Companies around the world are facing constant challenges in their quest for competitiveness. In this search for competitiveness, processes are one of the most important areas for innovation and achieving a competitive advantage. But to achieve excellence, to raise success levels and ensure long-term sustainability, a strategic vision is needed. And, in this scenario, adding technology to processes and integrating management systems are two ways for companies to differentiate themselves in a highly competitive market.
After acquiring the plant in Taboão da Serra (SP), União Química, one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in Brazil, saw the chance to improve its management of documents, deviations, change control and other related processes related to quality and, in doing so, meet with agility the new demands of the market and add value to their business.
União Química did not have an established document management system in use. The factory acquired in Taboão da Serra had mature processes that could be implanted in the other units, but which were very expensive because they were not automated.
The company then looked for a solution to integrate its management systems together with its ERP. The tool chosen to do this was the SoftExpert Excellence Suite (SE Suite) from SoftExpert.
With the implementation of the technological solution for excellence in management, process improvement and regulatory compliance, the company linked together its business management environment. Today the tool manages processes and more than 3,000 documents within the organization, providing operational gains and increased productivity.
According to the head of the Technological Governance division of União Química, Leonardo Pereira Pedrozo, the tool optimized resources and improved process management in the company.
“SE Suite helps us meet needs associated with the current economic situation in the country, solving issues with substantial financial appeal, automating procedures and increasing the efficiency of our operations, which generates, in addition to operational gains, cost reductions. In addition, one of the biggest advantages is document control and security, traceability and an incredible ease for searching for records and documents, which was a necessity in all areas of the company,” says Pedrozo.
According to Pedrozo, the solution allowed for the hosting of multiple management systems and fully met the requirements of the specific needs of different areas, providing total flexibility in the modeling of business processes.
“SE Suite is what we call a cross-area platform, which allows us to optimize, automate and strengthen business processes in different sectors and all in an integrated way. That is to say, all electronic approvals, indexing and traceability of documents is carried out using the tool,” says Pedrozo.
Today, the tool serves areas such as Human Organizational Development and Quality Assurance in several União Química units. In Human Development, the company customized its entire process flow using SE Process, a SE Suite module for business process modeling and analysis, and SE Workflow, a module for Business Process Automation. With this, it was possible to control the activities of personnel training, requests for employment terminations and increases in staff. Today, all Human Resources operational processes use workflows via SE Suite.
According to the Coordinator of Quality Systems of União Química and the key user of the solution, Roberta da Silva Rodrigues, there were many gains with the implementation of the tool.
“The system helps us throughout the records flow chain of the processes of Deviations, Change Control, Out of Specification (OOS) Investigations, Market Complaints and Quality Events, as well as in the monitoring of related corrective and preventive actions,” Roberta emphasizes.
In addition to document management modules, the Analytics module, as well as the HOD Training Management, Audit and Workflow modules, have recently been implemented. The plan is to implement these processes in all União Química units over this year.
Currently, the main areas served by the SoftExpert solution are Quality (and its sub-areas), Human Resources, Training Management, IT and Auditing. Expansion of the use of the system is also foreseen for the legal department, meeting the specific needs of the industry with workflows modeled for contract management, with approvals at the right times and monitoring of indicators.
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