at Hexagon Xalt Platform Solutions expanding the enterprise cloud mobile business solution.
