Impact of Product Changes, Storage Volumes, and New Equipment on Warehouse Training Needs

The following all impact on warehouse operatives’ and managers’ training needs.

(i) Product changes
When new or changed products are brought into the warehouse – whether they be devices for use by operatives or significantly novel or unfamiliar items or ranges of goods in sufficiently different quantities or shapes and sizes to be disruptive – operatives must be trained on their handling or usage. If the majority of product shifts from non-perishable to perishable, or from heavy to light goods, training will be required because changes to routines and physical conditions in the warehouse will occur. Training is the responsibility of managers, hence the first to be trained on new products will likely be managers. Formal training can be in-house but conducted by a third party or the product manufacturer. The training is likely to be formal with specific goals and targets for the trainees to achieve, possibly including specific actions to be demonstrated to the satisfaction of the trainer. Documentation in the form of manuals and posters might also be provided by the trainer. In some cases, managers may be sent to the manufacturer for training and on return distribute instructional material and train a team of supervisors to train operatives in the relevant skills and cascade practical know-how.

(ii) Storage volumes
If storage volumes increase or decrease significantly, new or adapted handling/processing operations are likely to be necessitated. To ensure that efficiencies are maintained or even exceeded with the new volumes, training of staff and managers on adaptation, new methods, new technologies, or the use of old technologies in new ways must be mandated. Operatives must learn to function in new ways if volume changes mean that considerable alterations to working practices, workloads, workplace layout, schedules, MHE usage, and even health and safety procedures are effected. Training could be formal or informal. But, if the warehouse’s operations are changing fundamentally as a result of volume increase (i.e. away from a variety-oriented operation toward a volume-oriented operation), then the training is likely to be structured and specific, i.e. formal.

Changes to storage volumes may have far-reaching implications for layout, facility capacity, space utilisation, movement around and inside the warehouse, housekeeping, PPE, shifts, workflows, material requirements (e.g. packaging and waste), and even KPIs and SLAs. To prevent operatives becoming overwhelmed by changes and to enable them to maintain the warehouse’s overall efficiency, they will have to be formally trained, with learning objectives and training requirements clearly articulated, tested, and periodically refreshed.

If the warehouse switches from supplying clients on a JIT basis to a less-frequent, higher volume-based supply format, then there will be fewer dispatches but much more storage activity and less frequent but more intense staging point activity. Operatives will be less time-pressured if they are not servicing JIT customers, but will be more engaged with scheduling and preparing very high SKU numbers and performing more complex, time-consuming checking and despatching activities, including (possibly) loading larger vehicles with more complex loading arrangements. Operatives accustomed to high frequency picking and preparing of small orders will require retraining. Operatives not trained in methods or handling orders requiring very high volumes or high quantities of very mixed product may have to be trained in bundling, grouping/handball, unitization/palletization, complex order checking, and loading techniques and tools. Managers may have to select which operatives receive such training, organise or conduct the training themselves, and monitor the subsequent performance of the trainees.

(iii) New equipment and systems
New MHE, WMSs, and IMSs can pose problems for operatives and managers, especially if they differ significantly from the long-running systems they are brought in to replace. Ideally, new equipment and systems will be used in parallel with legacy equipment and systems so that incremental rather than step-change switching occurs.

In the case of MHEs, the manufacturer or leasing company (supplier) will provide training as part of the service and support package. Training and certification by a qualified third-party provider is a possibility too.

In the case of WMSs, IMSs, or other digital systems, the developer’s representative or technical liaison, or an agent of the company who sold the product will provide in-house training. Such training is usually two-tiered: administrators (managers only) and operatives (managers and operatives), with information, simulations, and assessment tasks tailored accordingly. Managers’ training will, in most cases, be more complicated, exacting, and time-consuming than operatives’ training.

Trainers on both MHEs and information systems may remain onsite during the transition period to carry out ongoing training, while providing firefighting and ad hoc support to all operatives and staff, ideally until the new acquisition is fully-integrated, proven effective, and fully usable by all employees.

On all important new systems – mechanical and digital – full training will be provided, and a period of observed usage to ensure correct usage should follow. After the training, trainees may be tested and, pending their performance, given formal approval to use the equipment or system. Prospective drivers/operatives of new MHEs may have to be retrained and licensed to new specifications before they can commence unsupervised, insured usage. Managers may have to be formally trained to a higher level than operatives/drivers before they are licensed to train and license ordinary operatives.