Carhartt Expects a 340-percent ROI Using EmpCenter^®

Established in 1889, Carhartt is family owned and operated with employees dedicated to providing best in class apparel for the active worker. Carhartt manufactures premium work wear known for exceptional durability, comfort, quality of construction, and is a choice brand of those who work and play outdoors. Carhartt is proud to serve a variety of workers, men and women, in many industries, including construction and manufacturing along with farmers, ranchers and outdoor enthusiasts.

Workforce Challenges & Issues

Carhartt was looking for a workforce management system to support two of its plants, totaling 500 associates who hand wrote timecards to track hours, jobs, and production. Plant associates receive monetary incentives based on the distribution and quantity produced. The time spent on each product was recorded on a separate timecard, along with the quantity, so it was common for a single associate to have up to 15 timecards in a day. This manual process required four payroll clerks and made time tracking and auditing a nightmare. Payroll clerks manually calculated time for multiple timecards in order to determine the hours each employee worked. After time calculations were complete, hard copies of the time reports were sent to the appropriate cost centers to match activity to the service.

Carhartt needed to automate timekeeping and project tracking to increase accuracy and speed. The company wanted the ability to consolidate the data so it could look at the big picture, such as breakdowns on cost, production, resource allocation, and more. Carhartt’s managers suspected the organization’s complex business rules, including those governed by union contracts, would be easier to manage and cost less through automation.

Selecting WorkForce Software

The Carhartt selection committee included operations managers from both facilities, the payroll supervisor, and Katrina Agusti, senior analyst and project manager, who said, “We knew our pains and we knew what we were looking for to solve those pains.”

Carhartt chose WorkForce Software’s EmpCenter because it was user-friendly; flexible enough to meet its requirements, policies and union rules; and, it integrated with its current applications. “EmpCenter provided current technology,” continued Agusti. “And that was important, because we felt we were making an investment that would last well into the future.”

Agusti developed a feasibility report, highlighting the business needs, project costs, benefits, and a projected return on investment (ROI). The ROI calculation was based on the cost of EmpCenter over a span of three years. The ROI estimated to be nearly 180-percent, which meant EmpCenter would pay for itself in a short period. EmpCenter was going to automate processes and business rules, reduce overhead costs, and significantly reduce the time spent on audits. It was an easy choice when looking at the software functionality and the cost savings.

“WorkForce was the vendor of choice,” said Agusti. “We felt we would get the highest payback from EmpCenter than any other system we looked at.”

Implementation

The initial phase of a software deployment is the discovery, which can be lengthy, as this is the time when all the requirements, policies, etc., for the project are defined. It is also when the WorkForce Software consultants offer best practice suggestions for configuring EmpCenter to meet the customer’s needs. Carhartt’s vendor selection phase was extremely thorough, so much of the project planning and functional scope was finished by the time the software was purchased.

When the implementation began running at full speed ahead, the WorkForce team and Agusti worked together to ensure a timely and successful project. “It turned out to be a seamless implementation,” said Agusti. “There was no mad scramble or panic towards end of the implementation, which can happen. We were prepared.”

Data Collection

The two Carhartt plants chose to use badge readers to swipe in and out times. Associates simply swipe their badges to account for hours worked at specific labor distribution centers. Carhartt’s warehouse management system tracks product quantity for associates, which in turn synchronizes with EmpCenter’s Activity Based Costing to calculate distribution and quantity accurately. Union contracts and policies are managed automatically by the system, eliminating any manual calculations. The system then tracks and calculates time for each associate, so they are paid accurately and on time every time. Reports summarize and distribute important information in an easy to read format, so managers spend less time on the process and more time on the business.

Testing & Rollout

Making a change at any organization can raise eyebrows and questions, and Carhartt was no exception. Several groups were skeptical of the system’s accuracy and ability to manage union contracts. “The WorkForce Software team focused their efforts on training Carhartt associates,” said Agusti. “Training was broken down into five groups to give more people the opportunity to ask questions and see exactly how the system works.”

“The personalized training and smaller groups helped our associates accept the change and become part of the project,” said Agusti. “The project moved quickly and we were able to roll-out EmpCenter in a phased approach over 30 days.”

Customer Service & Support

“EmpCenter performs as advertised and requires little support,” said Agusti. “Our business rules and requirements are complex and it is so nice to have a system that automates the management of that complexity for us.”

“EmpCenter saves us a lot of time and money,” said Katrina Agusti, senior analyst at Carhartt.

Results

Carhartt calculated the costs of personnel, software, hardware, and consulting over a three-year period. Prior to implementing EmpCenter, Carhartt anticipated a 180-percent ROI within three years, but it is exceeding that number. Based on the analysis of the last three quarters, Carhartt now expects a 340-percent ROI over three years with EmpCenter.

Direct benefits include increasing productivity by reallocating resources that used to spend time manually calculating time cards and projects. By improving the timekeeping and project tracking process, Carhartt has access to reports that look at the big picture of labor and project data. This can help managers better track and identify enhancements that can be made to the organization’s production areas. By implementing the system in its remaining plants, Carhartt could see a potential for a return seven times 340-percent.