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The PEER Bearing Company (a manufacturer of bearings based in Illinois) was bought out by a Swedish company this year. The family that had owned the company gave surprise bonuses of $6.6 million to the 230 employees (an average of over $28,000).
family thanks employees with surprise bonuses
On the day the checks were distributed, Valentin Dima watched as co-workers broke down in tears over their bonus checks. He drove home first, then opened his envelope: $33,000. His wife received a check for a smaller amount, and the two Romanian immigrants have since taken a Caribbean cruise to celebrate.
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The new owners intend to operate the company based 40 miles north of Chicago as a wholly owned subsidiary. Workers have been told that most will keep their jobs.
A small bit of good news for these troubling times. It is nice to see true respect for people being practiced. The family also created the Spungen Family Foundation, 2 years ago.
Related: Tilting at Ludicrous CEO Pay 2008 - Focus on Customers and Employees - People are Our Most Important Asset - Manufacturing Continuous to Increase in the USA
Curious Cat Management Improvement Career Connections provides a source of jobs targeted to those interested in this blog. Take a look at the jobs listed now including: Lean Manager at Erlanger in Kentucky; Senior Lean Six Sigma Specialist at Cooper Crouse-Hinds in New York and CEO of Jefferson State Forest Products in California.
At the recent Deming Seminar in Colorado Springs I met the CEO of upstream21, which owns Jefferson State Forest Products: Bryan Redd. He has a great understanding of how to put Deming and lean manufacturing ideas into practice. Having a boss that is knowledgeable and passionate about the management improvement is a huge plus. I think this is a great opportunity.
So if you are interested in looking at new career opportunities look at the jobs posted on the job board and good luck. And if you have a management improvement opening, go ahead an add the opportunity.
Related: Signs You Have a Great Job, or Not - Deming Companies - Hiring the Right Employees
Hard to find a job, but not an internship
“Students are looking for internships even after their first year,” said Sheila Curran, executive director of Duke University’s career center, noting that 88% of Duke students graduate with at least one internship under their belts. “It’s become expected that you’d have at least one internship during college.”
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Universities are also recognizing the increased importance of internships and are working harder to secure spots for their students, said Richard Bottner, founder of Intern Bridge, a college recruiting research and consulting firm. Some colleges are even requiring students to do at least one internship to graduate.
The Deming Scholars MBA program at Fordham includes a heavy dose of internships (”Subject matter is delivered in five integrated learning cycles. Five eight-week sessions of classroom lectures, seminars and study are linked by seven-week internships at participating firms”). Integrating well planned internships can be very valuable to improving learning. By the way if your company would like to host these students you can contact the program to discuss the opportunity.
Curiouscat.com has a web site for locating internships. I would love to get some good management improvement based internships added - there is no charge to add internships. For actual jobs try the Curious Cat Management Improvement job board.
Related: Hiring the Right Employees - IT Talent Shortage, or Management Failure? - Young IT Workers Demands - Joel Management - The Joy of Work
Utah scrambling to meet need for technical workers
The situation continues to worsen, with jobs being created and unemployment remaining low in the state. And as the current work force ages, the supply of skilled workers is diminishing, forcing employers to recruit outside of Utah and sometimes leave Utah altogether, the report said.
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The college’s Lean Manufacturing Center was built from an old warehouse with state funds and $30 million from rocket-booster manufacturer Williams International. Williams provides the college with equipment and mentors to train students with practical, real-world applications, said Lloyd McCaffrey, the Lean Center’s director.
Related: Engineering Innovation for Manufacturing and the Economy - Applied Quality Engineering Education - Wisconsin Manufacturing - Top 10 Manufacturing Countries - Help Wanted: Lean Manufacturing Experts - The Lean MBA - Curious Cat Management Improvement Job Board
Three Amazing PHP/MySQL/Perl Developers Now Available - Posting on Craigslist. The url will expire so I included everything but the contact info below (follow the link for contact info).
Yesterday I had to do one of the more difficult things — lay off three of my good friends, all of whom are talented and professional developers.
I’m posting here today in hopes that someone out in the world is looking for some seasoned talent, people who can get things done for you. I will personally recommend all three of these guys, and I’ll detail below each of them. If you are interested, I’m including my phone number. I’ll take your contact information and give it to the person(s) you are interested in, and you can take it from there.
Here goes.
Developer #1
I’ve worked with Developer #1 since 2005. He’s worked for Fortune 500 companies and small startups. His strengths are conceptualizing and implementing complex systems using PHP and MySQL. These systems are not limited to the web, however the web is where most of his work has been for the last few years. During his employment with me, he:
* Designed a complex billing system, complete with audit trails
* Developed a site-wide internationalization system, allowing us to easily translate any phrase on the system to a different language
* Designed and successfully implemented several difficult projects based on half-way decent specifications documents (my fault)
Related: People are Our Most Important Asset - Bad Management Results in Layoffs - Hiring the Right People - Severance Plans to Respect People - Curious Cat Management Improvement Jobs
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Lean manufacturing saving jobs
“This is not about a reduction in the workforce, it is about reducing waste in the system,” Cook said. “There is a lot to be gained . . . and it is really just common sense.” The lean manufacturing session got its start in November at a mayor’s roundtable on advanced manufacturing. When the issue of cutting waste arose, Cook volunteered to lead a session and the London Economic Development Corp. organized it.
“This information is not proprietary. If these people take it back to their plants and expand on it, we all gain,” Cook said.
A number of great points, including:
the best management ideas are not proprietary - Management Improvement - Management Advice Failures - Open Source Management Ideas
Related: Manufacturing Jobs - Lean Thinking Misconception - Lean Manufacturing Resources
Do Lean Companies Create Fewer Jobs?
No, they create more. If you assume the lean company grows sales at the same rate as some poorly management company then it may well be that the lean company creates fewer jobs. However that is not a valid assumption. Deming provided the reason in his presentations to Japan in the 1950’s with his chain reaction. From page 3 of Out of the Crisis
For an example of this process at work see GM, Ford and Toyota. Toyota defines lean (Toyota’s management system is what was called lean manufacturing by Jim Womack and Dan Jones). Toyota continues to add employees while Ford and GM have been shedding jobs.
It is true, for lean (and un-lean) companies alike, productivity is improving (it just improves more at lean companies) which means that fewer people are needed to produce the same amount as we have in the past. We have posted previously about the mistaken belief that jobs are moving overseas.
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