Innovation
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The Happiest I’ve Ever Made a Customer
- February 19, 2025
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Business, Innovation
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I’ve been answering questions this month about the angriest a customer has ever been at us or the biggest career mistake I’ve ever made. So now let’s talk about how happy I’ve made a customer. Years ago, Texas utility companies were offering big credits and rebates to their customers for switching out their old industrial
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How to Recognize and Avoid Leadership Blind Spots
- December 26, 2024
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Innovation, Leadership, Management
Your leadership journey can certainly be derailed by unseen obstacles and leadership blind spots. These are the areas where your perceptions or behaviors don’t align with reality. We all have them, and if you think you don’t have them, well, there’s one right there. It’s like the scene from Catch-22 where Yossarian tells Appleby, “‘You’ve
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How to Cultivate a Growth Mindset Across Your Team
- December 18, 2024
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Business, Innovation, Management
“Growth mindset” is not just a trendy leadership buzzword. I mean, it is a trendy leadership buzzword, but it’s also a new leadership philosophy that works for most companies, regardless of industry, function, or size. It means that you see your team not as a collection of cogs in a machine but as a group
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Advanced Strategies for Creating a Lean Manufacturing System
- July 24, 2024
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Digital Transformation, Innovation, Manufacturing
You’re no doubt already familiar with lean manufacturing, as it’s now one of the most common manufacturing philosophies today. And even if you haven’t, you’ve heard about its core principles: reducing waste, improving efficiency, and maximizing your value to the customers. But lean is more than just eliminating waste or Jack Sprat’s wife’s dietary restrictions.
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Creating a Sustainable Manufacturing Operation
- July 17, 2024
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Innovation, Manufacturing
Sustainable manufacturing is no longer a buzzword, it’s a business imperative. It’s about balancing environmental responsibility, economic viability, and social equity. It means fulfilling your fiduciary responsibilities to your associates and your customers. It means avoiding harming the environment and earning expensive and painful fines and penalties. And it means being good corporate and business
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Building a Winning Team: Continuous Improvement and Development
- July 7, 2024
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Business, Innovation, Measurement, Productivity
Every manager dreams of building a winning team. Every boss dreams of having a winning department. Every sergeant dreams of commanding a winning squad. Members doing the high-quality work that needs to be done, fulfilling every function, completing every pass, every play, every task, every order, and functioning as a single unit with a single
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How to Stay Competitive in a Global Market
- April 24, 2024
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Innovation, Management
We are truly in a global market these days, and the cost of production in the United States makes cheaper overseas production much more attractive to a lot of buyers. Despite the push to “Buy American” and other campaigns, overseas manufacturers are slashing costs and paying their workers a less-than-optimal wage. That makes it a
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Use Inside and Outside Experts for a Major Undertaking
- September 13, 2023
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Innovation, Leadership
Manufacturing CEOs and COOs often deal with company-wide changes and projects that can affect how the entire business operates. One question we often dealt with at Robroy was whether to enlist the services of external experts during these challenges. The decision to bring in outside expertise can be a game-changer. There were times, like when
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Adopt a change management strategy when going through a major undertaking
- September 6, 2023
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Digital Transformation, Innovation, Leadership
Years ago, when I worked at Robroy, our company never had a proper warehouse management system — software that tracked our inventory and helped us know what we needed to order and what we had too much of. Our raw materials and our products would just sit on the floor and oftentimes got damaged. Not
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How Can Leaders Prepare for Changes in Modern Manufacturing?
- August 23, 2023
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Digital Transformation, Innovation, Manufacturing
The modern manufacturing industry is undergoing seismic shifts, especially in the last decade. But adapting to these shifts isn’t optional — it’s critical if you’re going to survive and succeed. So how do you navigate these changes without losing your way? How can a modern leader adapt to the changes in modern manufacturing? Do you