Humanist Manufacturing: A Humanitarian Approach to Excellence in High-Impact Plant Operations

PRAISE FOR HUMANIST MANUFACTURING

"It is all about people. Joe Sprangel’s Humanist Manufacturing: A Humanitarian Approach to Excellence in High-Impact Plant Operations comes at the perfect time when our labor markets are in such flux because people are looking for valuable work, not just a paycheck. He gives us a turn-by-turn guide on how to infuse integrity and respect into your leadership style, your product design and your manufacturing strategy. Joe explains exactly how you can do well by doing good. Along this journey, Joe shows how teams can build relationships and develop a sense of purpose to become not only better employees…..and better people."

—Christina Cain, Program Manager, Virginia Division of Economic Development and Community Vitality

Filled with compelling examples of success and countless resources, the Humanist Manufacturing framework provides leaders with a step by step plan to a sustainable future.

—Jair Drooger, Co-Founder/Founder, CT Assist, The WellMent Company (Certified B Corporation), & MSL Consulting

This is a welcome addition to the literature on Humanistic Business Management. How we conduct business and why we conduct business are all explored. The case studies of companies operating in a Humanist way are extremely helpful and enlightening. Humanism is not just a theoretical idea. It’s a practical one that yields profitable results for the companies who apply it to their businesses. If you want to learn what it looks like to operate a manufacturing company in a Humanist way, Joe Sprangel’s book is a must read.

—Jennifer Hancock, Founder, Humanist Learning Systems

This book is a comprehensive approach to leading with the heart in a world full of hard nosed decision making. It ties together the many parts of modern management theory with the oft overlooked special circumstances of leadership in todays pressure cooker manufacturing environment. It is designed to be a helpmate, not a read through once and forget it book. With questions for reflection and additional readings relevant to each chapter it is designed to be on your desk as opposed to on your shelf. It is full of actionable ideas that can be applied both every day and during times of strategic thinking and planning. A great book from which any leader can learn!

—Fred Keller, Founder and Chair, Cascade Engineering, A Certified B Corporation

Impact Makers is a Certified B Corp and an all-profits-to-charity model which allows us to provide maximum value to our clients while also supporting our community. As a socially-oriented business, we attract high-caliber personnel who have helped us contribute over $4 million in pro-bono consulting and cash support to our community partners since our founding almost 16 years ago. Manufacturing companies that follow Joe Sprangel's recommendation of adopting the B Corp model within his humanist manufacturing framework can also draw great people with a sense of purpose. Furthermore, organizations that use this business framework can become integral partners making a similar positive impact in their communities.

—Michael Pirron, Founder & CEO, Impact Makers

Humanist Manufacturing is more than just a guide to follow. It gives us a good dose of the application of humanism in the book’s arrangement. Dr. Sprangel views the reader as a seeker of knowledge and a believer that using humanism has better results for internal and external stakeholders and for leading people. I think my favorite parts are the questions he raises in the chapters which make you think and Closing Comments which tells the reader what he thinks. He certainly doesn’t demand we take his view on faith. It is refreshing, however, to view all levels of employees as good, wanting to do good and innately capable of it instead of having to manage them so that they will perform. I think you will feel better reading this, even if you are not ready to apply Dr. Sprangel’s 6 Phase Framework of Humanist Manufacturing. I did. It’s not just for manufacturers, either. Most of my clients are service businesses and I will be sharing Dr. Sprangel’s ideas with them — I already have in presentations he has made for me for my monthly online business forum.

—Jan Triplett, Ph.D. CBTAC, CEO, Business Success Center

"Academics can often fall into the trap of giving lip service to the value that practitioners can add to their fields. And, practitioners are often skeptical of the value academics can offer to the people who actually do the work. Joe Sprangel has managed successfully to bridge the gap and provide scholars and practitioners with valuable information that will help everyone during these tumultuous times to better understand the theory and the practice of manufacturing. By using the principles of humanism and applying them to the science of manufacturing, Joe has created a framework that helps professionals who are currently working in manufacturing, employees who are starting out, as well as students who are looking to better understand what manufacturing can be when the components of the manufacturing system are optimized. Humanist Manufacturing: A Humanitarian Approach to Excellence in High-Impact Plant Operations deserves a place on your bookshelf - but only after you actually read the material and work through the Chapter Reflection Questions. It is practical scholarship at its best."

—Joanne Tritsch, Ph.D, MBA Director & Assistant Professor, Mary Baldwin University

HUMANIST MANUFACTURING

A HUMANITARIAN APPROACH TO EXCELLENCE IN HIGH-IMPACT PLANT OPERATIONS

DR. JOE SPRANGEL

EMMANUEL STRATEGIC SUSTAINABILITY

Copyright © 2023 by Dr. Joe Sprangel

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

The web addresses noted in this book were live and correct at the time of publication, but may be subject to change.

ISBN: 979-8-218-08993-1 (paperback)

ISBN: 979-8-218-08994-8 (e-book)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2022920033

Edited by Arlynda Boyer

Proofread by Linda Reviea

Cover design by Standout Arts, LLC

Interior design by Jenny Lisk

Published by Emmanuel Strategic Sustainability, Staunton, Virginia

With hope for a better world for my granddaughters,

Cloey, Emma, McKenna, and Noelle,

who inspired me to write this book

CONTENTS

Foreword

Dr. Jackie Stavros

Preface

Introduction

Phase 1

1. A Humanist Perspective

Phase 2

2. Knowing Thyself

3. Why, Vision, Mission, and Values

4. Knowing Thy Executive Team

Phase 3

5. The Business Operating System

6. Product Design

7. Materials Selection

8. Processes

9. Sustainable Operations

Phase 4

10. Putting Employees First

Phase 5

11. Building Thriving Communities

Phase 6

12. Developing the Company Strategy

13. The Importance of Tactical Plans

14. The Change Process

Conclusion

Acknowledgments

Further Resources

Notes

About the Author

FOREWORD

DR. JACKIE STAVROS

In the Introduction, the author, Joe Sprangel, asks you to reflect on the question, "can manufacturing be more than a production operation?

Imagine your operation being more than a production facility. Our organizations are made of people and those people are the driving force of your production. In this book, Joe presents a humanistic manufacturing framework that aligns with how your employees can be more than just line and staff people. This book can help you develop strategic and operational excellence practices that can impact your people’s performance and commitment, which in turn impacts productivity in a positive way. The outcomes go beyond profit to creating workplaces that can work for all. He presents dozens of organizations doing this and doing it very well! These are organizations who are human-centered focus and are thriving because of it.

This book aligns with my humanistic AI approach to organization life; no, we are not talking about Artificial Intelligence, it is Appreciative Inquiry. Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is one of the most effective and widely used approaches for fostering positive change. AI has earned national and international recognition for creating a positive revolution in change with global brands like Apple, Boeing Corporation, Coca-Cola, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Interface Carpets, Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream, British Airways, United Nations, VISA, Proctor & Gamble, and Vitamix just to name a few. A defining factor in the accomplishments of these organizations is their focus on building from strengths – what is working well, what is life-giving, what is possible, opportunities, what do your stakeholders care deeply about, aspirations, and how do you know you are making a positive differences, results. Learning to SOAR by asking a generative question: how might we move forward together in a sustainable way that considers the whole system?

While the theory and practice of AI and SOAR or the call to bring humanism into your organizations are not new (yet might be new to some reading this book), this book, Humanistic Manufacturing: A Humanitarian Approach to Excellence in High-Impact Plant Operations, is a new and worthwhile read because it blends many theories, practices, assessments, and tools with evidence-based research in a thoughtful and responsible way. Joe has brilliantly assembled a framework with a sequence of phases and proven practices that address the triple bottom line that is doing well by doing good not only for the organization but to your people and our planet with purpose and passion. The six phases get to knowing and understanding what to do, why to do it, and how to do it:

Phase 1: Humanist Commitments – how to build commitment

Phase 2: Leadership Development – how to motivate and model the way

Phase 3: Develop Internal Operations – how to create operational excellence

Phase 4: Employee Centric – how to develop your employees to their fullest potential

Phase 5: Positive External Impact – how to support all your stakeholders and eco-system

Phase 6: Strategic Planning – how to facilitate a whole system strategic plan and lead change

Joe seamlessly blends his down-to-earth, heart-giving personality and unique background (30 years of manufacturing experience with 15 years of sustainable practices) to offer readers first-hand insights and experiences into the importance of knowing thyself before leading others as well as knowing your executive team and how to align values, vision, mission, and purpose to organization goals and objectives that will produce results. He explains how to build a sustainable operating production system that can achieve operational excellence in product design, material selection, processes, and control systems that support both employee well-being and our environment. Each chapter dives into how to make it part of your organization’s life. I love practical books and appreciate that each chapter starts with a quote to deepen your thinking and clearly lays out what you will learn and why and ends with reflection questions, checklists, and resources upon which you can act. You can build an amazing library just based on Joe’s reading suggestions!

What stood out for me the moment I picked up this book was the word human. That is to both invest in humankind and to be a kind human. Joe does both very well. The book is filled with a treasure trove of stories and resources. I love the Ten Commitments of Living Humanist Values in Chapter 1 and how this book starts and ends with the iconic Ray Anderson, founder and former CEO of Interface Carpets. I met Ray at the 2004 Business as an Agent of World Benefit – Sustainability Conference at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, OH. He read the poem by Glenn C. Thomas (1996) – Tomorrow’s Child. This poem can be found in the last chapter of this book. In these pages, it is wonderful to see how Ray’s journey has ignited both of our sustainability epiphanies and impacted our journeys (that was a special treat to read).

Joe truly models the way with all the learnings in this book. He has a wealth of knowledge and experience, which should be expected of any author who writes a reputable book, and he also writes with such inspiration, humility, and doses of humor to ground you. I admire Joe’s curious nature, and all the questions he asks us to consider! He certainly walks the talk of Humanistic Manufacturing in how he lives his life and works with others. Thank you, Joe, for sharing your North Star with us in the book to support those in a manufacturing environment what is possible. My career started in a software manufacturing environment, and I see the value of this book to those organizations who want to have a more humanistic approach to best serve its stakeholders – your advice is enduring.

To the readers, I expect that you will want to reference this book many times because creating an exemplary manufacturing operation that puts your employees at the core of your operations is a never-ending journey of learning, being, and doing. The Humanist Manufacturing Framework can build the DNA of your operations. I believe that most know we should do what Joe is advocating, and the value of this book is what do we do and how do we do it.

I love that you share the story of how your training for and completing of the Ironman Competition coincided with you becoming a humanistic manufacturer! For those who want to learn a bit more about Joe before starting the book, just jump to the last chapter first – it is my favorite chapter. Make sure you read the Preface because it gives Joe’s why and why this book is a gift to each of you. Thank you, Joe, for this very special book and for modelling the way!

Jacqueline (Jackie) Stavros

Professor, College of Business and IT

Lawrence Technological University

Southfield, Michigan, USA

[email protected]

PREFACE

An interview session for a plant manager position I was pursuing was with their VP of Accounting & Finance. Toward the end of our time together, he commented, You are not like others here at our company. The tone of his voice made me feel that he saw this as a favorable characteristic. I eventually ended up with the job and did learn that I was indeed unlike most others working for that organization.

The reality was that his comment was nothing new to me. I have worked for nine different employers over 27 years for various reasons. One as short a tenure of eight months and none longer than five years. Four employers asked me to leave because they were going in a different direction. In one case, their customer wanted to hire me when I was let go because they respected what I stood for, and I would have been their key liaison to my former employer. In a second instance, the parent company management fired the person who let me go and asked that I return because they recognized that I was of value to the company. A common theme was that I was not a good fit for organizations despite being a productive employee. I was looking for something more than the traditional approach to manufacturing.

Ultimately, I tell people I had a mid-life crisis and decided to become an academic. While it was during my mid-life, it was far from a problem. I had long felt a call to teach as far back as my teens, and something triggered in me that it was time to follow that path. I began that transition when I was with my last manufacturing employer. After researching various teaching options, I decided to go