Plant Manager
Thomas & Betts Corp.

Bradshaw is plant manager of 2005 IW Best Plants Winner, Thomas & Betts Corp. -- Athens, Tenn. operations. With Thomas & Betts since 1982, he has held positions in corporate & division engineering, operations management and project management. Bradshaw most recently chaired an international team that developed the Thomas & Betts Manufacturing System that documents the company's Lean philosophy and "How We Work" as an operating enterprise. He holds a bachelor's degree in industrial engineering and a master's degree in engineering administration from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville.

General Manager of Global Advanced Manufacturing
Harley-Davidson

Randy Christianson serves as the General Manager of Global Advanced Manufacturing at Harley-Davidson. The group is developing and helping to implement common best in class operating systems across the facilities to insure competitiveness and a sustainable future for H-D manufacturing. This includes implementation of common quality, maintenance, lean, operating, change management, people and ERP systems.

Randy started with Harley-Davidson since 1985, having worked for PPG Industries from 1997-2000 and then returning to H-D upon request. Prior to joining the GAM group, he served as co-lead for the restructuring project of the York facility. This project included development, negotiation and implementation of the newly designed manufacturing Operating system which included significant cost savings, new labor agreement, new manufacturing operating manual, leadership selection and retraining, creating the change plan to achieve a new culture, ERP design/implementation and other elements. The challenge was to restructure and create a new factory from an existing site. He also served in roles as Product Plant Manager of Finishing at the York and Tomahawk facilities responsible for production and engineering operations. These roles included several production expansions, strategy development, process improvements, technology integration and other key initiatives.

Randy’s career started on the shop floor as a production worker and has progressed through various roles of engineering and management. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Eastern University in Organizational Management.

Randy is an avid motorcycle rider and owns a 2010 FLHTC Electra-Glide Classic along with a classic 1982 FLH.

Co-founder and partner of the Lean Learning Center
IndustryWeek columnist

Jamie Flinchbaugh is a founder and partner of the Lean Learning Center in Novi, Michigan, and the co-author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to Lean: Lessons from the Road. He shares his successful and varied experiences of lean transformation as a practitioner and leader through companies such as Chrysler and DTE Energy. He also has a wide range of practical experience in industrial operations, including production, maintenance, material control, product development, and manufacturing engineering. Flinchbaugh is a graduate fellow of the highly regarded Leaders for Manufacturing Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where his research thesis was on implementing lean manufacturing through factory design. He also holds a bachelor's in engineering from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, PA and an master's in engineering from the University of Michigan. In 2006, he was named to Crain Detroit's 40 Under 40 list for his accomplishments.

Former Vice President of Productions
Reliable Automatic Sprinkler Co.

Will Franks has been at the leading edge of various continuous improvement and lean manufacturing methodologies for over thirty years. Beginning as a design and manufacturing engineer with Xerox Corporation in the early 80’s, he participated in one of that company’s first “Leadership Through Quality” teams, based on Japanese “Quality Circles”. This experience continued at Ciba Corning with their “TQM” or “Total Quality Management” approach. In early 1986, he was part of their team to work on a new inventory reduction program called “JIT” or “Just in Time”, widely recognized as an early version of Lean Manufacturing. Throughout the 80’s and 90’s he became an expert and leader in what was known as “World Class Manufacturing” and “Manufacturing Excellence”, serving on the board of the Association for Manufacturing Excellence, Northeast Region for seven years. Beginning in 1995 he became involved with and eventually an expert in a new improvement technique known as Kaizen. He helped spread the kaizen methodology to hundreds of U.S. companies by leading “Kaizen Blitz” workshops in cities across the country and speaking at various regional and national conferences.

Operationally he has held positions such as Vice President of Manufacturing for Pfizer Infusaid, a medical device manufacturer, and V.P. of Operations for PLC Medical, the Heart Laser Company. In 1997 he started ICON Business Associates, a Lean Manufacturing consulting firm. His clients include Zildjian, the oldest manufacturing company in the U.S., and Thermo Scientific, a $10 billion instrumentation and services company.

Will holds a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering from Cornell University, studied toward a Masters in Industrial Engineering at Rochester Institute of Technology and holds a Master of Business Administration degree from UMass Dartmouth. He is also a member of Delta Mu Delta business honor society, and the Mensa High IQ Society.

Retired Executive Director
Indy Partnership

As Executive Director of the Indy Partnership, Scott Fulford led the effort to bring new businesses, jobs and investment to the 10-county Indianapolis region. In 2009, Site Selection magazine recognized the vitality of this region by naming the Indy Partnership one of the nation’s Top 10 economic development organizations.

Previously, Scott spent over 30 years working for Cinergy (now Duke Energy) where he served as a Marketing Manager in their economic development department. He also spent 2 years with Indiana Economic Development Corporation (IEDC) where he served as Director of the Central Indiana region, working primarily with existing industry and companies to expand and grow their Indiana operations.

Scott received a Bachelor of Science Degree in Marketing from Indiana University. He has been recognized for service in economic development through receipt of the Indiana Economic Development Association “Excellence in Leadership” award and also the Utility Economic Development Association “Presidential Achievement” award. He is a member of the Indiana Economic Development Association and International Economic Development Council. He has also served on many industry specific groups and organizations as well as local civic and professional organizations.

Sr. Director Manufacturing Industry Marketing
Kronos Incorporated

Gregg Gordon oversees marketing efforts at Kronos, the leader in Human Capital Management Technology. Gordon, a strong advocate of improving workforce management globally to increase manufacturing effectiveness, has effectively led strategic initiatives in emerging international markets, as well as helped establish Kronos in growing market segments such as energy and life sciences.

Committed to enhancing operational excellence for manufacturers through improved workforce effectiveness, Gordon led the development of Overall Labor Effectiveness (OLE ™), a key performance indicator that measures the utilization, performance, and quality of the workforce and its impact on productivity.

Gordon has more than 20 years of experience in the manufacturing industry. Prior to Kronos, he was director of product marketing at i2 Technologies where he focused on supplier relationship management. Earlier, Gordon managed the design engineering team at Burndy, a division of Hubbell, a global manufacturer of electrical and electronic interconnect products. During that time he received two design patents for products that he developed.

Gordon has a degree in mechanical engineering from Stevens Institute of Technology and a master’s degree in business administration from Boston University. He is a frequent speaker at leading domestic and international industry events and has been quoted in publications such as IndustryWeek and Managing Automation.

VP Business Development & Marketing
TBM Consulting Group

A lean leader with more than 16 years of experience with lean and Six Sigma implementation across the value chain on both the shop floor and in business processes, Ken Koenemann brings to TBM expertise in teaching and coaching lean and value-chain concepts and using those concepts in sourcing, manufacturing, warehousing, distribution, and planning and scheduling processes.

Before joining TBM, Ken was director–delta at American Greetings in Cleveland, OH, where he served as a leader of the internal strategy and consulting organization focused on delivering large transformational projects to meet strategic objectives. While there, he led the redesign of the seasonal card business, and initiated a business-process redesign effort to enable new go-to-market strategies and reduce costs. Earlier in his career, Ken was Managing Director Consumer & Industrial Market Supply Chain practice where he worked as a consultant to large and mid-sized consumer and industrial companies implementing lean and Six Sigma across supply-chain operations.

As Managing Director of TBM’s Lean Value Chain Practice, he has focused exclusively on delivering Lean Value Chain training and implementation with companies such as Assa Abloy, ConMed, Energizer, McCain, Pactiv, Sealy and WIKA Instruments.

Ken’s lean experience began with Toyota Gosei, where he was responsible for deploying TPS in the manufacturing operations in the US as well as in the supply base. He was trained by two original members of Taiichi Ohno’s Autonomous Study Group and spent six months in Japan learning and implementing TPS. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree in management from the University of Missouri–St. Louis.

Director of Internal Communications
Allison Transmission

Ann C. Schneider is the Director of Internal Communications for Allison Transmission, Inc., the world's leading manufacturer of fully-automatic transmissions for medium- and heavy-duty commercial vehicles, fully-automatic U. S. military vehicles, and hybrid-propulsion systems for transit buses. She is 34 year employee who has held positions in all aspects of the business, the majority of that time within the Operations Organization. Her career at Allison has provided her a myriad of diverse responsibilities as the inaugural woman to serve in roles within manufacturing. She has served as the Superintendent/Manager in Manufacturing, Production Control, Quality, Purchasing, Marketing, and Industrial Engineering. 16 of those years she dedicated her efforts transforming Allison Transmission’s manufacturing processes via the design and implementation of the Allison Transmission Global Manufacturing System, a system which earned her the inaugural Indiana “Leading Light Award,” an honor bestowed by Women & HiTech for women in engineering. She is a graduate of Indiana State University with a BS in Mechanical Engineering Technology, a minor in Manufacturing Supervision, and is also a graduate of the Penn State Executive Leadership curriculum.

Director Manufacturing Extension Partnership Center
Purdue University Technical Assistance Program

David has 25 years of experience in advanced manufacturing environments and in economic development within the intensive manufacturing State of Indiana. His background includes industrial technology, quality management systems, technology transfer, and program management.

David previously held include Senior Management positions at Indiana Business Modernization and Technology Corporation (BMT) as the VP Technology; at Kaiser Marquardt Aerospace Company as Director of Quality Assurance; and at Hughes Aircraft Company, Radar Systems Group as Head of Product Assurance.
In March of 2005, David became the Interim Director of the Indiana NIST MEP (National Institute of Standards and Technology - Manufacturing Extension Partnership) Center and assisted in the transition of the Center from the former BMT organization to Purdue University’s Technical Assistance Program. The merger has been a tremendous success for Indiana and Purdue, and David is now Purdue’s Director for this program.

David holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the Indiana State University - School of Technology.

Manufacturing Practice Director
Zurich

Dan Willmer is an Assistant Vice President and Director of Manufacturing
for Zurich North America's Customer Industry Segments. Dan has been with
Zurich for over 7 years and focuses on providing manufacturers best in class insurance products supported with risk engineering and claims services in the middle market space. Zurich is one of the largest writers of property-casualty insurance in North America.