ORMS
Today
Quick
and easy Excel-based MRP software for small and large
manufacturing
By Vijay R. Kannan
Resource Manager by User Solutions Inc., provides
an intuitive, easy to use, production
planning system for a Material Requirements Planning
(MRP) environment. The software has the ability to
amongst other things, build production schedules from
forecasts using simple-to-develop bills of
resources (BOR), analyze capacity constraints, automatically
identify resource loading problems, and
develop an array of reports for monitoring and control
purposes.
Resource Manager offers two particular
advantages over many other production
. control software systems. First, it is Excel based.
Other than familiarizing oneself with the specific
functions and procedures of the software, which are
themselves
easy to learn, the user is not faced with learning
a fundamentally
new or different software system. Each system module
is represented by a single spreadsheet
residing within a common workbook. This
organization
makes moving between the integrated modules fast and
simple. The Excel format also gives the software the
capability to interface with other systems
and data formats. For example, data can be easily
imported and/or exported from other planning
systems using simple copy and paste operations.
Second, the software is compact, both
in terms of hardware requirements, and, more importantly,
cost. Users of Resource Manager are not
using a costly, data and resource intensive application,
but an inexpensive yet fully functional system that
allows them to manage typical planning activity without
unnecessary computing or financial overhead. This
makes the software particularly suited to smaller
organizations with a need for a fully
integrated and functional planning and control system,
but lack the resources or need for added complexity.
System
requirements
Minimum requirements to run Resource
Manager are a Pentium running at 200 MHz,
32 MB RAM, 3.2 megabytes of hard disk space, and Excel
97 or greater installed on a stand alone or network
PC. The software was tested on a 933 MHz Pentium 4
with 128 MB RAM. On this configuration, small test
scenarios ran rapidly. Larger scenarios
running on a slower computer will likely see a
noticeable difference in execution speed but
not to the extent that this precludes operation in
a real time mode. Beyond hardware and software
requirements, the software requires a working
knowledge of Excel, though nothing more sophisticated
than data entry, menus, file retrieval and
saving, and printing.
Documentation
and Installation
Software installation is quick and
easy. The software comes as a single file in either
floppy or CD ROM format, and unzips to a single .XLS
file and readme.txt file. Running the
software involves no more than opening the .XLS file
from within Excel. Other than revealing the Resource
Manager user interface and adding three drop down
menus, the screen has the familiar look and feel of
an Excel spreadsheet (the user manual mentions four
or five additional drop down menus, but one of these
is the standard Excel Help menu with help for Resource
Manager included, and the other is for an Accounting
option which was not included in the version tested).
Documentation for the software is well
organized. For each module, the documentation
walks through the functionality of the module, provides
step-by-step directions, and highlights došs and,
more importantly, don'ts of software use. In particular,
it draws user attention to data entry
considerations. Given the Excel platform, data entry
is an area where there is potential for
the user to compromise the integrity of the software
by corrupting system parameters, spreadsheet formulas,
formatting etc. While the software has
some post data entry error checking capabilities related
to the operation of the software, these do not extend
to preventing users from deleting/editing areas of
the spreadsheets that they should not be able to
(an area for possible improvement), thus the
tips on data entry are particularly valuable.
In addition to the user manual, the software
comes with a 12-step tutorial that allows
the user to get a feel for the software as well as
develop a
schedule for a simple product schedule. This tutorial,
upon which the review is
based, allows the user to develop a feel for the system's
capabilities within a very short period of time. The
developer also supports a "walkthrough"
designed to help individual users understand how the
software can be adapted to their specific needs, though
this is not necessary to get
acquainted and running.
User
Interface
The user interface is well organized and makes
system navigation trivial. The
opening or Settings spreadsheet to which the software
opens up, consists
of a menu of options as well as a graphic representation
of how the software works. This graphic
illustrates in a logical manner how the different
system modules are linked and illustrates the MRP
orientation of the system. Modules can be accessed
in one of three ways: by double clicking on the corresponding
entry in the top portion of the Settings spreadsheet,
by clicking on the Menu bar, or by using
the F4 key. The latter two options reveal
a dialog box listing all system modules, which is
organized the same way as in the screen
interface (Figure 1). Modules are organized within
the menus in a logical manner under the
headings Initialization (primarily database
functions), Scheduling, and Reporting. A useful feature
of the opening interface is that for each
module, comments have been included that
describe the module's purpose as well as providing
additional information regarding the module.
Comments can be accessed by simply dragging the cursor
over the corresponding red flag. This annotation
feature can be found throughout the system.
Forecasting and Scheduling
Scheduling begins by taking an existing
database of products and operations or
adding new products/operations to the database. The
database of products and operations are contained
in a well laid out Build spreadsheet. For new
products, the Build Bills-of-Resource (BOR)
function allows linkages between end products,
sub-components, and operations to be defined in a
logical manner. Once products and their
BOR's have been defined, requirements can be
entered via the Initialize Forecast Calendar
module. This allows forecast requirements
to be entered based either on a production start date
or a required completion date.
Figure 2. Data records for products, operations,
and forecast entry
The Master Scheduling module automatically links the
forecast requirements with corresponding
BOR's and existing load characteristics to develop
a
schedule. The output of this process is not only an
end product schedule specifying both start
and end dates and product cost information, but also
a detailed schedule of sub-component and
resource requirements and costs. Once
the schedule has been reconciled with inventory information,
a final schedule can be easily developed.
The Resource Calendar computes several
load related
statistics, automatically flagging (in red) problem
areas. Graphs of resource availability
and load by date and by operation can be
generated with a single click of the mouse. For purchased
items for which vendor information is
known, Resource Manager has the capability to automatically
generate purchase orders. In addition, the capability
exists to track receipts and automatically update
inventory records.
A useful feature of the software is its
extensive reporting capabilities. In addition to Gantt
charts that graph schedule completion for both
sub-components and end products and automatically
highlight bottlenecks, Resource Manager
provides several reports that summarize both product
and operation activity. These reports
can be generated in multiple formats (i.e.,
by product, operation, routing etc.) and degrees of
detail (i.e., product only, product and
components).
Figure 3. Complete MPS schedule and summary product
and operation reports for
sample product
The only apparent example of the product not delivering
all that is advertised is in the area
of "what
if" analysis. Both the product documentation
and user's manual list "what if" analysis
as a feature of the software. However,
it is not clear from the useršs manual what "what
if" capabilities exist even though they have
a unique listing in the manual. While the ability
to run alternative scenarios within the individual
modules exists, this does not take the
form of a traditional "what if" applications.
Concluding Remarks
Resource
Manager is a complete MRP system that is designed
to be adaptable to a user's specific needs as opposed
to being a one size fits all application. The Excel
platform makes it easy and intuitive to use even for
a novice. Within an hour or two it is possible
to understand the basics of system operation.
While the user's manual is comprehensive, the tutorial
alone allows one to get up and running rapidly.
A more elaborate tutorial test case would
however be helpful in allowing a new user get a more
complete sense of the software's capabilities.
The software may not have the functionality
and breadth of more expensive systems but is a complete
system suitable not only for managing
in a MRP environment, but also for familiarizing
those new to MRP. It is also an ideal tool for teaching
purposes. Not only could it be used to illustrate
the concept of MRP in an introductory
operations class, it can be used to bring a practical
element to an advanced course in manufacturing
planning and control.
Vijay
R. Kannan is an
associate professor of Operations Management at Utah
State University. He serves as an examiner for the
Shingo Prize for Excellence in Manufacturing,
and has written several articles in the area of manufacturing
planning and control.
VENDOR
COMMENTS
We would like to thank ORMS Today
for sponsoring the review of Resource Manager and
thank Vijay Kannan for the time he invested and the
final result: an honest, accurate and complete analysis
of Resource Manager for Excel.
Resource Manager is a product line of
which there are two versions:
Resource Manager for Excel (RMX), upon which
this review is based, and Resource Manager DB (RM-DB),
which is the upgraded, database, version of RMX.
RM-DB utilizes a run-time version of the popular
Microsoft Jet Database Engine, which is the same as
used by Microsoft Access.
RM-DB also includes a subset of RMX for report
generation using Excel.
These combined offerings provide unsurpassed
flexibility for leveraging Excel on local PCs, and
sharing data across a network.
In the review, Professor Kannan mentioned
an area for possible improvement in the way of protecting
certain parts of the spreadsheet from user access. In reality, we have not had any customers, in
over 10 years, cause any damage that they weren't
able to easily and quickly recover from. For example, RMX provides internal tools to find and
correct any problems, allows for quick upgrading of
select data into new versions, and finally, our support
is only a quick e-mail away.
By sending us any problem, as a
e-mail attachment, we can support customers
in near real-time.
However, Excel is a wide open platform, and
RM-DB addresses several inherent limitations of the
Excel based version.
Some of these include: networked, multi-user,
concurrent operations, multi-level security and data
integrity, detailed inventory transactions, and the
ability to feedback and reconfigure BOMS and Routings,
on-the-fly, to reflect real-time production decisions.
Another area in the review was the apparent
lack of 'What-If" analysis. In contrast from most any other Manufacturing Software offering,
Resource Manager was built from the ground up to accommodate
a variety of requests from a number of customers in
very diverse industries.
Some of our customers have mentioned they are
using RMX for "What-If" analysis and this
is why we included it in the manual.
Some of the users are using the two schedules
(Forecast and Plan) to compare various scenarios,
others are running a schedule, then copying the results
to a blank part of sheet, then running another scenario,
and performing some matrix arithmetric to compare
results. We
will gladly revisit this and clarify the use of 'What
If" analysis.
In the concluding remarks, Professor
Kanaan mentions the use of the tool in teaching. We
do have an educational program that offers the products
(Instructor and Student editions) at significant discounts
for this market.
Also, the Professor suggests a more elaborate
test case tutorial would be valuable. We offer a customized
phone walk-through with application specific data,
for each customer's application.
There is also a full set of training videos
on our free CD.
Due
to the products flexibility, in addition to MRP, Resource
Manager has been used for Process (Batch), Shop Control,
Service and Repair, Project Management, Lean Manufacturing,
and other types of applications. In addition, the product has been used by large companies to
complement existing ERP Systems, small companies as
their initial system, and ones in-between.
We look forward to continuing to support the
manufacturing and operations management community
with MS Office based planning, scheduling, and tracking
solutions that are flexible and affordable.
