Changes dead-ahead at SDD

Toni Gorlei is a busy man. He starts his days early, dividing the hours between staying in touch with his staff on the "shop floor", maintaining and establishing client and partner relations, and overseeing the implementation of new business disciplines at SDD.

Gorlei had his beginnings in the Cape car industry before most of the people at SDD were born, he says with a smile. In a career that spanned close to 40 years, Gorlei worked with a number of international car manufacturers, including Daimler Chrysler, Mercedes and most recently, Nissan.

He cites his reasons for leaving early retirement for the MD post at SDD as seeking personal fulfilment in a more dynamic industry. It was the most difficult of the options open to him at the time, and more than a month on, he says it was definitely the right choice.

Acquisitive growth, a lumbering infrastructure and a market laden with over-expectations created a number of operational problems for SDD. At its worst, company morale was down and staff worked into nights and over weekends trying to fix what Gorlei calls "a goofy system".

That has been righted, he believes, with the implementation of the Profitability accounting system in partnership with Ixchange.

[VIDEO]"I think we've caused ourselves a lot of harm internally. My real goal is take SDD back to where it rightfully belongs; hopefully over the next 18 months we'll heal the process."

"The original intention behind implementing Profitability," Gorlei explains, "was to move towards a more real-time, more efficient, more effective system which allowed us to give ourselves internally better control on the business, and to create the type of management analytical reports that we needed to reprocess the business continuously.

My real goal is take SDD back to where it rightfully belongs.

Toni Gorlei, MD, SDD

"Margins in this business are very important and we're dealing with such tight margins in our type of very competitive business, in the different brands that we move around, that we needed tools that could enhance our processes, and allow us to fine-tune many things."

One of the issues requiring fine-tuning is that of cash flow management. As Gorlei notes: "The perception in the marketplace is that SDD is going down. The fact is, we need to change our cash management style, but we have it under control and we're beginning to forge ahead quite strongly."

Among Gorlei's other goals is making the system more visible on the Internet, allowing SDD customers to track their delivery from time of order through time of receipt on their cycles. It's also expected to help the distributors and dealers with whom SDD is working to establish supply chain management processes.

Gorlei's initial experience with SDD partners and suppliers has been positive, for the most part.

[VIDEO]"I don't know [if I've impressed them] - I haven't had time to dwell on that. Right now what I'm trying to do is re-forge existing relationships or forge new relationships. I believe we have been too internally focused, we have been too worried about what we've been trying to do and not worried too much about the levels of service we've been delivering outside.

"It has required that I move around fairly fast, getting to meet the main players, both from the vendor and dealer/distributor side, and I'm encouraged because I've come away each time with almost a blessing from each one of them, giving us another chance."

The perception in the marketplace is that SDD is going down.

Toni Gorlei, MD, SDD

Gorlei expects resistance when it comes to what he terms a restatement of business principles and disciplines.

"I'm not too sure whether I'm going to make many friends in the short-term by putting those in. In actual fact, I know I won't because we've run the business, in many instances, not too healthily. It's going to be difficult for the staff here, and for the people we've been trading with because we've been sloppy.

"When you try and correct sloppiness, there is wastage in the process, and we're going to have to work out a way to take care of that waste and re-educate our people in how to handle waste management."

A larger management issue that Gorlei has faced is that of poor employee morale and low levels of individual effectiveness.

"When you walk into an organisation, you try to take a barometer reading of what's around you and the first impression is either the right one or the wrong one. My impression here when I first walked in was that I'd never soon so many excited, active people moving around doing so many things.

"A couple of days later, I noticed that while there were a lot of people moving around, there didn't seem to be any focus around what they're doing. The possibility of improving the morale emerged as an opportunity when I sat down and started doing one-on-ones with people, and trying to ascertain what the problems were.

My impression here when I first walked in was that I'd never soon so many excited, active people moving around doing so many things.

Toni Gorlei, MD, SDD

"It became very evident at that stage that we needed a much stronger leadership style in the organisation. The staff had developed the art of upward delegation to the point of absolute perfection. And I think there perhaps became my first tool of motivating people - not to allow them to upward delegate, but to do the functions which they're responsible and accountable for."

Four weeks later, says Gorlei, people are talking a bit differently. They've achieved a higher level of competence, and they're starting to stretch their targets.

Another area he plans to address is that of customer service. It's frightening to consider the number of people who have been taught how to look after customers, he says. The solution is simple.

"It's essentially those things that your mother taught you, and if you listened to her properly you don't actually have to be trained in it. It's as uncomplicated as that. Unfortunately, most people didn't listen to their mothers. We're going to do a reinforcement of the basic principles of good manners - return a phone call within x number of minutes, reply to an e-mail in x number of seconds."

The idea is to equip SDD staff with the tools to be "a fantastic representative of this company".

And while training and development of people is crucial, Gorlei intends to keenly focus the type of training that is done.

"Once a person has been with SDD for two or three years, they're a prime target for poachers. I need to stop the continual exodus of young, competent people moving from us to competitive organisations. I need to offer them a deeper career at SDD."

Gorlei also speaks of an initiative to streamline the company operations.

"We're very good at distribution - that's the core of our business process. It's my intention, and I have the support of my board, to go forward and address all those competencies that are not complementary to what we're trying to achieve."

The appointment of a management team that will be complementary to the organisation, and the entrenching of basic principles of management are what Gorlei believes will help lead SDD into the future.

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