Reinforcing United Steel: a young professional’s guide to success

At the beginning of 2019, I applied for INFOSYS 345, a course with a reputation for being notoriously hard among undergrad students. The course gives students an opportunity to work with a real business and help them solve a business problem over two semesters.

My project team helped United Steel increase the efficiency of their steel mesh manufacturing process. The project was the most gruelling and most rewarding experience I have ever had. Here are a few things I learned that helped me deliver a successful business improvement project and accelerate my career.      

1. Focus: Scope creep is a significant threat to your project outcomes. During a project, you will encounter many things that can be improved that fall outside of your scope. Document these and disclose them to management as soon as possible. Try to not get side-tracked by over analysing other opportunities.     
2. Selling: When pitching ideas to management it is best if you can quantify the improvement opportunity in numbers. Where there are many indirect benefits that are hard to measure you should list as many as you can think of. Does the idea reduce lead times? Reduce training time? Save floor space? There are usually many indirect immeasurable benefits to any improvement opportunity. Make sure that they are known so that you get the support you need.
3. Team: The people that help you during your project are the most important factor for success. I was lucky to have Harshith Vijay as my project partner. He helped me stay focused on the goal and had many crucial insights on the project direction. Building a team internally in the company is just as critical. Speak to everyone you can in the organisation and let them know what you are trying to do. The people you meet have unique knowledge about the operations of the company. Some will resist or attempt to block your progress. Find project champions who go above and beyond to help you deliver a successful project.

These three things, among many others, helped me and Harshith deliver a successful project with significant business outcomes. The course helped me develop many skills that can not be learned in a lecture theatre. I learned how to effectively communicate ideas to upper management as well as floor staff. We discovered how important it is to have people on your side at all levels who want you to succeed. Being pushed outside of my comfort zone made me grow from a shy student into a confident professional ready for any challenge.

If you lack professional experience or are pursuing a career in consulting, I would recommend taking INFOSYS 345. The people you are exposed to and the skills you learn will fast track your career in business.

I have since used what I learned in INFOSYS 345 to create, manage and implement another successful project for Castle Portable Buildings. I am now an operations consultant with a successful track record and the skills needed to help businesses achieve operational excellence.

Lucas Arrowsmith is an operations consultant.