Building Tomorrow starts by building it right, today

About a month ago, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to spend a week on our Shippensburg factory floor. As a lawyer for the company, I’m usually kept in a dark room away from anything I could break, so for me, going out on the floor was something to be really excited about. I met a ton of really good people and had my respect for the men and women out there reaffirmed.

There are many observations and anecdotes I could share. I could talk about how impressive it was that everything, and I mean everything, out on the line has a purpose and a place. I could talk about the amount of thought everything around you has been subject to. I could talk about how the TACT times (Target Actual Cycle Time or, “how long you get to do something”) are really tight and that so much is expected of every individual on that line. I could talk about the quality of the people I met and how fortunate we are to have them. I could talk for a long time about everything that impressed me, but I’ll simply recount what took place during one 20 minute period on just another day.

It was middle of the shift and we were lowering the fully assembled drivetrain into the frame of an L90 loader. This process is really tricky due to the size of the drivetrain and the limitations on visibility. Once we had the drivetrain lowered and the transmission mounts in place, we began the process of connecting hoses, torquing bolts and connecting the driveshaft. While we were doing this, Mike Croutz (the poor soul who got stuck with me for a week) noticed one of the hoses was slightly damaged. The hose was painted and it was obvious that the paint had been peeled back. Upon closer inspection, the hose itself was “shaved” a bit. It wasn’t bad and the likelihood the damage would have any material impact on functionality appeared pretty low, at least to my untrained eye. Mike wasn’t having it though. It didn’t matter that the hose was located in a spot that made it incredibly hard to get a wrench on. It didn’t matter that we couldn’t find any evidence the hose rubbed up against the frame during install. He wasn’t interested in assigning blame to anyone. All that mattered was the hose was damaged and it needed to be fixed. Mike hit our red button (the signal for a team leader to come by when you have a problem) and within a minute Shane Sanders, team leader, showed up to look at the problem. I could tell from the expression on Shane’s face that it needed to be replaced. That look of frustration passed quickly and was replaced with another look; it was the look of “ok, let’s get this done.” Shane didn’t look to blame anyone or delegate the work to someone else. He got to it himself with Mike helping out. The necessary repair was made, the loader left Zone 3 for Zone 4 and we got another frame to install another drivetrain. Back to work.  

We at Volvo talk a lot about our values and how we are Building Tomorrow. I must say that it was awesome to see the commitment to quality we have. Replacing that hose was hard. It was in a location that made it very difficult to get to, probably wouldn’t have made a bit of difference in the performance of the machine and likely wouldn’t have been noticed by anyone. None of that stuff mattered. Mike and Shane were not going to let it slide, and it was going to be done right. They understand that you can’t Build Tomorrow unless we’re building it right, today.