Lotus Notes provides a standard application known as the “Project TeamRoom,” which is quite useful for project teams to organize their documents and activities; however, it has some limitations that restrict its usefulness. Everyone has a slightly different opinion regarding how a tool of this type ought to work, yet many are reluctant to sanction the modification of a “standard” tool.

Directed and managed the ongoing effort to identify and then add needed features. The team made them configurable, so that those who did not want them were not forced to have them, and also added anticipated features that turned out to be much appreciated. None of this affected the application’s out-of-the-box functionality.

Sparked approximately 10% time saving for the members and managers of 80+ project teams. The fact that more than 80 teams, from all business units, chose to use this particular tool speaks volumes about its general usefulness.

Product and process changes need to be approved by as many as 50 people before they can be implemented. The system for obtaining these approvals was a very labor-intensive paper system, requiring storage and management of large amounts of paper and much manual followup from Corporate QA. System needed to be automated, but resistance existed because some people just like to see the “paper trail” and others are not comfortable with electronic signatures.

Led team that defined and built an application to manage and collect electronic signatures for those approvals, and automatically assist with routine followup tasks. Using and publicizing the Lotus Notes “ATM card-like” authentication method reassured everyone of the security and validity of the electronic signatures.

Reduced approval and followup time for product and process events by up to 50%. This application also eliminated a wait of up to a week to obtain copies of prior product events, by making them available in electronic form 24/7, thereby enabling product analyses that were previously not done.

While the application works quite well, it would be even better if it did not require a live connection to the company’s WAN. It is also quite slow over a dial-up connection, because of the volume of data flowing back and forth. Given priority by senior management, both of these problems could be addressed.

January 1, 2000 (Y2K) was coming, and nobody knew for sure if the control systems running the company’s equipment would continue to work past that point, due to the well-known “Y2K bug.” Some were near panic, while others were in denial. The shareholders and board members wanted reassurance. Many of the people in the best position to provide information and testing had more urgent things to do, such as get product out the door.

Leveraging personal twin toolboxes of chemical engineering and IT, chaired the cross-functional team that evaluated all control systems and embedded systems for Y2K compliance. The team remedied situations that needed it, and documented all systems.

Extreme turnover of team members caused some disruption to the effort. Fortunately, there was enough slack in the schedule to compensate. The quality of the project was reflected in convincing upper management that the company did not need to have engineers “on standby” in the plants “just in case” at 00:00 on 01/01/2000.

There were zero disruptions to the company’s operations due to Y2K. Additionally, for the first time ever, there was a complete inventory of all control and embedded systems throughout the company.

The version of the MAXIMO maintenance management system in use at the Rochester plant was no longer supported by the vendor, and was not certified to work on the current company standard operating systems. Indeed, there were operational problems caused by the use of incompatible computing infrastructure. While it was causing problems, none of them was yet mission-critical, meaning that it was difficult to obtain support for upgrading to the new version. Additionally, personnel were busy on other projects.

Sold management on the need to prevent further deterioration of the situation, as well as the high likelihood of it getting worse without the upgrade. Built and led team to perform the upgrade.

The project met all cost, schedule, and functionality requirements. It beat its already tight downtime estimate. The successful completion of this project meant that the facility was no longer exposed to the catastrophic failure of a non-supported maintenance management system.

This project was highly successful because of careful planning, the use of workstations optimized for each step of the upgrade process, and two complete rehearsals. This was actually three sequential upgrades. While there was a tested fallback scenario, one upgrade step at a time could have reduced the risk even further.

The US plants were relying upon a paper tracking system and a shared electronic file folder to manage the workflow and dissemination of their standard operating procedures (SOPs). The inefficiencies and deficiencies of this system were jeopardizing the plants’ ISO 9000 registration and consuming more personnel time than necessary. Each plant had its own unique life cycle and workflow for managing SOPs. Some procedures were undocumented and/or the de facto procedure differed from the documented procedure.

Assembled a project team to assess the situation and determine each site’s needs. Ensured the creation and maintenance of a single application that could be configured for each site’s specific needs.

The US plants gained an ISO 9000 document management system that passed the internal and external auditors’ inspection, eliminating a risk to approximately $100 million per year of business predicated on having ISO 9000 registration. Efficiencies gained from the application likely saved an entire FTE per plant.

Given the criticality of agitation and mass transfer to fermentation, a lot of engineering time was being spent on researching and analyzing it. Unfortunately, there was much duplication of effort, very little standardization, and very little communication between engineers.

Every plant tends to be self-contained, with relatively unique equipment. The engineers had a wide range of experience and expertise, and tended to use their own favorite methods.

Produced an "Agitation scale-up and analysis kit" that was used by fermentation engineers as a standardized starting point for analyzing their processes. Its correct prediction of process and equipment behavior facilitated its adoption as a standard.

Saved approximately a week of research time for up to ten engineers per project, and promoted process standardization throughout the company.

A granulated product was forming major clumps on its way to the customer. This major customer demanded its suppliers prove that they adequately understood a quality problem before accepting an assertion that it had been solved.

Some members of management and the technical staff believed that they did, in fact, understand why the problem happened, and that they did not need any further studies. The customer was not accepting the explanation.

Recruited by VP of QA to submit the available data to a rigorous statistical analysis, and proved to the satisfaction of everyone what the original root cause was (an aspect of the material’s thermal history during transport to the customer).

More than $10 million of annual business was no longer at risk after convincing the customer that the team understood the reason for the problem and had solved it.

Genencor International was a publicly traded company, and, therefore, needed to comply with Sarbanes-Oxley, and its requirements for an auditable change management system. Unfortunately, any change management being done by the Corporate IT Department was very informal and fragmented.

The Corporate IT Department had historically been a very informal organization, with very little regard for formal “paper trail” procedures. Additionally, everyone did his/her own thing, as there was very little standardization between, or even within, groups.

Defined and developed an application and the associated procedures to execute and document change management. All information, workflow, and approvals now reside in a single database that meets the needs of company, IT department, business units, and auditors.

Price Waterhouse Coopers (the external auditors) explicitly stated that this is one of the best change management systems they have ever audited. There are no concerns regarding change management for the IT area.

If faced with a similar problem in the future, would insist on being part of the team to write the procedure at a much earlier date, saving the need to negotiate changes after version 1.0 of the application was already up and running.

Corporate QA and Regulatory frequently need product formulations for general inquiries and regulatory filings. However, the needed information generally resided in paper files at the manufacturing plants that needed to be analyzed by high-level plant personnel before shipping the information. There was no corporate-supported system in which to store the information in a well-defined and rigorous manner.

Directed a cross-functional team consisting of the company’s LIMS consultant, Corporate QA, and several plant personnel in devising a way to store the information in the corporate LIMS system, and a report to instantly retrieve it.

Anyone who is authorized can now retrieve product formulations within seconds, 24/7 (maintenance windows excepted). The new report saves at least two hours of multiple professionals’ time every time it is run. The value of the calendar time saved for customer and governmental filings is incalculable.

Upon seeing the potential benefits of a high-end data visualization and integration software package, many company engineers and scientists wanted it rolled out immediately. However, the company’s repositories for process data were not sufficiently rigorous to support this type of system. Many members of the team literally fell in love with the software, and this generated a high emotionally charged environment.

Convinced management team that the company’s data infrastructure could not yet adequately support a system of this type, preventing a premature expenditure of more than $5 million. Redirected attention, instead, on upgrading the data infrastructure, which would eventually allow for further improvements.

When Eastman Kodak Company spun off Genencor International, the spinoff was originally permitted to remain on Kodak’s information systems indefinitely. However, after a year or so, Genencor was informed that it needed to vacate all of Kodak’s systems on a very aggressive timetable, putting the entire $15 million Rochester development and commercialization facility at risk.

The Kodak systems ran on IBM mainframe computers. Given the size of the Rochester plant, a totally different architecture on minicomputers needed to be used. Accordingly, all of the process data systems needed to be built from scratch, and the existing data had to be migrated to a different format.

Built the project team and managed the project to define and provide the replacement systems, and to migrate the existing process data. The project included data modeling, requests for proposal, proposal evaluation, and implementation. Recruited a local vendor to handle the installation and data migration.

The project went smoothly, deadlines were met, and the replacement systems were widely seen as an improvement over the originals.

Lots of product information was available online, but it was highly fragmented, access to it was problematic, and many people needing the information did not know it existed. Additionally, the groups owning the information were spending unproductive time retrieving and disseminating it.

The major hindrances included concerns about misunderstood information, unauthorized access, timeliness of the information, differing platforms on which the information resided, and certain technical issues. There were also some turf issues.

Assembled a cross-functional team representing all stakeholders that determined which information was suitable for presentation in a self-service product information portal, and to whom it could be presented. Personally ensured the creation of the portal itself, and its ongoing usefulness and improvements.

More than 50 people now save at least an hour every day by looking up the product information they need on the portal. They range from the shop floor to executive vice presidents, and span all company organizations.

Because it can deal with an especially wide range of technology platforms, Lotus Notes/Domino is an adept tool for portals of this type. Rolling out a more formal approval for inclusion in the portal sooner would have saved a few turf battles in the early days.

The aging population is becoming more susceptible to cardiac problems, and locations containing large numbers of senior staff and management tend to be older than the average population. Indeed, at the operations center, there were several people who had cardiac incidents, including one at work.

Proposed obtaining an Automatic External Defibrillator (AED) for the facility. In order to begin to remedy the situation and prevent any more incidents, first had to fight some misperceptions: 1) nothing other than an ambulance crew can make a difference; 2) the Brighton Volunteer Ambulance is close enough that having an AED onsite would not materially help; and 3) the equipment is too expensive to afford.

Won approval, then implemented an AED and the training necessary to use it. Especially helpful in obtaining approval was an OSHA report on the AEDs at O’Hare Airport, showing how critical early defibrillation is, and how relatively inexpensive the equipment is.

The operations center now has an AED and a crew of people who are qualified to use it. Besides the health and safety benefits, it has had a positive impact on employee relations. The next step in the process is to upgrade the level of first aid coverage from its current very basic level. Knowing the company cares, even if it is not altruistic, can have a very positive impact on employee morale.