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1. Introduction
The need to adapt to new realities imposed by the competitive environment demands that companies develop an ever-increasing ability to plan and manage their operations. Therefore, logistics has come to play a critical role in the competitive differentiation of companies. The impetus behind this strategic importance relates to its capacity to reduce costs and add value (Ballou, 2004). Thus, as new processes and technologies emerge that are able to improve the productivity of logistics operations, companies become more willing to adopt them, as in the case of voice picking systems (Minis et al., 2011).
In the industrial environment, one of the logistical processes that is most costly is the problem of routing the collection or separating of orders within warehouses (also known as picking or order picking), in which people travel between aisles in a stocking warehouse to fulfil client orders or supply the needs of production lines. Currently, separation done by voice command (voice picking) is presented as a possible solution to this problem. Its main benefits reported in the literature include greater productivity and precision in the execution of the operations (Saxena, 2009; Sehgal, 2009; Minis et al., 2011).
In line with this, the objective of this study is to identify and analyse the difficulties encountered in the implementation of voice picking system at a large multinational company of the tractor industrial segment, outlining a comparison related to the main critical factors concerning the system implementation at a Brazilian and a USA plant, specifically, in regard to the main critical factors involved in the implementation of the technology. The methodology adopted was a case study conducted through deep interviews.
The motivation for the research stems from the recognition that using new technologies like voice picking presupposes the immediate incorporation of operational benefits and advantages, generally already well-publicised within the specialised press (e.g. in Tecnologística, 2014; Logistics Management, 2010; Abralog, 2013). However, the difficulties of such implementations and adaptations in different countries have not yet appeared in related discussions.
The use of voice picking systems by Brazilian companies is recent, having begun in the last decade, and only a small percentage of Brazilian industrial companies have already migrated to this new technology. According to the electronic journal Tecnologística