Nieuws - 19 May 2022 Arnoud Joosten; our new Cost Engineer!

Why was this new department created?

"We hope to generate more sales in the future and we want to reduce the workload that this increase in sales will bring," Edwin begins his story. "We want to increase the percentage of received orders and be able to serve our customer faster."

“To accomplish this, we have purchased an estimating package; one that can meet all of our future needs. We built the role of Cost Engineer around this package. Arnoud had experience in a similar role. We had the desire, and the hope, that he would be willing to take on this challenge."

Was it a difficult choice?  I ask Arnoud curiously. He nods no. "For me, it was a no brainer," he adds with a laugh. "At my previous employer, I fulfilled a role that had a lot of common ground with what I'm going to do now. I still enjoy working for MULTIFIX and this is a very nice new challenge. There is a lot involved in the development of a calculation tool. I don't yet have full knowledge of all the different aspects, but I enjoy delving deeper into the matter."

Is the implementation of the tool snappy?

“We purchased a standard package that we have a certain future expectation of. The capabilities are far beyond those of the current package. It is therefore a major digitization stroke to achieve this. It's up to Arnoud to start fine-tuning this package and setting it up according to our wishes."

Is there a relationship between the new ERP system and the digitization stroke you are pursuing?

“That's unrelated," Arnoud explains to me. "You prepare a new work so that it can enter the system 'without contamination. After all, you don't want to have information from orders in the system that ultimately don't go through. I am involved in both processes and can therefore overcome this as well as possible."

“Actually, what Arnoud does, as Cost Engineer, is ahead of the ERP system. He processes the request and makes the calculation. Only at the moment of the customer's approval is this information processed in the ERP system. This is currently happening, but sometimes something that should not be there ends up in the system. We want to avoid this in the future."

What is the significance of this new direction?

“A bit of professionalization and digitalization," Edwin answers convincingly. "We want to be able to serve the customer better and faster and thus achieve growth."

A customer should be able to upload a drawing into our future web portal and receive a quotation within a few hours, by email. That is the ultimate goal.

The system is custom made; everything is fully adapted to our requirements. The big difference? The gain in time. Currently, we request information from suppliers for a calculation. That is then redundant."

"The calculation tool will play an important role in the future! Ultimately, this development contributes to the growth of the company. That's why we want to invest heavily in this in the coming years. We hope to be able to provide our customers with quotations faster by 2023."

What about price increases?

“The developer of the software makes sure that all these data are corrected in real time. This process is continuous and happens daily. Although we ourselves will also have to remain alert to this for our own data. Basically nothing will change; we also have to deal with fluctuations now. Price increases are unfortunately unavoidable," says Arnoud.

Are you happy with this new step?

“Definitely! It's a really nice challenge," Arnoud says, laughing. "Ultimately, it's a chance to develop. I know a lot about production processes and sales markets, but I am not yet familiar with all the machines. I need to acquire that knowledge. Fortunately, I am very curious!"