HIGH TECH ROCHESTER MANUFACTURING CONSULTANTS RECEIVE NATIONAL RECOGNITIONOrlando, FL – Michael Sisson of High Tech Rochester, Donald Albright of Penfield-based Operations Consulting Service and two members of Virginia’s A.L. Philpott Manufacturing Extension Partnership organization. The team was honored for its work in developing and delivering the ongoing Lean Manufacturing training program with the American Red Cross Biomedical Services Division.
The award was presented at the MEP National Conference, held in Orlando this week and attended by over 300 MEP consultants as well as industry and government officials. Nationally, the MEP organization consists of nearly 800 manufacturing specialists located in 443 offices across all 50 states and Puerto Rico.
The Practitioner of the Year award is given to “individuals whose specialized contributions have made a significant impact on the MEP system.” In this case, the award recognizes the importance to national health of the program now underway. Specific goals targeted by the initiative are based on HTR’s earlier work with the Red Cross in Rochester and include:
· Improving blood collection efficiency and reducing the time required of donors
· Improving the effectiveness of scheduling and processing donors, thus increasing the system’s capacity
· Providing all Red Cross centers with standardized procedures which can be further improved over time
Mr. Krause, Mr. Sisson and Mr. Albright have been working with the Red Cross’ blood processing facility on John Street in Henrietta since 2003. During that time, they have trained Red Cross personnel in Lean Manufacturing techniques and helped refine procedures for collecting, processing and testing blood products.
Recognizing the value of this work, Red Cross management in Washington, DC, decided to undertake a national Lean Training initiative across all 35 regional Biomedical Services units. The HTR/Operations Consulting team is providing expert guidance in the application of Lean to Red Cross processes, while the Virginia MEP works with Red Cross headquarters and other MEP centers across the country to schedule and deliver customized Lean training events. The national Red Cross effort is managed by Ann Saunders of Rochester, Vice President of Process Excellence, and Jennifer Ralston of Washington, DC, Director of Process Improvement at Red Cross’ Washington headquarters,
In most of their consulting engagements, MEP centers work with individual manufacturers in their local areas. However, occasionally programs are developed to deliver services at the local facilities of national organizations. These programs are an extremely efficient way to improve U.S. manufacturing by leveraging the experience gained in one company division across a large number of similar units. The current Red Cross initiative is the first such program to be developed by a New York-based MEP center.
This award marks the second consecutive year that Mr. Krause has been honored by the national MEP organization. In 2007, Dick was named “Innovator of the Year” for his work in promoting and implementing the “Green Supplier” system of productivity and waste assessments, coupled with New York state grant funds to execute waste reduction projects.
