At about my third year on the local school board, we would have executive sessions on personnel and it would be brought up that certain teachers were not competent--or at least not doing well. Some of us on the board had business backgrounds, so we asked why they didn't non-renew (fire) them. Well, came the reply, they have had consistently good reviews even though they haven't been doing well. This happened quite a few times.
We had to counsel school administrators to begin following rigorous personnel policies. They needed to identify the failing teachers. Meet with them, let them know that they were not meeting expectations, let them know clearly what the expectations were, lay out a plan to help them improve, and then let them go if they didn't.
This is not as heartless as it may sound. You've hired these people. At one time, anyway, someone thought they could do the job. If they don't, you give them a fair chance. It's like I told a couple of engineers in my life as a manager, "It's really better for both of us. You can go find a situation in which you can succeed. I can get someone who can do this job." It also took them out of a situation where they were foundering. Everyone could see they were lost.
Good leaders will turn around many, if not most, people. But sometimes you just have to give them the proverbial kick in the pants to wake them up to make decisions to find a better situation. I've had that decision several times--and it never got easy. I'd lose sleep for a week. On the other hand, once I tangled with my boss (and his boss) and was asked to leave. I think I sang in the car on the way home,, I was so happy to leave that place. (I never applied for a quality manger job again, either.)
So, did the school system do the right thing? If they fired the principal, too, then perhaps they did. Giving everyone a fresh start is sometimes a good thing.
]]>The Accenture Life Safety Solution uses Wi-Fi technology in plant environments to alert central controllers of incidents and of workers' locations. It is designed for hazardous working environments such as refineries, chemical plants and other locations, where dense steel infrastructure can make wireless safety solutions difficult to introduce.
Marathon Oil Corp.’s Robinson, Ill refinery is deploying the Accenture Life Safety Solution across two units in the facility. Marathon intends to further evaluate the use of this technology once the two units have been completed.
“The refining industry has not been able to use wireless networks to remotely detect hazards or remotely locate workers,” said Jerry Welch, senior vice president of Marathon’s refining organization. "This solution not only alerts on-site individuals to gas incidents but would also allow off-site colleagues to locate workers and rescue them if an event were to occur. The cost effectiveness of this solution has the potential to transform on-site safety in our industry and should be relevant to many other sectors.”
]]>This is not your father’s “shop class” but rather learning a series of interrelated activities and operations that involve product design, planning, producing, materials control, quality assurance, management, and the marketing of that product. In executing its master plan for building a technically-skilled workforce, the SME Education Foundation is raising the bar for high school students with a $175,000 in funding for the introduction of Computer Integrated Manufacturing (CIM) Centers at 400 Project Lead The Way (PLTW) schools across the country while engaging industry partners and SME Chapters.
The CIM course, rewritten by the Foundation’s industry partner, PLTW, enhances students’ computer modeling skills by applying the principles of robotics and automation to the creation of three-dimensional design models. The course will be offered at 65 PLTW high schools, reaching 2,000 students in 25 states where CIM classes are currently taught. Funded states include: Alabama, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Washington, and Wisconsin.
The Foundation’s funding criteria provides up to $5,000 per school based on the number of years the CIM program has been taught, and granting the total amount or fifty percent, depending on the financial situation at the school, with either the school or an industry partner paying the other half.
The Foundation will begin working with industry advisory boards already established at each of the PLTW high schools – some of whom are manufacturers, and engage these companies and SME Chapters in setting up the new Computer Integrated Manufacturing Education Centers at high schools, asking them to serve as mentors and offer internships.
The CIM course is based on several key concepts: Computer Modeling using a three-dimensional, solid modeling software package with mass property analysis; CNC Equipment – understanding the machine tools and its operating and programming aspects; CAM Software – converting computer generated geometry into a program to drive CNC machine tools; Robotics – using a robot for material handling and assembly operations, and Flexible Manufacturing Systems – working in teams to design manufacturing work cells and table-top factory simulations.
Says Bart Aslin, director, SME Education Foundation, “The complex, high tech processes of advanced manufacturing today calls for a highly-trained, skilled workforce, making the funding of our CIM program critically important to the economic future of our country.”
In one section of the course, “Designing for Manufacturability,” high school students learn, while at a very impressionable age, that manufacturers have an ethical responsibility to create safe products and to provide a safe work environment. They also learn manufacturers have a legal responsibility to provide safety information about their products, about following a code of conduct or code of ethics, and how to analyze case studies of engineering failures in order to avoid future failures.
The Foundation is also sponsoring the course at pre-existing partner schools in Charlotte, N.C., and Lee’s Summit, Mo. The Lee’s Summit R-7 School District’s Summit Technology Academy, Lee’s Summit, Mo. was funded on Feb. 16 for the creation of its first CIM laboratory serving students in the Kansas City region.
As next generation products continue to develop, parts for combat vehicles, molds for passenger jets, components for solar dishes, the demand for technically skilled workers is a given. In order to increase student awareness and encourage them to prepare for these jobs, the Foundation will also introduce students to the myriad career opportunities in advanced manufacturing through an upper-level high school program, the sMe Institute (summer Manufacturing institute).
According to a new study published by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE), “As a group, graduates with computer-related degrees (computer programming, computer science, computer systems analysis, and information sciences/systems) posted a 6.1 percent salary increase—the highest reported in the Winter 2010 Salary Survey, which pushed their average up from $56,128 to $59,570.
]]>So, now there is a big battle between the politicians from Alabama and Washington about the never-ending conflict (and you thought the ISA100 thing was long-lasting) about who will build the new/old tanker for the US Air Force. One builder/bidder is a consortium led by a European company, although they pieced together some US companies and will build the tanker in Alabama. The other bidder is Boeing. All American (I think).
Now I get a press release from one of my US Senators opposing US money for the giant wind farm in Texas to generate lots of clean energy. No, he's not the Republican--he's the Democrat (we have one of each from Ohio just proving we're bi-polar). Reason? Too much Chinese content in the windmills.
I'm getting press releases from corporate CEOs--usually never accused of being flaming liberals--either positioning the company to get as much Federal money as possible or asking the Federal government to do something to boost manufacturing. Note: The Federal government either spends money or creates regulation. Some of it is good, some is debateable. But that's about it.
Anyway--hey, welcome to a global economy people. And, let's not wait for the government to do something. Politicians get elected with the economy as a factor. But they really don't have much to do with it. It's people starting businesses, serving needs, making money. That's what we're here for. Boosting manufacturing, not by waiting for someone else. No one ever got rich waiting for someone else.
]]>CSIA adds first Chinese member. Hollysys of Beijing has joined the Control Systems Integrators Association. Jack Yu, international business director, will attend the annual CSIA Executive Summit April 29 to May 1 in Seattle.
Safety
TUV Qualified Safety Package. There will be more in the March issue of Automation World, but Altera Corp. of San Jose, Calif. has gained acceptance from TUV Rheinland of a pre-qualified development tool chain that includes safety manuals and safety intellectual property cores. The base product includes FPGAs with certified tools.
Speaking of safety, ABB is touting global growth of its Safety Execution Centers--expanding from eight centers to twenty centers over the past four years. These centers provide customers with local resources for safety instrumented system (SIS) design, engineering and project execution, as well as access to resident safety standards experts and technology experts. In total, this global team includes more than 500 TÜV certified and ABB technology certified safety engineers. It claims to have more safety centers with TÜV certification for Functional Safety Management System (FSMS) delivery and implementation than any other supplier in the industry.
In late 2009, ABB Safety Execution Centers in Beijing and Shanghai, China and Bangalore, India were certified by TÜV as having in place and applying an FSMS for delivery and implementation of safety system projects in accordance to international industry standards. ABB also recently announced that its Safety Execution Center Buenos Aires, Argentina was certified by TÜV. Other TÜV certified centers are located in Denmark, Germany, Italy Singapore, and the United Kingdom.
One more safety information piece comes from Beckhoff, which has introduced TwinSafe Terminals for the EtherCat I/O system. Rated for SIL 3 and conforming to IEC 61508 and EN ISO 13849-1 PL e, TwinSafe Terminals for EtherCAT are certified for use throughout North America. EL6900 safety PLC terminal can integrate up to 128 4-channel safety terminals (512 safety devices) and is capable of processing 256 safety-relevant function blocks. The safety function blocks integrated into the EL6900 Safety PLC are configured according to each unique application. In this way, safety functions such as emergency stop, safety door monitoring, two-hand control, serial/parallel muting, timers and latches can be easily programmed. Even a connection shutdown function can be established so interchangeable sections of equipment with safety terminals installed can be removed from the machine without causing safety system errors.
Products
In product news, N-Tron Corp. <> announced six new models of fully managed industrial Ethernet switches. Housed in compact, hardened enclosures, the 709FX, 710FX2, 711FX3, 712FX4, 714FX6 and 7010TX were designed to provide maximum performance in harsh industrial environments.
Product highlights include:
• -40°C to 70°C Operating temperature
• Rugged DIN-Rail Enclosure
• ESD and Surge Protection Diodes on all Ports
• Redundant Power Inputs 10-49VDC
• Configurable Bi-Color Fault Status LED
• Store-and-forward Technology
• Onboard Temperature Sensor
• SD Memory Card Configuration Backup (optional)
Invensys Operations Management announced that its Wonderware IntelaTrac mobile solution has achieved Enterprise Mobility validation through Motorola's Enterprise Mobility Validated Solution Program. The IntelaTrac solution is a mobile workforce and decision support system. Featuring configurable software and ruggedized mobile hardware, it enables better workflow, procedural and general task management focused on plant operations, maintenance management, production tracking and compliance applications.
The mobile component of the IntelaTrac application can operate with a wide variety of hardware from Motorola, which is available through the Wonderware brand as a part of a customer’s purchase of the system. These products include the MC55 and MC70 Enterprise Digital Assistants (EDA) and MC9090 family of mobile computers.
Motorola’s Enterprise Mobility Validated Solutions Program enables partners to test and validate their mobility solutions on Motorola products to help ensure interoperability and meet the application-specific needs of customers, as well as reduce risk and time to deployment.
]]>He takes examples from the life of Moses--the guy who led the Hebrews out of Egypt. Can you imagine the leadership problem of organizing a huge group of people, in the desert, with no experience in governing themselves, probably no real knowledge of how to live in the desert, wondering where they were going--and why, and the settling the disputes that inevitably arise when lots of people are in a small space? Wow.
A few of the thoughts (you've got to read the whole thing to get the impact): admit that working nonstop is unsustainable; understand your unique calling; select qualified leaders to assist you; give these leaders responsibility and authority; and only do those things which others cannot do.
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