Featured Presenters
This global virtual conference provides the insights of an elite group of international thought and industry leaders bringing you examples of successful improvement practices from world-class organizations in managing continuous improvement.
Ahmed Al-Ashaab, Ph.D., LeanPPD Technical Coordinator, Cranfield University
Ahmed Al-Ashaab is the technical coordinator and leads the research team for the LeanPPD project at Cranfield University. He also is senior lecturer in the Department of Manufacturing and Materials. Al-Ashaab has been an active researcher in the areas of concurrent engineering, knowledge-based engineering, lean product development and performance measurement. His research projects have a strong focus on industrial applications. He has 18 years of research and teaching experience in Mexico, Colombia, France and the United Kingdom. Al-Ashaab is the author or co-author of more than 45 research papers and has supervised more than 50 master’s and doctoral degree theses. His current industrial collaborators are Airbus, Rolls-Royce, Visteon, GETRAG and CEMEX.
Howard Conroy, Director of Industrial Engineering and Asset Management, BDS Supply and Operations Chain, The Boeing Company
Howard Conroy is the director of industrial engineering and asset management for the BDS Supply and Operations Chain within The Boeing Company. He formerly served as BDS director of asset utilization from June 2010 through September 2011. During his 32 years at The Boeing Company, Conroy has held many positions. He was director of operations global services & support; operations and site director for Phoenix/Mesa Gateway; operations director of the C-130 gunship program in Crestview, Fla.; production engineering and material support director AH-64D Apache Longbow; director of Apache production assembly and support; and director of Rotorcraft Materials Management. Conroy began his career as a methods analyst on the 767 jetliner program in Everett, Wash., in 1980. Some of Conroy’s career highlights with Boeing include leading the successful effort to implement the Apache final assembly “pulse moving line,” which won the prestigious Shingo Award, mentoring and coaching the El Segundo Satellite Management team with their initial journey in lean, and successful re-establishment of the Material Management organization in Philadelphia. Conroy holds a B.S. in industrial technology from Central Connecticut State College and an MBA from the University of Phoenix.
Peter Hines, Professor and Co-Founder, Lean Enterprise Research Centre
Professor Peter Hines is the co-founder of the Lean Enterprise Research Centre (LERC) at Cardiff Business School. He has undertaken extensive research into lean thinking and is the author of more than 100 papers and books including the Shingo Prize-winning book Staying Lean, first published in 2008. Hines is chairman of S A Partners, a specialist consultancy organization operating in the United States, United Kingdom, Ireland and Australia. In 2012, Hines also launched a new portal at www.LeanBusinessSystem.com to help his 70,000 LinkedIn group members to be able to learn, share and grow faster on their respective lean journeys. He also continues his academic links with his adjunct professorship at the University of South Australia and associate role at LERC.
Jeffrey K. Liker, Ph.D., Professor, University of Michigan
Jeffrey K. Liker is a professor of industrial and operations engineering at the University of Michigan and president of Liker Lean Advisors. He is the author of the international best-seller, The Toyota Way: 14 Management Principles from the World’s Greatest Manufacturer (26 languages, more than 750,000 copies sold) and has co-authored six other books about Toyota: The Toyota Way Fieldbook, The Toyota Product Development System, Toyota Talent: Developing Exceptional People the Toyota Way, and Toyota Culture: The Heart and Soul of the Toyota Way. His three books in 2011 are The Toyota Way to Continuous Improvement, Toyota under Fire: Lessons for Turning Crisis into Opportunity, and The Toyota Way to Lean Leadership: Achieving and Sustaining Excellence through Leadership Development. On 11 occasions, his articles and books have won the Shingo Prize for Research Excellence. He is a frequent keynote speaker and consultant.
Stephen R. Mayfield, Ph.D., Vice President Performance Excellence, Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian
Stephen R. Mayfield is vice president for performance excellence at Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian. Mayfield previously served as senior vice president at the American Hospital Association and worked with hospitals and health systems across the country. He created the AHA Quality Center, which grew into the permanent strategic platform Hospitals in Pursuit of Excellence (HPOE). A key component of improving enterprise performance is an engaged workforce, and Mayfield contributed to the development of the guide Using Workforce Practices to Drive Quality Improvement from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). He has directed the National Patient Safety Leaders Fellowship and served on the AHRQ Technical Expert Panel for the development of the just-released Quality Improvement Toolkit. His work focus areas include the implementation of quality management systems, including ISO 9001 that align organizational efforts for improved performance and transparency, and the applications of lean/Six Sigma methods to reduce costs of poor quality while improving work flow and patient flow.
Arturo (Art) Muniz, Senior Staff Manager - U.S. Industrial Engineering, UPS
As a senior staff manager, Art Muniz is responsible for the industrial engineering support for UPS’s U.S. Domestic Transportation network. His group provides strategic direction for domestic and some international transportation activities. The team manages organizational performance and directs quality improvement initiatives, constantly looking for opportunities to improve service and reduce operating expense. Muniz previously held operations and engineering assignments in various regions in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, South America, and the Caribbean. He received his B.S. in industrial engineering from the University of Miami. Muniz has been with UPS since his college years and is now celebrating his 33rd year of service.
Sreekanth Ramakrishnan, Ph.D., Engineer and Scientist, IBM
Sreekanth Ramakrishnan is an advisory engineer, scientist and a learning specialist with IBM Learning (CHQ, Human Resources), based in Waltham, Mass. In this role, he has global responsibilities for facilitating business transformation across IBM Corp. by enabling process excellence through lean practices and organizational culture change. He is a certified lean master and lean Six Sigma black belt. He has won international awards such as the 2011 IIE Lean Best Practice Award and the 2012 SEMS Management Award. Ramakrishnan has an M.S. and a Ph.D. in industrial and systems engineering from the Department of Systems Science and Industrial Engineering at Binghamton University. He has four patents, has more than 40 publications in reputed conferences and has spoken at numerous conferences, webinars and universities. He is a member of IIE, the Society for Engineering and Management Systems (SEMS), IEEE and the American Society for Engineering Management (ASEM). He serves on the board of directors of IIE’s Logistics and Supply Chain Division and SEMS.
Durward K. Sobek II, Ph.D., Professor, Montana State University
Durward K. Sobek II is a professor and program coordinator of industrial engineering at Montana State University and board chair of the Lean Product and Process Development Exchange Inc. He holds M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in industrial and operations engineering from the University of Michigan, and an A.B. degree in engineering sciences from Dartmouth College. Sobek has been researching lean product development and lean healthcare for more than a decade, focusing on how organizations can increase their performance capacity through the application of lean principles. He is a frequent presenter and has published numerous articles in publications such as Harvard Business Review, Sloan Management Review, and IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management. He is co-author of the prologue to Allen Ward’s seminal book, Lean Product and Process Development, and is co-author of the Shingo Prize winning-book Understanding A3 Thinking: A Critical Component of Toyota's PDCA Management System.
Joan Tafoya, Principal Engineer, Intel
Joan Tafoya is a senior principal engineer in ATM and a 21-plus-year veteran of Intel Corp. with experience in all aspects of semiconductor manufacturing, including wafer fabrication, package assembly and unit test. Her field of interest is industrial engineering/manufacturing science. Manufacturing science is the application of math, science and systemic thinking to improve the effectiveness and efficiency in manufacturing by reducing variation, including all aspects of equipment, labor, materials and work-in-process flow. Tafoya has worked in the United States, China, Vietnam and Malaysia leading manufacturing improvements across the Intel factory network and equipment suppliers utilizing factory physics concepts with lean thinking to realize improvements in capital efficiency, capital and capacity planning business processes, and manufacturing effectiveness. She has a B.S. in computer science from Arizona State University and an M.S. in industrial engineering from Stanford University.