Case Study

From the information in the case study below, "Marvel Glass Works: The X-Glass Project" you

should provide the following:

For this case study, there are 3 parts to your answer, from 3 different perspectives.

1. From Davidson’s point of view, what is the problem, and what should be done in the short

term and long term?

2, From MacTavish’s point of view, what is the problem, and what should be done in the short

term and long term?

3. If you were an outside consultant, present at Marvel, aware of all of the facts in the case, how

would you independently advise Davidson and MacTavish.

4. As presented in the concluding comments of the case,

What would you do if you were Davidson?

Feel free to reference any of the individuals mentioned in the case to support any points made in

items 1, 2 or 3 above.

Marvel Glass Works: The X-Glass Project

After several highly successful years, 2007 had been difficult at Marvel Glass Work's

Bloomington plant. In July 2007 the yields and productivity of the X-Glass process began a long

decline, and the entire plant organization was working overtime trying to correct the problem.

Morale plummeted as yields continued to decline throughout the summer and fall. In December

2007 a team of engineers from the corporate Manufacturing and Engineering (M&E) staff were

assigned to the plant; the group's charter was to focus on long-term process improvement while

the line organization concentrated on day-to-day operations.

On the morning of March 24, 2008, Eric Davidson, leader of the M&E project team at

Bloomington, sat in his office and reflected on the group's first three months at the plant. The

project had not gone well, and Davidson knew that his team members were dis couraged. The

technical problems they faced were difficult enough, but apparently the line organization had

resisted almost everything the M&E team had attempted. In addition to conflicts over

respon sibility and authority, deep disagreements arose concerning the sources of the problems

and how best to solve them. Cooperation was almost nonexistent, and tense relationships

developed in some departments between team and line personnel. Davidson favored an

immediate change in the project's direction.

Sifting through the comments and memos from his team, he recalled David Leibson, Vice

President of Manufacturing and Engi neering, saying to him shortly after he accepted the

Bloomington assignment: "Eric, this is the M&E group's first major turnaround project, and the

first real project of any kind in the Industrial Products Division. I picked you for this job,

because you're the kind of guy who gets things done. This is a key one for our group and I think

a big one for the company. In situations like this, you either win big, or you lose big. There's very

little middle ground."

Marvel Glass Works background information

During the early 2000’s Marvel Glass Works was a corporation in transition. Long a leader in the

development of glass and ceramic products for industrial and commercial uses, Marvel had

entered several consumer goods markets during the 1990’s. Under the direction of Lee

Waterman, president from 1997-2006, Marvel developed a strong marketing emphasis to

accompany several new consumer products.

Although the public's perception of Marvel in the late 1990s was no doubt dominated by its

well-known Cyrex and Ovenware cooking prod ucts and Pyroceram dinnerware, its most

suc cessful consumer product was actually CRT tube casings. Utilizing an innovative

glass-forming process, Marvel entered the market for CRT tube funnels and front plates in 1998

and soon attained a strong market position. Throughout the mid-to-late 2000’s growth in CRT

casings at Marvel was rapid, and the profits at the CRT division constituted the backbone of the

income state ment.

During this period, Marvel's organization was decentralized. The operating divi sions had

considerable control over marketing and manufacturing decisions, and corporate staffs in these

areas were relatively small. Only in research and development did corporate staff personnel

influence the company's direction. The Technical Staff Division was responsible for all research

and development activities, as well as for manufacturing engineering. New products were

regarded as the lifeblood of the corporation, and the director of new product development,

Harvey Blackburn, had built a creative and energetic staff. This staff devel oped the

glass-forming process that made CRT tube production possible, and the corporation looked to

this group when growth in the CRT division and other consumer products began to slow in the

late 2000’s.

Changes in CRT and Corporate Reorganization

The critical year for the CRT division was 2005. Until then sales and profits had grown rapidly,

and Marvel had carved out a substantial share of the market. In 2005, however, BDA (a major

Marvel customer) opened a plant in Ohio to produce glass funnels and front plates. Several of the

engineering and management personnel at the new BDA plant were former Marvel employees.

BDA's decision to integrate back ward into glass production had a noticeable effect on the

performance of Marvel's CRT division. Although the business remained profitable, over the next

three years growth slowed and Marvel's market share declined.

Slower growth in CRT products in the 2003-2006 period coincided with reduced profitability in

other consumer products as costs for labor and basic materials escalated sharply. These

develop ments resulted in weaker corporate financial performance and prompted a reevaluation of

the company's basic direction.

These deliberations created a reemphasis of the technical competence of the company in new

product development and a focus on pro cess excellence and productivity. A major step in the

new approach to operations and produc tion was the establishment of M&E at the cor porate level.

This reorganization brought to gether staff specialists in processes, systems, and equipment under

the direction of Leibson, who was promoted from director of manufac turing at the TV division to

a corporate vice president.

Shortly after the M&E Division was formed, Thomas MacAvoy, the general manager of the

Electronics Division and the former director of Physical Research on Marvel's technical staff,

was named president of the company. Mac Avoy was the first Marvel president in recent times

with a technical background; he had a Ph.D. in chemistry and a strong record in re search and

development. An internal staff memorandum summed up the issues facing Marvel under

MacAvoy:

“An analysis of productivity growth at Marvel from 1996-2006 shows that performance was no

better than the average for other glass products manufacturers (2%-4% per year) and in the last

two years has actually been below average. With prices on the in crease, improved productivity

growth is im perative. At the same time, we have to im prove our ability to exploit new products.

It appears that research output has, if any thing, increased in the last few years (X-Glass is a

prime example), but we have to do a much better job of transferring prod ucts from the lab into

production.”

Manufacturing and Engineering Division

Much of the responsibility for improved pro ductivity and the transfer of technology (either

product or process) from research to production fell to the new and untried M&E Division.

Be cause of the company's historical preference for a small, relatively inactive manufacturing

staff, building the M&E group into a strong and ef fective organization was a considerable

chal lenge. Remembering the early days, Leibson reflected on his approach:

I tried to do two things in the first year: (1) attract people with very strong technical skills in the

basic processes and disciplines in use at Marvel; and (2) establish a work ing relationship with the

manufacturing people in the operating divisions. I think the thing that made the difference in that

first year was the solid support we got from Tom MacAvoy. It was made clear to all of the

division general managers that produc tivity growth and cost reduction were top priorities.

From 2002 to 2007 engineers from the M&E Division participated in numerous projects

throughout Marvel involving the installation of new equipment and process changes. A typ ical

project might require 4 or 5 M&E engineers to work with a plant organization to install an

innovative conveyor system, possibly designed by the M&E Division. The installation project

might last 3 to 4 months and the M&E team would normally serve as consultants thereafter. In

addition to equipment projects and inter nal consulting, the M&E group participated in the

transfer of products from R&D to produc tion. After laboratory development and proto type

testing, new products were assigned to an M&E product team that designed any new equipment

required, and engineered and im plemented the new process. Leibson believed that successful

transfer required people who ap preciated both the development process and the problems of

production. In many respects M&E product teams served as mediators and trans lators; especially

in the first few projects, their primary task was to establish credibility with the R&D group and

with the manufacturing people in the operating divisions.

By 2006 M&E had conducted projects and helped to transfer new products in most of Marvel's

divisions, although its role in Indus trial Products remained limited. The manufac turing

organization in that division had been relatively strong and independent, but Leibson felt that the

reputation and expertise of his staff was increasing and that opportunities for col laboration were

not far off. He also felt that M&E was ready to take on a completely new responsibility-a

turnaround project. Occa sionally parts of a production process, even whole plants, would

experience deterioration in performance, sometimes lasting for several months with serious

competitive consequences. Leibson maintained that a concentrated appli cation of engineering

expertise could signifi cantly shorten the turnaround time and could have a measurable impact on

overall corporate productivity.

The X-Glass Project

The opportunity for M&E involvement in a major turnaround effort and for collaboration with

the Industrial Products Division came in late 2007. Since June of that year, yields on the X-Glass

process at the division's Bloomington plant had declined sharply. Sub stantial effort by the plant

organization failed to change the downward plunge in yields and in October, Oliver Williams,

director of manufac turing for Industrial Products, met with Leibson to establish an M&E project

at Blomington.

Williams, a chemical engineer with an MBA from N.Y.U. had been named director of

man ufacturing in November 2006, after 18 years in various engineering and operations positions

at Marvel. He felt that the product's importance (corporate expectations for X-Glass were great)

coupled with the seriousness of the problem warranted strong measures. Williams and Leib son

agreed that an M&E project team would work in the plant under the general supervision of a

review board composed of Leibson, Wil liams, Martin Abramson, Head of Process En gineering

in the M&E Division, and Bill Che nevert, head of M&E's equipment development group. The

team's charter was to increase yields, define and document the process, and train the oper ating

people. A budget, the team's size, specific goals, and a timetable were to be developed in the first

month of the team's operation.

Although the plant manager and his staff had not participated in the decision to bring in the

M&E team, Williams and Leibson agreed that their involvement and support were essential. A

decision was made to allocate all M&E charges to the Industrial Products Division to relieve the

plant of the extra overhead. More over, M&E specialists assigned to the project would be at the

plant full-time.

Since this was M&E's first turnaround proj ect, Leibson personally selected the team leader and

key project engineers. He easily found people willing to work on the project. Everyone in the

M&E group realized that turnarounds were the next major activity for the group and that those

working on the first team would be breaking new ground. Leibson chose Eric Da vidson to lead

the Harrisburg project. He was 32 years old with a master's degree in mechan ical engineering

from Cornell and six years of experience at Marvel. Davidson had com pleted several projects in

the M&E Division, including one in France , and had also worked as an assistant plant manager.

A close friend and colleague commented on Davidson's rep utation: "To say that Eric is on the

fast track is a bit of an understatement. He has been given one challenging assignment after

another and has been very successful. The word around M&E is that if you have a tough problem

you want solved, just give it to Eric and get out of the way."

Working under Leibson's direction, Davidson spent the first two weeks meeting with the plant

management and selecting members of the M&E team. At the outset, he chose four spe cialists to

work on the first phase of the proj ect - data collection and problem definition:

Richard Grebwell: 35 years old, an expert in sta tistical process analysis with 10 years at Marvel.

Although Grebwell was considered a bit eccentric by some, his characteristically brilliant use of

statistical analysis was vital to the project.

Jennifer Rigby: 28 years old, with a master's de gree in industrial engineering from the Univer sity

of Texas . She had worked in the Bloomington plant for six months on her first assignment at

Marvel.

Arthur Hopkins: 40 years old, a mechanical en gineer with 12 years at Marvel. Hopkins had

worked with Davidson on the French project and was, in Davidson's words, "a wizard with

equipment.”

Frank Arnoldus: 37 years old, a chemist with Marvel for six years, he also had worked on the

French project and had earned Davidson's admiration for his ability to solve processing

problems.

For the first two or three weeks Davidson planned to use the small group to identify prob lems

and then expand the team as specific tasks and subprojects were established. Focusing his

objectives on the long term, he explained:

I'm after increases in yields as soon as we can get them, but what I'm really shooting for is

permanent improvements in the pro cess. To do that we've got to define the process and document

its operation. My whole approach is based on the idea of re ceivership: whatever solutions we

come up with have to be received, or accepted, by the plant organization. And I mean really

accepted; they have to own the changes. That's why I will be taking a team ap proach - each

project we do will have two co-leaders, one from M&E (the transferrer) and one from the plant

(the receiver).

After a brief period to get acquainted and develop a plan, Davidson and his M&E team began

working in the plant on December 10, 2007.

X-Glass: Product and Process

X-Glass was Marvel's code name for a mul tilayered, compression-molded glass product that was

exceptionally strong and impact-resis tant for its weight. Its durability and hardness, combined

with its low weight and competitive cost, made it an attractive substitute for ceramic and plastic

products used in the construction and auto industries. Introduced in 2003, X-Glass products were

an immediate success. From 2003 to 2007 production capacity grew 35 to 40% annually yet

failed to meet demand. Many people thought that the array of products was only the beginning of

X-Glass applications.

To Marvel's knowledge, no other company in the world had yet developed the capability to make

a product like X-Glass and if one did, presumably it would have to license the tech nology from

Marvel. In fact, much of this technology was still an art form because nu merous characteristics

of most X-Glass products were not completely explainable in known glass technology: people

knew what it could do and roughly why it could do it, but were still utiliz ing trial-and-error

methods to perfect existing products and develop new ones.

Blackburn and his staff developed X-Glass during the early 2000s. The product was liter ally

Blackburn 's baby. He not only conceived the idea but, typical of the way Marvel oper ated before

the M&E Division was created, he and his staff solved numerous technical prob lems, built all the

machinery and equipment needed for prototype production, and even worked in the plant during

start-up. Further more, Blackburn had championed the product in discussions with top

management. Several times when the project faltered, his reputation and skills of persuasion

obtained the necessary funding. When yields began to fall in 2004, engineers at Bloomington had

consulted Black burn when necessary; he still felt responsible for the product and intimately

knew its nuances and subtleties.

The Process

Making X-Glass products consisted of three main steps: melting, molding, and finishing, which

were linked and had to be carried out in a fixed time sequence. The process required precise

control over the composition and thick nesses of the various glass layers, as well as careful timing

and monitoring during the mold ing and finishing operations. Maintaining this precision in a

high-volume environment re quired continuous, tight controls as well as a feel for the process.

Melting. The first step was the preparation of the different types of molten glass that composed

the various layers. These mixtures were pre pared in separate electrically heated vats, de signed

and built by Marvel. Each vat was carefully monitored to insure that the ingredients of the glass

were in correct proportion, evenly dis tributed throughout the vat, and at the appro priate

temperature.

The base layer was poured continuously onto a narrow (2 to 3 foot long) moving strip. The other

layers were poured on top of each other at precisely controlled intervals so that when the lay ered

strip arrived at the molding stage each layer of the multilayered glass sandwich was at the proper

temperature and thickness for mold ing. Minor (and, at the beginning of process development,

almost un-measurable) deviations from the recipe could lead to major problems, often requiring

ad hoc solutions utilizing the un-programmable skill of the operators and tech nicians.

Some problems were clearly identifiable with the melting operation. For example, the exis tence

of blisters (tiny bubbles in one or more of the glass layers), stones (un-melted bits of sand), and

streaks (imperfectly melted or mixed ingre dients) were visible and obvious indicators of

problems. Separation of the different layers, ei ther after the molding or after the finishing

op erations, often could also be traced to improper execution during melting. But when the glass

sandwich did not mold properly, there was usu ally some question as to which operation was at

fault.

A process engineer explained the difficulty of melting control:

The secret to avoiding problems at the melting state is maintaining its stability. Sometimes it's

easy to tell when something has gone wrong there, but more often you don't find out until

something goes wrong at a later stage. And usually it takes a long time to determine whether

you've really solved the problem or are simply treating a symptom of a larger problem. It's tough

to keep on top of what is going on in each of those melting vats because it's largely a chemical

operation.

Despite the difficulty of maintaining control over the melting operation and of correcting it when

problems developed, Marvel had been able to achieve yields as high as 95% at this stage of the

process.

Molding. In contrast to melting, molding was basically a physical operation: rectangles of the

soft glass sandwich were cut off the moving strip and moved onto a series of separated con veyor

belts. Each slab was inserted between the jaws of a compression-molding device that con tained

several molds for the particular parts being produced. After the parts were tamped out, they

continued down the conveyor line while the glass trim was discarded. Depending on the product

mix, several conveyors might pool their contents before the parts entered the finishing stage.

Despite the apparent simplicity of this pro cess (problems could be detected quickly and usually

corrected quickly), so many different problems arose and so many different variables could be

manipulated that it was generally con sidered to be even more difficult to control this stage than

the melting stage. Typical problems included the basic dimensional specifications of the product,

its edge configuration, and buck ling and flattening after molding. These prob lems, together with

machine downtime asso ciated both with correcting problems and changing the product mix,

made it difficult to achieve more than 80% efficiency (good output to rated machine capacity)

during this stage.

Finishing. The finishing operation consisted of heat treating the molded objects, then applying

one of several possible coatings. Heat treating stabilized the internal tensions generated by the

molding operation and appeared to improve the lamination between the various layers of the

glass sandwich. Since it required a precise se quence of temperatures and their duration, this

operation occurred as the objects passed on con veyor belts through long ovens. Cracks or layer

separation occurred infrequently, sometimes caused by the heat-treating operation.

The application of coatings, however, was more of a job-shop operation and could be done

off-line. There were numerous coatings that could be applied, from the practical (improving the

reflective, insulating, or electrical conduct ing properties of the surface) to the ornamental.

Sometimes decals were also applied either in place of or in addition to a coating. The selec tion of

coatings was steadily increasing, and one process engineer characterized the operation as "a

continual bother: lots of new processes and equipment, lots of short runs but a necessity to

maintain high speeds." The seldom-attained target yield was 95%.

The unique characteristics of the three stages made overall control and fine-tuning of the total

process quite difficult. The backgrounds and skills of the hot-end workers varied considera bly

from those at the cold end, and involved entirely separate branches of engineering. When

problems arose, many went undetected for some time, and often only appeared during

destructive testing of parts after they had com pleted the process. Then it was often difficult to

isolate which part of the process was at fault, because there appeared to be a high degree of

interrelation among them. And, finally, once a problem and its cause were identified, it

some times took a long period of trial-and-error fid dling until people could be convinced that it

was indeed corrected.

The Bloomington Plant

The decision to put X-Glass into the Bloomington plant had been based on its availability. Built

in 1988 and long devoted to the production of headlights and other auto products, the plant had

operated with excess capacity for several years in the late 1990s. In 2002 headlight production

was consolidated in the Farwell, Ohio, plant while Bloomington was set up for X-Glass

pro duction. Several of the production foremen and manufacturing staff members were

transferred to Farwell and replaced by individuals who had been involved in X-Glass prototype

production.

The Bloomington plant manager was Andrew MacTavish, a 54-year-old Scotsman. He came to

the United States shortly after the Vietnam War and began working at Marvel as a helper on a

shipping crew at the old main plant. Over the years, MacTavish had worked his way up through

various supervisory positions to pro duction superintendent and finally to plant manager. He was

a large man with a ruddy complexion and a booming voice. Although his temper was notorious,

most people who had worked with him felt that some of his tirades were more than a little

calculated. Whatever peoples' perceptions of his personality might be, there was no question

about who was in charge at Bloomington.

In mid - 2007 MacTavish had been at Bloomington for six years. From the beginning he had

developed a reputation as a champion of the little people as he called them. He wore what the

workers wore, and spent two to three hours each day on the factory floor talking with fore men,

supervisors, and production workers. If he had a philosophy of plant operations, it was to keep

management as close to the people as possible and to rely on the experience, judg ment, and skill

of his workers in solving prob lems.

The Bloomington plant was organized along de partment lines, with a production superinten dent

responsible for three general foremen who managed the melting, forming, and finishing

departments. Ron Lewis, production superin tendent, had come to the plant in 2005 after eight

years at Marvel. He was quietly efficient and had a good rapport with the foremen and

supervisors. Besides Lewis, three other man agers reported to MacTavish: Al Midgely, di rector of

maintenance and engineering, Arnie Haggstrom, director of production planning and inventory

control, and Royce Ferguson, head of personnel.

By June 2007 the management group at the Harrisburg plant had worked together for two years

and had established what MacTavish thought was a solid organization. He com mented to a

visitor in May 2007:

I've seen a lot of plant organizations in my time, but this one has worked better than any of them.

When we sit down in staff meetings every morning everyone is on top of their situation and

we've learned to get to the heart of our problems quickly. With the different personalities around

here you'd think it would be a dog fight, but these people really work together.

Of all the managers on his staff, MacTavish worked most closely with Midgely. Midgely, 46

years old, came to the plant with MacTavish, had a B.S. in mechanical engineering, and was

regarded as a genius when it came to equip ment. "He can build or fix anything," Mac Tavish

claimed. Midgely was devoted to MacTavish: "Ten years ago, Andy MacTavish saved my life. I

had some family problems after I lost my job at Bausch and. Lomb, but Andy gave me a chance

and helped me pick up the pieces. Everything I have l owe to him." Sev eral people in the

Bloomington plant gratefully acknowledged MacTavish's willingness to help his people.

M&E Project at Bloomington

Davidson's top priority in the first two weeks of the project was to define the problem. Over all

yields had declined, but no one had analyzed available information to identify the major causes.

The M&E group believed that the plant organization had spent its time on fire fighting during the

past six months with little overall direction. Grebwell analyzed the historical data collected by

the production control department. Other team members spent this time familiar izing themselves

with the process, meeting with their counterparts in the plant organization, and meeting together

to compare notes and develop hypotheses about what was going on.

One problem surfaced immediately: the rel ative inexperience of the department supervi sors. As

MacTavish explained to them, four of the six supervisors had been in the plant less than nine

months. The people they replaced had been with the X-Glass process since its pro totype days.

MacTavish felt that part of the ex planation for the decline in yields was the de parture of experts.

He expressed confidence in the new people and indicated that they were rapidly becoming quite

knowledgeable.

Grebwell's preliminary statistical work pointed to the molding department as the primary source

of defects, with melting the second major source. The team identified four areas for immediate

attention: overall down time, trim settings, glass adhesion, and layer separation. As Grebwell's

work proceeded, other projects in other departments were iden tified and staff members were

added to the team. By mid-January it was evident that the overall project would have to

encompass activ ities throughout the plant. It was decided that the only way to measure

performance equitably was to use overall yield improvement. A time table for improved yields

was established and approved by the review board in late January 2008.

Davidson commented on the first six weeks of the project:

Our initial reception in the plant was lukewarm. People were a little wary of us at first, but we

did establish a pretty good relationship with Ron Lewis and some of the people in the production

control group. I was confident that with time we could work together with MacTavish and people

in other departments, but I wasn't as confi dent that the problems themselves could be solved. My

objective was to obtain long -term improvements by defining and docu menting the process, but

when I arrived I found an inadequate data base and a pro cess more complex than anyone had

imagined.

Davidson encountered resistance to the very idea of process documentation. The view of

MacTavish and others in the plant was aptly summarized by Blackburn, who appeared in

Bloomington off and on throughout the first three months of the M&E project. On one such visit

he took Davidson into a conference room to converse:

Blackburn [after drawing on the blackboard]: Do you know what this is? This is a corral and

inside the corral is a bucking bronco. Now what do you suppose this is?

Davidson: It looks like a cowboy with a book in his hand.

Blackburn : That's right, sonny, it's a green horn cowboy trying to learn how to ride a bucking

bronco by reading a book. And that's just what you are trying to do with all your talk about

documentation. And you'll end right where that greenhorn is going to end up-flat on your face.

Conflict Emerges

Following the review board's acceptance of the proposed timetable, Davidson intended to create

subproject teams, with an M&E specialist and a plant representative as co-leaders. Despite

Blackburn 's lecture, Davidson pressed ahead with plans for process definition and

documen tation. A key element of the program was the development of instrumentation to collect

in formation on the critical operating variables (glass temperature, machine speeds, timing, and so

forth). Beginning in early January, Ar noldus had spent three weeks quietly observing the process,

asking questions of the operators, and working on the development of instru ments. He had

decided to debug and confirm the systems on one production line (there were five separate lines

in the plant) before transfer ring the instruments to other lines.

The instrumentation project was scheduled to begin on February 1, with the installation of

sensors to monitor glass temperature in the molding process. No plant representative for the

project had been designated by that time, however, and Davidson postponed the instal lation. A

series of meetings between Davidson and MacTavish followed, but not until two days before the

next review board meeting on February 23 were plant representatives for each subproject chosen.

Even then, things did not go smoothly. Arnoldus described his experi ence:

I didn't want to impose the instrumenta tion program on the people; I wanted them to understand

that it was a tool to help them do their jobs better. But I had a terri ble time getting Hank Gordel

(the co-leader of the project team) to even talk to me. He claimed he was swamped with other

things. The thing of it is, he was busy. The plant engineering group had several projects of their

own going, and those people were working 15 hours a day. But I knew there was more to it than

that when I started hearing people refer to the M&E team as spies. After a while, people stopped

talking to me and even avoided me in elevators and the cafeteria.

The other subprojects suffered a similar fate. The only team to make any progress was the group

working on materials control. Ron Lewis thought the program was a good one and sup ported it;

he had appointed one of his better supervisors to be co-leader. In the other areas of the plant,

however, little was accomplished. Attempts to deal informally (lunch, drinks after work) with

people in the plant organization failed, and Davidson's meetings with Mac Tavish and his requests

for support were fruit less. Indeed, MacTavish viewed the M&E team as part of the problem. He

forcefully expressed himself in a meeting with Davidson in late March 2008:

I've said right from the beginning that this yield problem is basically a people prob lem. My

experienced production people were promoted out from under me, and it has taken a few months

for the new people to get up to speed. 'But this kind of thing is not going to happen again. I've

been work ing on a supervisor backup training pro gram that will give me some bench strength.

I’m not saying we don’t have problems. I know there are problems with the process, but the way

to solve them is to get good people and give them some room. What this process needs now is

some stability. Last year two new products were introduced and this year I’ve got you and your

engineers out there with your experiments and your projects, fiddling around with my equipment

and bothering my people.

And then there’s Blackburn . He blows in here with some crazy idea and goes right out there on

the floor, and gets the operators to let him try out his latest scheme. The best thing for this plant

right now would be for all of you to just get out and let us get this place turned around.

I am convinced we can do it. In fact, we’ve already been doing it. You’ve seen the data for the

past 12 weeks. Yields have been increasing steadily and we’re now above the average for last

year. While you people have been making plans and writing memos, we’ve been solving the

problem.

Resolving the Crisis

Davidson sat at his desk in the Bloomington plant on March 24, 2008, and reviewed the events

of the last three months. He realized that he also had been guilty of excessive fire fighting, and

had not taken the time to step back from the situation and plot out a course of action. The

situation demanded careful thought.

He was genuinely puzzled by the recent improvement in yield performance; since the M&E team

had done very little beyond data analysis the improvement must have come from else where. All

his training and experience sup ported the concept of definition and documen tation, but he had

never encountered such a complex process. Perhaps MacTavish was right, but he just couldn't

bring himself to be lieve that.

Several options came to mind as he thought of ways to resolve the crisis; none of them were

appealing. He could go to Leibson and WilIiams and ask, perhaps demand, that Mac Tavish be

replaced with someone more support ive. He could continue to try to build alliances with

supporters in the plant (there were a few such people) and get a foothold in the organi zation. Or

he could develop a new approach to the problem (perhaps new people) and attempt to win over

MacTavish. Davidson knew that his handling of this situation could have impor tant

consequences for the M&E Division, for the company, and for the careers of several people, his

included.