Keltech Participate in Annual WIT Lean Forum

Following on from last year’s success, Keltech were again honoured to present at this year’s Annual Lean Forum held at Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT) on the 4th May 2017. This industry-academia conference focuses on best practices and cutting-edge developments in lean enterprise, operational, and process excellence; lean thinking and practices; and continuous improvement.

This year it was the turn of Seamus Lawlor, Business Development Manager, to deliver one of the morning presentation sessions titled ‘Lean in an SME- Not just for the manufacturing area’.

Following a brief introduction to Keltech by Declan Walsh, General Manager, and an overview of the Operational Excellence approach by Gerry Forristal, Quality Manager, Seamus spoke about how applying Operational Excellence principles has shaped the Marketing and Sales approach in Keltech.

Using the Constancy of Purpose and Creating Value for the Customer Operational Excellence principles as a guide, Seamus explained that the sales and marketing function in Keltech is now much more focussed, allowing real alignment with our core competencies. Embracing Scientific Thinking has also driven Keltech to become experts in these core competencies, like tank cleanliness and surface finishing.

Taking Systemic Thinking as a guide, Seamus commented that one of the biggest changes he has seen in the Sales and Marketing function is how customer development is now seen as a shared responsibility across all departments. On the other hand, the Sales and Marketing function is also now much more aware of how the sales strategy impacts these areas. Seamus feels that the OE approach has been of great benefit to Keltech, concluding with the comment ‘we now box smarter and achieve results’. The presentation was followed by a short Q&A session where a high level of engagement was shown by the near capacity audience.

Keltech personnel also took the opportunity to attend some of the numerous breakout sessions throughout the day with a wide variety of topics from different organisations on offer. In particular, it is always worthwhile to take in keynote speaker Professor Peter Hines who gave us his thoughts on the ‘Essence of Excellence’.

The overall message taken from the conference was that it is simply not good enough to copy someone else’s OE implementation – it is situational and the principles must be thought through to preserve the essence of excellence.

This conference is a unique opportunity to exchange knowledge with experts from academia and diverse industries in an open and honest manner. Keltech are delighted to participate in this event and are looking forward to next year already.

Enjoyed reading this post or want to find out more? Contact me on seamus.lawlor@keltech.ie or 00353864681333

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