Does your current process fail to meet expectations, which leads to frustration and disappointment on your team? That’s far from a competitive advantage. Agree? Then keep reading. What most onboarding processes get wrong is that they don’t create the right expectations. Newcomers are frequently thrown into the deep end from day one, left to navigate their responsibilities without guidance. This leads to the oft-used phrase, “Feeling burnt out”. Frustration, stress, and confusion are typically the

Would you agree with the following statement: success leaves clues? How do we better engage and train our middle managers, who so often are, the lifeline and one of the most important cogs in the manufacturing wheel? In our latest edition of “Engineering 365” we will pick up the clues left behind by one of the most exceptional places to work, Stryker, a global medical device manufacturer. I’m a huge fan of looking at what

Last week, I spoke with a CHRO and COO about the importance of understanding the phase an organization is in when hiring key strategic executive roles. Imagine a startup, just out of the gate, with ideas and energy to last for days, but craving direction. Or picture a company hitting its growth spurt, expanding faster than ever, hungry for structure to manage its new size. Maybe there’s a manufacturer in the midst of a major

Allow me to paint a recent scenario: The President of a manufacturing facility had been stepping into the Plant Manager role over the past 9 months because they couldn’t identify the right style of leadership for the position. The goal was to promote from within, but the internal search revealed no candidates ready to revitalize the culture and spearhead lean strategies. This is where we stepped in… Creating a successful lean implementation at a turnaround

We’re back with another edition of “Engineering 365”. I hope everyone enjoyed the weekend and is in good spirits as we kick off the new week. Over the weekend, I had an “aha” leadership moment that I want to share. Buckle up because we’re about to dig into some leadership wisdom inspired by my Spotify playlist. Go Hard or Stay Home Picture this: I was driving to get some food with my wife, and I decided

We recently asked our LinkedIn network to participate in a survey where we asked for the top HR priorities over the next 6 – 12 months. With over 350 respondents, the overwhelming majority selected “Leadership and Management Development” as a main area of focus in 2024. This edition of “Engineering 365” addresses this critical gap in the market by drawing on the timeless wisdom of “The New One Minute Manager” by Ken Blanchard. “The New

Let’s talk about the elephant in (all) rooms. There will always be implicit and explicit expectations. In our journey to build thriving organizations and teams, clarity is paramount. From the initial hiring process to the ongoing development of leaders, ensuring that expectations are explicit and measurable is not just beneficial – it’s essential. Unspoken, undefined, or unmeasured expectations will often lead to frustration, and resentment, and could cause your best and brightest to run for

Recently a Director of Operations shared with me where they believed the issues on the team began. Poor performers forced them to have to bring on an intern from the local college, hire a 3rd party consultant, and the VP of Ops had to dedicate time out of his day to take on additional tasks. This inevitably created a backlog of work as they were taking time away from their most critical projects to make

Do you feel like you always see the same 2-3 TED talks in your Youtube recommendations? How about the LinkedIn newsletter recommendations that don’t apply to your industry or interests?  If you’re a content junkie, like myself, who is always looking for inspiration, insights, and fresh perspectives to elevate your organization or personal learning and development, this one is for you. In this week’s newsletter, I will share 4 TED talks and 2 newsletters that

I was talking to a client last week, and after 3 weeks of progress updates on a retained search for an Engineering leader, we were closing out a shortlist and agreeing to an interview scheduled for 2 candidates. I came off the Teams meeting, and I caught myself thinking, “I thoroughly enjoy working with this client!” Why? Because not all clients are created equal, I will highlight what I think makes a good, if not