New MD and restructuring at FSL Aerospace
Carly is taking over day-to-day running while Tim steps back and retires, taking the role of Chairman and retaining ownership.
This is an evolutionary step for the company. Tim now feels that the company needs the drive of a younger person to build on the strong foundations that have been laid. Since Tim’s daughter Carly joined the business in May 2008, he has seen at first-hand her drive, firmness and professionalism.
Tim Halliday said: “I haven’t grown this business on my own. I’ve been the glue in the organisation and I have been surrounded by a fantastic team. Carly fills me with an overwhelming level of trust but I see a strength and passion for the business in her.
“She is the best person for the job and is fully committed to the FSL way of doing things. She will steer the company for the coming decades and beyond, and I have no doubt that she will build on the high growth the company has experienced in recent years.”
Carly added: “I’m very fortunate; I love my job. This is an extremely well-run company and there are no grand plans to change direction. However this is a time of change so I’ll be carefully managing the transition.
“I just want to get on with driving the business forward and focusing on continuous improvement to ensure we provide our clients with an even better level of service. I also aim for us to secure SC21 silver.”
Carly joined FSL as Client Services Manager, worked as Purchasing & Administration Manager, and then took over responsibility for HR having completed a diploma in HR and became an associate member of the CIPD.
She also leads the team which is responsible for implementing SC21 and the company is just about to secure its 4th consecutive bronze award. Carly led the process of firstly undertaking audits, developing and implementing the Continual Sustainable Improvement Plan (CSIP), and importantly securing staff ownership. The company is now aiming to secure a silver award.
Carly’s main interest is in people development. The company always conducted biannual appraisals, but she built on this by driving the process to create company values, which all staff now carry with them in the form of a credit card-type aide memoir.
From this she developed a skills matrix where all the skills of every employee are recorded, even those not directly relevant to their current jobs. This enables the company to draw on these skills in the future. Carly has also developed a company training plan.
The change in leadership is accompanied by the departure of Dean Woodley who joined Tim in starting the company.
Carly and Tim are in the process of completing a full restructure of the company. Working closely with Carly will be Richard Woodward who is promoted to General Manager. Richard has been with the company for 27 years and has worked in most functions.
Tim and Carly’s aim throughout this process is to keep a sense of stability for the whole FSL 25-strong team, who have 350 years of collective service.
The company is like a family and always promotes from within wherever possible. FSL is complimented regularly on the culture of the organisation because when clients visit, they experience an environment where happy and cooperative staff want to deliver for the clients time and time again. The staff of FSL are fully aware and supportive of the changes.
As Managing Director, Carly will be able to dedicate more time to oversee the strategy of the business moving forward, capitalising on SC21. This has been a brilliant initiative for the business, revolutionising systems and processes.
Carly introduced an anonymous, annual staff survey, which is about making sure they can make improvements for their staff to keep up morale. As an organisation, FSL invests heavily in becoming more efficient and they’re in the process of installing a new updated version of their IT system.
Carly & Richard also set up an internal improvement team (Team Jigsaw) to investigate areas of improvement within the business. The team was created from volunteers from each department as a continuation of a Business Improvement NVQ they completed in 2014.
The primary aim was to reduce RFT to meet a target of 99.5%. The team is using the lean tools learnt from the NVQ to identify any gaps in any process and can then implement the necessary improvements.
Carly wants to develop relationships with existing clients and to introduce new ones with whom the company can build long-term partnerships.
Over the past three years Carly has also pushed new systems and processes for managing the supply chain. She has put structures in place which have focused minds on the top 25 suppliers (which account for 80% of the company’s spend in a typical Pareto fashion). These are monitored on a number of criteria, including OTIF (on time in full) and RFT (right first time).
Each of these 25 suppliers has a biannual visit and they are judged according to an FSL supplier rating system on their communication and delivery. They’re rated bronze, silver or gold and the team creates risk registers and succession planning. Carly’s focus is now on continuing to build stronger collaborative relationships going forward and she is investing a lot of time in evolving supplier development plans.
