If you run a small manufacturer
You already know the problems
They show up every day, and they are rarely caused by a single tool or person. They are caused by a system where every function runs on its own spreadsheet.
How DO.Impact solves them
Instead of buying a separate tool for each problem, DO.Impact gives you one connected operating system: one plan, one pipeline, one schedule, one set of KPIs, and one improvement loop. Every symptom gets matched to the right method, the right owner, and a measurable financial benefit.
- → One connected flow from strategy to the shop floor
- → One owner and one KPI per problem, not per department
- → Method suggested by the symptom (TOC, A3, 8D, Hoshin, VSM)
- → Benefit tracked in money and time, not just activity
The real cost of disconnected systems
When your systems don't talk, someone has to carry the picture.
In most small manufacturers, that person is the owner.
DO.Impact connects strategy, sales, production, people and improvement so the business doesn't depend on one person carrying the whole picture.
Before
The owner walks the floor, updates the forecast, chases orders, and reconciles spreadsheets — becoming the human integration layer.
With DO.Impact
The system carries the picture: connected plans, live KPIs, scheduled work, and one source of truth the whole team can see.
Start with your problem
Tell us what's going wrong. We'll show you exactly how it gets solved.
Pick the problem you're living with, answer two questions about your shop, and walk the real screens — with real data — that close it out. Including an honest look at your other options.
What is actually going wrong right now?
Two quick questions so the answer fits your shop
Everything below replaces a spreadsheet you already maintain — the data you key in once feeds the board pack at the end.
How DO.Impact solves “Skilled labor shortage”
Experienced CNC machinists, welders, quality inspectors, programmers, manufacturing engineers and maintenance technicians are hard to hire, and retirements are outpacing new talent entering the trades.
What this screen shows
Headcount, coverage and open capability gaps.
What you decide here
See whether the people side can support the plan.
Why this step: See headcount, coverage and where the holes are
Your options, honestly compared
DO.Impact is not the right answer for everyone. Here is how the four realistic routes compare for this problem — including what you still have to do yourself with us.
| Your options | Keep doing it in spreadsheets The status quo | Hire a consultant Buy the expertise | Run a MOM/ERP project Buy the platform | DO.Impact Buy the operating system |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | Free — until something ships late | $20k–$150k one-off | Six figures plus setup and licences | A monthly subscription, no setup fee |
| Time to value | None — it is what you have today | Weeks to the first report | 6–18 months before anyone sees a screen | Same day — sign up and start entering |
| Who owns it afterwards | Whoever built the file, and nobody after they leave | The knowledge walks out with them | IT, and a change request queue | Your own leaders, in their weekly routine |
| What it needs from you | Constant manual re-keying | Access, data and management time | A project team you probably do not have | About an hour a week of leadership cadence |
| Honest downside | It breaks quietly as the shop grows | Nothing persists once the engagement ends | Long, heavy, and configured for somebody else's process | You still have to run the cadence — the tool will not do the meeting for you |
| On the labor gap specifically | A skills tab nobody has updated since the last audit | A capability assessment, delivered once | HR module you pay for and never populate | A live skill matrix that shows where you are one person deep |
Keep doing it in spreadsheets
The status quo
- Cost
- Free — until something ships late
- Time to value
- None — it is what you have today
- Who owns it afterwards
- Whoever built the file, and nobody after they leave
- What it needs from you
- Constant manual re-keying
- Honest downside
- It breaks quietly as the shop grows
- On the labor gap specifically
- A skills tab nobody has updated since the last audit
Hire a consultant
Buy the expertise
- Cost
- $20k–$150k one-off
- Time to value
- Weeks to the first report
- Who owns it afterwards
- The knowledge walks out with them
- What it needs from you
- Access, data and management time
- Honest downside
- Nothing persists once the engagement ends
- On the labor gap specifically
- A capability assessment, delivered once
Run a MOM/ERP project
Buy the platform
- Cost
- Six figures plus setup and licences
- Time to value
- 6–18 months before anyone sees a screen
- Who owns it afterwards
- IT, and a change request queue
- What it needs from you
- A project team you probably do not have
- Honest downside
- Long, heavy, and configured for somebody else's process
- On the labor gap specifically
- HR module you pay for and never populate
DO.Impact
Buy the operating system
- Cost
- A monthly subscription, no setup fee
- Time to value
- Same day — sign up and start entering
- Who owns it afterwards
- Your own leaders, in their weekly routine
- What it needs from you
- About an hour a week of leadership cadence
- Honest downside
- You still have to run the cadence — the tool will not do the meeting for you
- On the labor gap specifically
- A live skill matrix that shows where you are one person deep
Skilled labor shortage
Experienced CNC machinists, welders, quality inspectors, programmers, manufacturing engineers and maintenance technicians are hard to hire, and retirements are outpacing new talent entering the trades.
- See headcount, coverage and where the holes are
- Find the skills that sit with only one person
- Quantify the gap against what each role requires
- Agree what good looks like before hiring or training
- Check the succession bench for retiring expertise
- See where the shortage shows up as red days
- Turn the response into owned workstreams
- Show the capability risk and the plan to close it
Production scheduling & capacity planning
Frequent schedule changes, expedited orders, machine downtime and material delays make it difficult to meet delivery commitments while keeping utilization high.
- Compare 24 months of demand against real capacity
- Find where flow actually breaks, gate by gate
- Track the delivery misses day by day with a cause
- Watch OTD and utilization against target
- Design out the waste that eats the schedule
- Keep every recovery action owned and dated
- Report the delivery position on one page
Quality & compliance requirements
Aerospace (AS9100), automotive (IATF 16949) and energy customers demand extensive documentation, traceability, audits, PPAP/FAI and zero-defect performance. Quality failures can cost contracts.
- Catch every quality escape the day it happens
- Force root cause before committing a countermeasure
- Hold the audit evidence across all six pillars
- Prove new work through the five gates and FAI
- Sequence customer and regulatory audits
- Lock the checks into the leader cadence
- Show audit readiness and cost of poor quality
Supply chain disruptions
Long lead times for castings, forgings, specialty metals, electronics and purchased components force the business to carry more inventory or delay shipments.
- Track long-lead materials against the build plan
- See which orders are stalled waiting on parts
- Log shortage-driven red days with a reason code
- Watch the inventory and cash impact week by week
- Size what the disruption costs in EBITDA terms
- Run dual-sourcing and buffer work as workstreams
- Report exposure and the mitigation plan
Rising operating costs
Labor, raw materials, utilities, insurance, tooling and maintenance costs keep rising while OEMs press suppliers to reduce prices.
- Bridge the headwinds against the offsetting levers
- Check part margins, COPQ and the cash position
- Attack the non-value-added time driving the cost
- Exit old and loss-making programs through the LCG 8 gates instead of carrying their cost
- Track cost per unit and scrap against target
- Convert each lever into a workstream with an owner
- Make cost recovery a breakthrough, not a side project
- Show the bridge and what has actually landed
Cash flow pressure
Long payment terms (60–120 days), large inventory investments, expensive equipment and project-based work create working capital pressure despite strong sales.
- Run the 13-week cash view and working capital drivers
- Right-size inventory against the real demand signal
- Test whether the booking plan supports the cash need
- See which customers carry the receivable risk
- Quantify the cash levers alongside the P&L ones
- Give the board one credible cash story
Technology & digital transformation
The business still runs on spreadsheets or disconnected ERP, MES, quality and maintenance systems. Without real-time data, productivity improvement stalls.
- One operating system instead of scattered files
- Live SQDP status replacing the whiteboard
- One KPI library with target versus actual
- Every action from every meeting in one list
- Industrialize new products and validate new equipment before it hits the floor
- The whole change portfolio on one timeline
- A weekly cadence that runs off live data
- Reporting built from the data, not rebuilt in slides
Winning new business while holding margin
Dependence on a few major customers creates risk. The business needs to quote faster, differentiate, and stop taking low-margin work just to keep machines busy.
- See the commercial position at a glance
- Expose concentration in the customer base
- Know what customers value before deciding what to price for
- Filter the pipeline by margin, not just value
- Reconcile pipeline and backlog against the plan
- Map who decides at each target account
- Link new business to the growth lever it funds
- Industrialize the win before it hits the floor
- Report growth and margin mix together
What you get
How the modules connect
Strategy → Commercial → Operations → People. Each pillar feeds the next, so the plan, the pipeline, the floor and the capability stay in sync.
STRATEGY & TRANSFORMATION
What are we trying to achieve?
COMMERCIAL & GROWTH
What work will create the revenue & load?
OPERATING MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
Can we deliver the work on time and at plan?
PEOPLE & LEADERSHIP
Do we have the skills, coverage & leadership?
A day in your shop
What changes when the system actually works
Walk the floor and know exactly where every job stands
Catch bottlenecks before they break the day and ship more orders on time
Stop copying numbers between spreadsheets, whiteboards, and Post-its
Build next week's schedule in minutes instead of chasing people down
See what each value stream actually delivered today
Give the floor, the office, and the owner the same real-time picture
Built for shops like yours
Made for small manufacturers whose growth has outrun their systems
DO.Impact is for the shops still running the business on Excel, whiteboards, QuickBooks and a handful of tools that do not talk to each other.
10–150 employees
Small enough that everyone knows each other, big enough that memory no longer scales.
$2M–$50M revenue
Growth has outpaced the systems that got you here.
Owner- or family-operated
Decisions happen fast — they just need better numbers behind them.
Excel, whiteboards, QuickBooks
Plus three tools that do not talk to each other.
Why this is not a MOM/ERP project
No implementation project. No setup fee. Start the same day.
Most owners have watched a MOM/ERP rollout eat a year and a budget. DO.Impact is deliberately the opposite: you sign up, switch on the modules you need, and start running the shop with them.
Traditional MOM/ERP
DO.Impact
Implementation project
Sign up and start the same day.
Consultants on site
Set up your value streams and boards yourself.
Months of configuration
Turn modules on and off as you need them.
Setup fee before you see value
No setup or implementation fee.
A system your team works for
A system that works the way your shop already runs.
One predictable monthly subscription. No setup or implementation fee. Cancel whenever you want.
See it with real data
Not a slide deck. A fully worked example.
Every account includes a read-only demo workspace built as a complete manufacturer: boards, jobs, KPIs, pipeline and a full board report. Open it, click through it, and decide for yourself before you enter a single number of your own.
Exec Team Room + Enterprise Network
One add-on, two capabilities. Convene a CEO-chaired room of AI directors — Operations, Sales, HR, Finance, Safety, Quality, Lean and an Exec Assistant. Ask one question and the relevant directors answer in a single transcript, grounded in a read-only briefing pack of your live company data. Enterprise Network maps your sites, entities and flows so you can see how they depend on each other.
Grounded in your data
Every answer references your actual numbers, not generic advice.
Scoped to your setup
Only the pillars and modules you have switched on are fetched or discussed.
Advisory, never destructive
The directors read and recommend — they never change your data.
Enterprise Network
Model sites, entities and flows, with a dependency matrix across the group.
One Platform. Stronger Relationships. Greater Impact.
Ready to turn pressure into progress?
Start on the free sandbox, open the worked example, and see whether one connected system beats the spreadsheets you are running today. No card, no setup, no sales call required.
Still have questions?
Get clear answers about manufacturing operating systems, small business manufacturing software, shop floor management, and how DO.Impact differs from other tools.
Explore by topic
Deep dives into how DO.Impact works
Resources for the problems small and mid-sized manufacturers solve every day.
ERP alternative for small manufacturers
No implementation project, no setup fee, one monthly subscription.
CNC machine shop software
Where every job is, why it is late, and this week's schedule.
Shop floor management software
SQDP boards, hour-by-hour tracking, loss Pareto and escalations.
Production tracking software
Hour-by-hour plan vs actual, with the reason attached.
Manufacturing operating system
What it is, and why one connected model beats point tools.
Lean manufacturing software
A3, 8D, VSM and gemba connected to tracked savings.
Continuous improvement software
Keep the improvement loop alive past the first quarter.
Hoshin Kanri software
A living X-matrix linked to real execution and benefit.
Strategy, consolidation and turnaround
Strategy, site consolidation, restructuring and turnaround in one connected model.