Steve was approached by NH MEP about a new program they offered called TDMI or Technology Driven Market Intelligence. TDMI identifies the benefits and the market impacts related to a company’s technology-based products, and provides customized actionable intelligence.
“The major issue that had been getting more difficult for us over the last 15 years was, customers wanted things faster,” said Turner Hansel, President of Filtrine. “So we looked into our processes to see where we can cut down our time. We found out engineering was holding things up.” They needed to cut 2 weeks out of engineering but how to do that?
“We looked at our operation as if it was a manufacturing facility rather than greenhouse,” said Mike Goyette, Operations Manager for Pleasant View Gardens. “So out of necessity to improve our operating margin, we needed to look at how we do our work more efficiently and more effectively with better balance.”
“We were looking to increase our business,” said Ed Nordengren, Operation Manager for MuShield. “That led to us getting more inquiries from the aerospace and defense industries.” Those inquiries meant MuShield was being sent more complex, detailed drawings where GD&T was needed to understand and manufacture the components.
“All our work is for the DoD,” said Gary Andrews, President of Tech Resources, Inc. “So when we heard that the DoD’s NIST 800-171 cybersecurity requirements would be flowing down to their contractors in the near future, we wanted to get ahead of it in order to meet those requirements and not have any interruptions in our business with them.”
They tried to create their own cybersecurity System Security Plan (SSP) but soon found many areas that needed shoring up. That was also when their IT Manager at the time was about to attend the NH MEP NIST 800-171 Cybersecurity for Manufacturers information session.
“I started at XMA in 2013,” said Marc Smith, President and CEO of XMA Corporation. “Because my background was in aerospace, I understood the value of a Quality Management System. We needed a robust QMS because it would strengthen our company culture. The employees would create it, follow it, be accountable for it and own it. This leads to a solid company culture where together every employee benefits.”
XMA’s customers were also pushing back on them to have a QMS. “At the time not much of our work was in aerospace,” said Smith. “But by having a QMS it would allow us to enter new markets and lead to sustainability and continued growth of the company.”
Marc eventually heard about NH MEP’s AS9100D On-Site Registration Upgrade training and enrolled XMA.
“Customers only like two things, quality and on-time delivery,” said Tom Barber, Chief Operating Officer for Costa Precision. “But we were struggling in manufacturing engineering with quoting and manufacturing processes prior to going to the shop floor. This caused irregular workflow, and customer quote deadlines to be missed.”
The manufacturing floor had its share of issues too. “We were failing to provide needed quantities of parts per shift, per day. This led to poorer quality parts being produced because we would get behind schedule and had to rush parts out the door,” said Barber. “This also led to late deliveries.”
They knew they needed to do something to overcome these challenges and not lose customers.
It all started in 2010 when one of their large customers began putting pressure on them to get ISO certified. “This caught us off guard,” said Mark St. Gelais. “We heard horror stories about ISO certification. We really didn’t know how to go about it.”
Then in 2011 they heard about and attended an information session put on by the New Hampshire Manufacturing Extension Partnership (NH MEP). “The info session went over what ISO certification was all about and let us know about the NH State job training grant program to help offset the cost.” said Mark. They took advantage of the grant, and along with his wife Johanna attended NH MEP’s ISO 9001:2008 Collaborative Program in 2012.
With a new facility, new processes, and new equipment, Kerri knew they would need help with efficiencies and where to place the new equipment. “We tried to be proactive with all the changes going on,” said Mobile. “So in mid-2016 we brought in NH MEP to implement Lean training. We wanted everyone in the company to be of the same mind-set, learn how to reduce waste, and understand the benefits of continuous improvement.”
“If we wanted to retain certain customers and get new ones, we needed to be ISO certified,” said Peter Spohn, Director of Business Development for Textiles Coated International. Recently they attended the NH MEP ISO 9001:2008 Collaborative Training Program and became ISO certified. “But to keep our business current we realized we needed to upgrade to ISO 9001:2015,” said Spohn. “Again we turned to NH MEP for help with handling our ISO upgrade training.” This time, the training would be done on-site.
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