Stories of Leadership, Lean, and Learning
Armstrong World Industries was forced to open a mineral wool plant, in response to the loss of a critical supplier of this vital raw material for ceiling tile manufacture. Because of this, they relied on more outside vendors to design and build the plant than they were comfortable with. They had never spun molten stone (slag) into fibers before and therefore couldn’t use their experience to reduce the potential for errors and inefficiencies in their process.
Read MoreI developed a Kaizen facilitator training program for CITY Furniture. Once I realized I could train others in facilitation techniques I had developed over many years of experience, I decided to share the program with my network.
Read MoreI have experienced two mergers/joint ventures in my corporate career at Armstrong. The first one was a ceiling grid venture between Worthington Industries and Armstrong. It was extremely positive and productive and is still doing well to this day. The second one was a ceramic tile venture between Armstrong’s American Olean Tile and Dal-Tile, based out of Dallas Texas. This one didn’t go nearly as well. I learned many lessons from the Dal-Tile experience, mainly about my ability to survive.
Read MoreDuring my career, I have been fortunate to have worked all over the world. I was brought up as a “tourist.” Whenever I traveled with my family, we would do everything possible to see the sights and learn the history of the region we were visiting. Because of this, I naturally enjoyed my business travel and did my best to explore and experience the culture of any location I visited.
Read MoreLast year, Dave, a network connection, reached out to me to see if I could help him in his continuous improvement journey. His wife had worked with me at Armstrong, and one evening he was talking with her about some of his frustrations at work. She said, “If you want to get the right help, call Adam. He is tenacious and won’t let you or your team fail.”
Read MoreEarlier this year, I received an email from someone I never met, asking about my approach to 5S – organizing a workspace to improve safety and productivity. He heard about me from another location in his company, who I helped six months earlier. Later that week, we were in a Zoom meeting, and he invited me to his factory in Oregon to see if I could help jump-start their 5S efforts.
Read MoreIn the 1980’s, Thomasville Furniture was the market leader in high-end furniture. They were extremely focused on process improvement in all areas of the business. I worked on a staff of industrial engineers. Each of us supported one or more of the many manufacturing facilities. We were tasked with finding ways to improve safety, quality, productivity, and customer service.
Read MoreCritical problems seem to happen over a holiday weekend when there is less coverage. For me, Thanksgiving provided many challenges. Early in my career, I had to come into the ceramic tile factory the day after Thanksgiving to supervise a crew trying to clear a jam in the kiln. Many years later, a water main in St. Helens Oregon broke and shut down the ceiling tile plant. Once again, I was the one covering, and had to respond quickly and deal with a near disaster.
Read MoreDuring Armstrong’s Lean transformation, we took many benchmarking trips to learn from companies that were further along in their Lean journeys. One memorable trip included visits to Boeing and Nucor Steel in South Carolina on an extremely hot day in July.
Read MoreFor the early part of their Lean journey, I was the interim Lean Leader for Armstrong World Industries’ Hilliard Ohio plant. I was returning to the corporate office in Lancaster Pennsylvania from my assignment as Operations Manager at the St. Helens Oregon plant. I spent two out of every three weeks at the plant, until my family moved from the West coast to join me.
Read MoreWhen I opened my business, I tried many ways to attract clients. After spending money on advertising that didn’t lead to business, I focused on delivering a great customer experience and then let my business grow organically through word of mouth and referrals. This is a slower path, but it fits my principles of how I want to conduct my business.
Read MoreAdmit it. After reading the title of this story, some of you are hearing the famous Lionel Richie song in your head. This story isn’t about that, but rather it concerns a challenging Kaizen event I recently facilitated for CITY Furniture. The business problem we were trying to solve was a series of computer programs that ran after all showrooms closed each evening. There was a period of time where no revenue could be generated through their e-commerce website, until all programs completed their reconciliations. Our goal was to cut the time by 75%, so that we could free up overnight revenue generation.
Read MoreArmstrong World Industries kicked off their Lean journey in 2010. They put a lot of effort into building a culture of Kaizen across their 22 manufacturing locations worldwide. I was sent to many facilities to assist.
Read MoreI was facilitating a Kaizen event for a large furniture retailer in Florida. They offer many services that set them apart from their competitors. They have a nice sales and service advantage and impressive customer loyalty. The Kaizen topic we were working on was the use of replacement parts in their process. Our goal was to reduce the amount of replacement parts needed.
Read MoreI was asked to facilitate a 5S Kaizen at an electronics manufacturer. The specific area of interest was in a testing lab that was used to analyze components that failed in the field. There were an amazing number of parts and supplies in the lab. On first glance, the lab owner felt he needed everything in the lab to accurately perform testing. We must have removed 80% of everything in the space to improve the safety and productivity of the area.
Read MoreWe hear so much about lead generation, Search Engine Optimization, and other marketing methods. I don’t know much about marketing, but I do know strong relationships can lead to business partnerships.
Many years ago, I was Business Team Manager for one of Armstrong World Industries’ flooring business units. I had a co-worker named Jonah, who was the Business Team Manager for another business unit at the same site. He helped me in my early days on the job. He was promoted soon after I got there. Eventually he left the company to go on to bigger and better things.
Read MoreI moved to Armstrong World Industries’ St. Helens Oregon ceiling tile plant and took as Production Manager for three years. During that time, I was able to test many Lean principles and improve my understanding of how to manage an organization to high performance.
Read MoreI have been fortunate to help strengthen the Kaizen culture of one of the largest furniture retailers in South Central Florida. They have been using Lean and Kaizen for more than 15 years and I have been facilitating many Kaizen events focused on improving operations performance and internal operations experience. A recent event focused directly on the end use customer.
Read MoreDuring my corporate career at Armstrong World Industries, I gained a reputation for many things: Lean zealot, “Conveyer Whisperer,” and someone who was willing to take on any challenge anywhere I was needed.
Read MoreBefore I developed the Wheel of Sustainability, I had to find other methods to sustain the gains my teams worked so hard to develop during weeklong events. Here’s a story of the extreme lengths one team went to make sure no one could ever make a change to their improvements.
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