Hello, my name is Jerry Williams, and I am the Corporate Safety Director for Siegel-Robert, Inc. Probably never heard of us but I would say you see us every day, in every state and maybe even internationally.
Siegel-Robert Inc has three divisions: Automotive, Plastics and Diversified. In Automotive we are the largest plastic plating company in the United States. We make the grilles, headlights and even nameplates on almost every car and truck moving. If it shines, we probably made it or shared in it. Our plastics division makes everything from baby wipe containers to the soap dispensers in our bathrooms. Our diversified division makes everything from office furniture to Industrial Hygiene equipment (sysdyene)
We are a private company with a long history of success and high quality standards and customer focus. Now I sound like a sales person. All the divisions have one common focus: Lean Manufacturing.
How many of you are involved with companies that are practicing Lean Manufacturing? Now I know all of you have to help ensure that information and measures provided today meet the standards set by Lean Manufacturing. If not, stand up, scream, what ever it takes, let's get it right.
Lean is not a new business strategy that replaces the Adkins diet to ensure all executives remain fit while they bleed our companies dry. Lean is not the flavor of the month or decade where one of our executives went to a seminar and decided the entire company has to be run this way, and Lean is not a Wonder pill that provides easy great solutions overnight.
Lean always starts with a hypotheses: What we want to be able to prove is that Lean and Safety principles are intrinsically similar and are integrated into the day to day operations of a Lean Manufacturing company for the purpose of creating a world-class quality product that exceeds our customer's expectations, below our business plan and produced in an injury-free, hazard-free work environment. Now I sound like a cheerleader.
What we plan to do today is introduce the concepts and systems of Lean Manufacturing and blend the Safety systems at each strategic part to prove our hypotheses and show how Lean Manufacturing and Safety Systems are a good marriage.
A little over thirty years ago a small automotive company began a series of experiments in manufacturing. They wanted to create a system that develops an IDEAL person, Group of People or machines that:
Is defect free (Injury Free).
Can be delivered one request at a time (Safety involved in every activity and decision made).
Can be supplied on demand (Safety resources are available on demand, safe work practices already set).
Can be delivered immediately (Safe work practices are a part of every task and can be applied to any new job or task).
Can be produced without waste (Safety has been extensively involved to produced a product without injury or hazards uncontrolled).