CANPACK

How was the situation before AG5?

We have 19 sites across the world and 6.000 direct employees. The way we were doing the training was basically sending many of our most experienced people to the sites to start up new employees. There would be a ‘tribal’ knowledge transfer, it wasn’t standardized. For future endeavors, it was necessary to have a standard mechanism to track competencies and make them visible. At that point, we found AG5.

In AG5, we created a global standardized skills library in a very simple, user-friendly way, which was an important effort. As an example: worldwide, we used to have 600 skills for electricians in all of the various Excels. By creating the global skills library, we reduced that to 92.

What was the process of implementing AG5?

It was a change management process. We didn’t just decide top-down how the new skills would be named, but we were more flexible and we put our people at the different sites together to discuss. In the end, we were able to simplify the titles and the number of skills.

We started with three plants: the UK, Colombia, and the Netherlands. We implemented it there, they loved it, and after that, the other sites have been adopting it.

What benefits are you seeing after AG5?

The result is that all sites are speaking the same language. Now, if a mentor visits one factory and the next month he visits another one in another country, he finds the same set of skills everywhere. We were honest: we told our employees that we understood they might not be happy with every change, but to bear with us, as there is a huge benefit in synergy locally and world-wide.

Another benefit of AG5 is visibility. Say that employees want to become an expert in his/her machine. We want them to first align with their supervisors, so they can get the needed time to be trained on the next step. We don’t want them to go rogue and just choose one training, but to have that conversation in a very intentional way. These conversations with supervisors are now taking place more frequently because of AG5, where the employees have been made visible their next step, and they can clearly see which training they need to get there.

Fifteen sites across 11 countries are now using the same language for our Skills program.

In what ways are teams using AG5?

One of the ways people are using the system is by looking for experts. When somebody isn’t working tomorrow, they search for another employee with the same or similar skill set that can replace them. They really like that feature, and it also helps us to select experts across the factories.

How did you ensure a successful transition to AG5?

One of the reasons the implementation of AG5 has been successful is because it was not top-down. Instead, we talked with the teams, tried to understand their struggles, and showed them the benefits. And to be honest, choosing between Excel and a digital tool that allows you to see things very clearly was not a hard sell.

As you can see below, we are incorporating ‘Nurture your talents, Master your skills‘ as the central message in our training, emphasizing its importance in our communications with our team members.