A Brilliant Invention

In my early corporate days at Thomasville Furniture, I was given the opportunity to try many things to improve the performance and quality of the operation. This story isn’t about me, but another engineer, who came up with something so creative, he saved the company millions of dollars and improved quality of the product for our customers.

With Persistence and Desire, Anything is Possible

I started working for Thomasville Furniture out of college as an Industrial Engineer. Born and raised in Maryland and working in North Carolina, I was called “Yankee,” and I had to prove myself worthy every day. I felt like I was up for the challenge. My mother reminded me I was born south of the Mason Dixon line, but it didn’t seem to matter to North Carolina natives.

The Pursuit of Creativity

In my years of running Kaizen events, I never saw anything as powerful as a creativity approach called 3P – Production Preparation Process. The goal is to eliminate waste in the design of a new or existing process or product in the maximum way possible, unlocking the creativity of the team in ways most of them have not experienced. In 2016 I was fortunate enough to experience this approach through the eyes of the man who invented it, Chihiro Nakao.

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