Recognizing inefficiencies and blockers in current manufacturing workflows
Key Takeaway
Find blockers by watching the people who do the work and by mapping the full as-is process, including the processes that intersect it. Then match each blocker to the Agentforce Manufacturing capability that meets the need.
Discovery for Agentforce Manufacturing starts with finding what slows a manufacturer down today. Common blockers include manual data entry, forecasts scattered across spreadsheets and ERP systems, siloed teams and weak partner collaboration. A consultant finds these blockers by observing and interviewing the people who do the work and by mapping the current process. The consultant then matches each blocker to the Agentforce Manufacturing capability that meets the need.
Where manufacturing blockers come from
Agentforce Manufacturing is built on Sales Cloud and Service Cloud and adds manufacturing-specific objects, workflows and a data model. Agentforce Manufacturing unifies back-office data on orders and inventory with front-office data on sales agreement negotiations. Many of the blockers it solves therefore come from data and teams that are split apart.
Siloed teams are a core manufacturing blocker. Signs of siloed teams include:
- Incompatible goals
- Fragmented sales processes
- Multiple revenue models
- Disconnected order-capture channels
- Dispersed customer data
- Limited supply chain visibility
Together, these signs give an inconsistent view of customers and weak performance.
Patchwork forecasting is another common blocker, where forecasts are spread across spreadsheets, ERP systems, computerized maintenance management systems (CMMS) and accounting software.