Well I have officially made it through my first Christmas season at Cadbury unscathed! Considering I started thinking about Christmas on August, it seemed to whiz past!
For my team and in my role in particular, Christmas is a very busy time. As a programmer for Roses and Heroes Tins I have to ensure that we have enough production to match the demand. Something that seems relatively simple is in fact a minefield of material lead times, unit manufacturing and constantly changing customer demand! It is also something that forces you to learn a lot about the business in such a short space of time!
As tins drive the biggest volume of our Christmas sales their service levels are being constantly monitored by all areas of the business. This year we had a good season by smashing our target volume and in some weeks gaining record service levels thanks to all of the hard work of everyone involved.
Coming back after Christmas, the pace has slowed down which has made me realise how much I have learnt, I am by no means at the top of the steep learning curve that is my job but I feel a lot more comfortable making decisions. Hopefully this is something that will keep improving as my confidence grows!
Well now back to planning tins for next Christmas…
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