Safran Seats

With more than one million seats equipping the fleets of the major airlines, Safran Seats is one of the world’s leading suppliers of seating for passengers, crews and helicopters. It also provides Aftermarket Services, such as product repairs.

There are three Safran Seats Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), also known as business units, which supply Safran Seats Aftermarket: Safran Seats United States, Safran Seats Great Britain, and Safran Seats France.

Challenge

Safran Seats GB needed to replace its ERP system, which was no longer fit for purpose. The Baan system it was using relied heavily on manual processes, was not maintained or supported by the vendor and was out-of-date with current business operations.

With Safran Seats’ French, US and British business units all using different ERP/MRP tools, it was decided to streamline processes and provide one common platform across all three. Following in the footsteps of Safran Seats France, the British unit selected Infor M3, an ERP software solution designed for medium-to-large national and global manufacturers, distributors, and after-sales providers.

Safran Seats GB asked Optimum, which has a great deal of experience working with travel and leisure organisations, to deliver training across the organisation in preparation for the new system going live.

The Solution

Optimum developed all of the end user training materials for the new system across 10 workstreams (below), delivering extensive training for employees, both on-site in Safran Seats’ warehouse and production centres, and collaborating remotely.

Optimum worked alongside end users to help overcome any initial resistance to the new system, demonstrating flexibility and adaptability to work around any challenges and ensure stakeholder buy-in. It collaborated closely with Safran Seats throughout the process, delivering a Train the Trainer approach and receiving excellent feedback from all participants. It also delivered pilot end user training to the Safran Trainers.

Delivering more technical courses like Production, Optimum also facilitated a training handover to the business to complete the final stages before going successfully live with the new system.

Workstreams: Finance, Procurement & Strategic Purchasing, Production, Quality Assurance, Logistics & Warehouse Management, Master Data, Aftermarket & Sales and Programmes & Design Engineering.