Blog! Five Fast Things for March 2, 2007

By Bob Vavra, Editor, Plant Engineering March 2, 2007

1. Manufacturing is cool! I know that. You know that. The Society of Manufacturing Engineers is taking that message to young people. Their new Website, manufacturingiscool.com , is designed to help pre-teens and teens understand the coolness of manufacturing. I’ve been on the site. It IS cool.

“If we are going to inspire enough young people to pursue careers in engineering in the coming decades, we have to show our kids how fascinating math and science can be,” said Glen Pearson, president of the SME Education Foundation. “With this Website, we’re showing kids all the cool things they could do if they pursue a career in manufacturing.”

Here’s what you all need to do — share this site with your own kids, your employees and your local schools. Get it in the hands of EVERYONE involved in manufacturing at every level. You want to raise the value of manufacturing in this country? It starts with the current generation of plant workers taking that message to the next generation. SME has done an amazing job with this site, and it needs to get to the widest audience possible.

2. Aberdeen report: Agility on the plant floor: A new report by The Aberdeen Group on manufacturing flexibility points to three KPIs: on-time delivery, finished goods inventory, and manufacturing cycle time. Using MES effectively (which will be a topic at our Manufacturing Summit next month in Chicago) is one important factor in that effort. Another is making what Aberdeen calls dynamic decision making. Read more of this sponsored report . It’s information worth acting on.

3. Safety and manufacturing symposium: Safety should be everyone’s focus in manufacturing. That means making workers safe and making sure systems are safe. ISA , one of the sponsors of the Manufacturing Summit, will grab that focus at its 4th annual Safety Division Symposium will be held May 22-23 at the Wyndham Mount Laurel in Mount Laurel, New Jersey. The symposium will cover safety systems, alarm management and cyber security. For details, go to the event Website .

4. More on alarm management: The TiPS User Conference, April 17-19 in Austin is being billed as the‘who’s who in alarm management. It features founding members of the ASM Consortium and contributing authors of the EEMUA 191 guideline. It’s a chance to gather some more information on this emerging issue. Head here for more about the conference.

5. Call for papers on reliability: The deadline to submit abstracts for papers and tutorials for the Institute of Environmental Sciences and Technology’s 54th Annual Reliability & Maintainability Symposium is April 16. The event, slated for Jan. 28-31, 2008 in Las Vegas, has a theme of “Dawn to Dusk — Life Cycle Prescriptions.” Information on the conference and call for papers is at www.rams.org .

.