 Background in Lean Manufacturing |
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In addition
to a Bachelors Degree in Mechanical Engineering and a Masters Degree in
Mechanical Engineering (Emphasis; Behavior of Metals); the President of
WA Technology, Jerry Uttrachi, also holds a Masters of Science Degree in
Engineering Management from the Industrial Engineering Department at New
Jersey Institute of Technology.
In his
graduate degree programs, he focused in Statistical Techniques and
Manufacturing Engineering; courses including:
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Advanced
Management Engineering |
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Managerial
Economics |
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Industrial
Costing and Managerial Control |
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Engineering
Reliability |
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Vector and
Tensor Analysis |
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Statistical
Design of Experiments |
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Advanced
Analytical Engineering Statistics |
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Statistical
Inference |
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Design of
an Enterprise (welded aluminum boats) |
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In addition
he has attended a number of related courses while in industry including the
following:
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Louis
Allen: Planning, Organizing, Leading & Controlling |
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Reliability
and Maintainability by Dorian Shannen (AMA) |
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MRP/Costing
by Ollie White (Ollie White & Associates)
[Attended this Management Overview Course given personally by Ollie White
-considered the father of Materials Requirements Planning.
After working within this manufacturing system for a number of years I now
understand that this approach was based on a very poor assumption!] |
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MRP II
(R.D. Garwood, Inc) |
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Achieving
Process Improvements Through Activity Based Analysis (National Association
of Accountants) |
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TEAM TRAINING
techniques were reinforced in the following courses:
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Team
Training Skills (Cornelius) |
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Team
Training Management Update (Don Lyttle) |
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Team Skills
(AWS) |
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Conflict
Management (AWS Colloquium) |
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Quality
Quest Leadership (FDTC) |
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Business
Leadership (FDTC) |
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Additional
Experiences:
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As
a Senior Manager, Mr. Uttrachi participated in the expenditure of over 1
million dollars with DeWolff Boberg and Associates, Management
Consultants. They worked closely with the production team and hourly
workforce and saved well over the expenditure. Each of the work teams
would report results summaries to the senior management team. The
analytical approach learned and used by many of the hourly workforce was
impressive. |
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While
Welding Materials and Process Laboratory Manager the charter included
Manufacturing Development. We worked closely with two manufacturing
plants developing innovative techniques and procedures to improve quality
(including developing a simple test production workers used to define MIG
welding wire cleanliness and maintaining chemical cleaning tank quality,)
reduce rework and scrap and develop new manufacturing procedures.
Statistical techniques were used to answer the question often asked
throughout by Production Managers (often those involved in welding
fabrication)…”But it was working fine
yesterday and we did not change anything!”
(The answer often is, "You may not have a made
a significant change but the manufacturing (or welding) process variables
were far-off centerline and you were close to a disaster!") |
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Participated in a complete change in a production operation to Cellular
Manufacturing. Gave hundreds of tours of the facility an encouraged
discussions with hourly work force. It's of interest to see their
perspective of why the Cellular Manufacturing was much better than the
previous MRP driven system. Benefits were very significant, including a
substantial increase in product quality and decrease of work in progress.
Outsourced a number of raw material supplies to in-house vendors and
watched while they managed inventory of their products far better than we
had, often decreasing total amounts by 80%!
The production workers relayed to the visitors how frustrating it was to
find with the previous MRP system a $5000 item being assembled was missing
the proper bolt! With Cellular Manufacturing a representative from a
hardware supply company kept all fastener bins at each cell filled with
several days needs. Instead of having thousands of fasteners we didn't
need in stock (because the sales force didn't forecast the future) we had
much less of only the correct inventory |
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SIDE BAR
Recently, while touring the plant
I had watched successfully switch to cellular manufacturing, the VP of Operations showed one of the cells changed to a
"paced line." Unlike the manually-moved carts used with the previous
cellular manufacturing approach each power supply assembly base was placed on a slowly moving belt.
The VP mentioned being able to increase speed to increase production as
skills increased. I wondered if this was not a step backward since there was
no time for an individual to fix a problem or elicit the help of a fellow
cell worker without stopping the whole line. Also questioned if there would be any concerns by the employees of having
the speed slowly increased? I asked
the VP if he had very seen
Charley Chaplin's 1936 film, "Modern Times?" He had not. It is a social
comedy, exaggerating the abusive business techniques some companies practiced at the
time (it included some practices reportedly being used by Ford.) In one
scene the "boss" increased the speed of the assembly line making it
impossible for the workers to keep up. There was a similar "I Love Lucy" TV
show where Lucy and Ethel were working in a candy factory where the "boss"
increased the belt speed transferring the candy to packaging to such a speed that they had to stuff candy
in their mouth to keep up! Although both are funny, unfortunately some
believe companies exploit workers using similar techniques. It is my
experience if that occurs the company does not last long!
I also watched as the company who
built my fiberglass Street Rod body switched from one person building the
whole body at individual work stations to an assembly line where
workers only did a specific part.
Less skill was required for the segmented work, but the job was not as rewarding. Quality
suffered.
Ultimately
eliminating inefficiencies is the job of management and workers to remain
completive and assure both have a viable future. In fact the workers, who
live every day with the process, usually have the best ideas for
improvement. Suggest watching "Modern
Times" (which is available free to watch on the net) to understand some of the
thinking of the 1930's recession. It has similarities to what some
folks are expressing in our 2010-2011 "recession" where they say they are
being exploited by "rich" bosses! |
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