Keith Oakley

I am responsible for the performance of 13 production sites worldwide.
This includes all operational capex projects Quality, production costs, engineering etc.

As the Operations Director I was responsible for the whole production and supply chain across all the production sites located in the UK, USA, France and Portugal.
Key achievements:
•The planning and installation of a new energy centre (biomass) which came in on time and under budget, giving cost savings of £135K per year and thus adding over £3m to the bottom line over the next 20 years.
•The implementation of a forecasting and production planning system ensuring full alignment which gave a reduction in waste of 80% by year 2.
•Developed a QMS system reducing customer complaints by over 50% within the first 18 months and ensured repeatability of process.
•Leading a cultural change in the business, ensuring the roles and responsibilities were clear and people started to have the confidence to make the decisions they were responsible for - this moved the business away from a blame culture to one that had full engagement of the staff.
•Lead a delivered significant savings on the supply base while ensuring supplier relationships remained excellent.
•Delivered successful justifications for new facilities based on forecast v production capacities of over £1.5M.

As the Operations Director, I had full responsibility for the production and supply chain which included the sourcing of materials from around the globe. 4 direct reports with a total headcount of 120 in peak seasons.
Key achievements:
•The reduction in waste through the implementation of process controls and robust production planning against forecasted sales (£250k in first year).
•Developed and introduced a quality audit process which has helped reduce customer complaints from the previous year from 23% down to 13%, and down to 9% the following year.
•Labour costs reduced on static volume by over £250k through focused management of people and processes over 2 years.
•Developed an organisation where growers had clear areas of responsibility and introduced a system to audit their performance which increased overall yields and levels of housekeeping.

As the Operations Manager I had full responsibility from intake through to dispatch in this fresh produce business. The factory worked 24hrs, 5 days a week and I had 7 direct reports and total headcount of 160.
Key achievements
•The planning, execution and completion of a £4.2m factory refurbishment, which was done around a running factory. It came in on budget and on time without any disruption to customer service.
•The removal of 2 levels of Production Management replaced with 1 Team Manager role giving £90k per annum cost savings and improving overall efficiencies.
•Introduction of on-line waste measurement, taking raw material waste from 11% down to 2.8%.
•Increase in productivity (OE increased from 46% to 61% in 12 months), achieved through improved line management and the introduction of short interval controls.

As a team manager I had the responsibility for the factory during an 8hr shift. The areas covered included intake, juice make up, bottle blowing and filling. I led the factory in performance and ran a number of improvement activities using a range of lean techniques.
Key achievements
•The introduction of a suggestion scheme across 2 factories which was very successful and produced a great response from all employees which was evidenced in the staff surveys before and after this introduction of the process.
•The development of online reliability monitoring which then led to OOE measuring - a fundamental tool for continuous improvement activities.

Bespak, Kings Lynn Norfolk