The Area Tree is the backbone of your organization's structure in the TRACC Platform. It is also closely related to the TRACC Implementation Structures, and therefore needs forethought and planning to make sure your TRACC implementation is successful.
"By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” ~ Benjamin Franklin
A well designed area tree will ensure that:
- Reporting is accurate
- Areas can be compared similarly and fairly
- Maturity scores can be aggregated accurately
- Knowledge is shared with the correct areas
- User access is granted to the correct areas of the organization
- Users are given access to the content and functionality they need to fulfill their responsibilities
When the Super Administrators in partnership with the TRACC coach design the area tree, the following factors will need to be considered:
- TRACC License Agreement: This will impact how the area tree is structured. It defines how many licensed entities exist versus structural entities.
- Organizational Structure: in the case of global organizations, is the business divided by geographical regions (e.g. North America or Europe) or by Business Units (e.g. Soft Drinks and Confectionery)?
- Implementation Structures: at what level will the Executive Leadership Committee (ELC), Site Steering Committee (SSC) and Implementation Task Force (ITF) operate? At what level will the Team Leaders and teams operate? The area tree needs to take this into account in its design.
- Practices being Implemented: different practices are implemented at different levels of the organization. Some are specific to make - i.e. the Operations Practices - and others cover the full Supply Chain. i.e. Enabling and Supply Chain Practices. Please read our article Which practices are implemented at which level? to learn more about where they are implemented.
- Standard Naming Conventions: It is important that a consistent naming convention is used for different parts of the manufacturing facility. This makes it easier to benchmark and compare areas later in the implementation journey.
Once you have unpacked the points above you will be in a better position to design a TRACC Area Tree that meets the specific needs of your organization.
Note:
- It is also useful to assign area categories to all areas in the tree. This will make comparison reports much easy to generate. For example, producing a report for the Set-up Time Reduction maturity at all Bottling Lines.
- It is recommended that all new clients have their area tree vetted and approved by your TRACC coach or the TRACC Client Support team (support@traccsolution.com) before deploying TRACC.