Six Moves That Saved My Manufacturing Business (and Could Save Yours)

I'll never forget the day I learned we had $10,000 left in the bank, with payroll due in three days.

On paper, my company looked decent. We had contracts, skilled workers and equipment that ran most days without major issues. But we were bleeding underneath, losing money on certain parts, our prices were inconsistent and some jobs barely broke even.

Standing in that room with my head spinning, I realized: I didn't have a cash flow problem; I had a me problem.

Every business turnaround I've led since then taught me the same lesson. The solution isn't complicated; it’s hidden. But of all the places you could look for a solution, very few leaders consider the mirror.

Over the years, I developed a framework to guide every acquisition and turnaround I've tackled. I call it “The B.A.S.I.C.S.” Brute Force, Analyze, Structure, Improve, Culture and Sustain. It's not sexy or revolutionary, but it works, and it's saved more than one company from the brink.

Brute Force: Stop the Bleeding First

When a company is in trouble, you don’t have time for long-term strategic plans. You need triage.

Brute Force identifies the things that undermine the business right now and shuts them down. Fast.

In my case, it was specific part numbers that drained us. We'd run them for years, and nobody questioned whether we made money on them. It turned out we didn't—not even close.

I see this pattern everywhere. Products lose relevance, but companies continue making them for years. Production costs rise, but customers demand rock-bottom pricing and endless revisions. Machines break down every other week, but people shrug and say, "We'll fix it eventually."

Brute Force requires action. Find the bleeding and stop it. You can analyze later, once you've stayed alive.

Analyze: Now Figure Out Why It Happened

Once you've stopped the bleeding, you can ask the harder question: Why did this happen in the first place?

This makes many leaders uncomfortable because the answer usually points back to decisions they made—or failed to make.

After I cut those money-losing part numbers, I faced the truth: We lacked a reliable system for tracking costs. Our pricing ran on three-year old assumptions. Material and labor rates had changed. But our quotes hadn't.

Analysis is about patterns, not blame. I walk the floor and ask:

• "Where do jobs stall?” 
• “Where do we redo work?”
• “Where do people look confused about what they're supposed to do?”

One company I advised couldn't figure out why their on-time delivery kept slipping. The analysis revealed: It took an average of 48 hours for their product to move from sales to production. Two full days of lag, before work even started. The problem was their clunky, disorganized handoff process.

Structure: Build Systems That Don't Depend on Heroics

Struggling manufacturers employ great people who work incredibly hard—to overcome terrible systems. This shouldn’t happen.

Your best machinist should be able to find their prints. Somebody besides your production manager should know how to expedite an order. Your quality inspector should have clear guidelines so they don’t have to second-guess.

Structure means creating repeatable processes that work, even when your A-team is unavailable.

I implemented a written definition of "Done" for every critical process.

For example, production looked like this:

• Assembled
• Tested
• Packaged
• Documented
• QC-inspected and signed off

The result? Our defect rate dropped 73% in six months. We didn’t need better people or equipment. We just needed a standard of what "done" truly meant; that was enough.

Improve: Make It Better, Then Make It Better Again

Only once you have structure, can you truly improve things. Improvement without structure is like spreading chaos with the best of intentions.

I've watched manufacturers spend months mapping faulty processes, expecting them to work. While I respect strategies like lean and Six Sigma, you can't improve a process that lacks a sturdy, structural foundation.

Start with one bottleneck where work piles up, you're always behind and people constantly ask, "What's the status on this?"

One shop I worked with had a brilliant welder who was their inspector, trainer and go-to problem solver. He was also the bottleneck, because he couldn’t do all those jobs at once. To improve we trained two others to handle inspections and created a troubleshooting guide. Now we had the depth and knowledge transfer necessary to improve.

Culture: the Part Nobody Wants to Hear

Your culture is a reflection of you. If your shop floor is chaotic, consider how you make decisions. If your employees don't take ownership, ask yourself whether you've given them anything to “own.” If communication is terrible, look in the mirror.

Culture is about more than ping-pong tables and pizza Fridays. It's everything that happens when you're not in the room.

After my company hit rock bottom, I had to change myself before anything else could change. I had to admit: I didn't know what I didn't know. I had to stop pretending problems didn't exist because I didn't want to face them.

Culture shifted when I started saying things like "I don't know" or "I made a mistake" out loud. I started asking floor workers what they thought instead of telling them what to do. I made it safe for them to talk about problems, instead of hiding them.

Your employees already know what's broken. They've known for months, maybe years. The question is whether they feel safe telling you.

Sustain: the Step That Separates Comebacks from Collapses

Here's where most turnarounds fail: six months after the "fix," everything slides back into chaos. Why? Because the leader failed to build discipline to maintain what they created. “Sustain” builds rhythms that catch problems before they become crises again.

After I rebuilt my company, I implemented three simple disciplines: weekly production reviews, monthly financial deep-dives and quarterly strategic check-ins. Instead of meetings for their own sake, we focus on clear agendas and accountability.

Weekly production reviews catch scheduling conflicts before they become late deliveries. Monthly financial reviews spot cost creep before it kills margins. Quarterly check-ins keep us from drifting back into old habits.

Sustain also means measuring what matters. I've seen manufacturers track dozens of metrics… that nobody acts on. Pick three to five numbers that tell if you're winning or losing, review them religiously, and don’t waste time gathering or reviewing irrelevant data.

Where to Start

If you're thinking, "My operation needs all six of these," you're probably right. Most do.

But don't try to fix everything at once. First, you have some deep internal work to do, to change your company by changing yourself. The hardest part is looking in the mirror first.