United States Marine Corps retired.
Manager, Sierra Management Technologies
DW: You were responsible for implementing a TOC-based program in
the Marine Corps?
RL: Yes, when I was commanding officer at the Naval Air Depot in Cherry
Point, North Carolina. I started the implementation there, which they have
continued. As a colonel I had in essence a $625 million company and 4,000
people working for me. Everybody says the government is always the last to
get the message. I don’t know if that’s true. My
personal belief is that the
government gives guys like me the opportunity to try things a little
differently.
DW: Tell us about your implementation.
RL: We had problems delivering H-46s on time. The H-46 is a 25-to 30-year-
old Boeing helicopter used extensively in the Marine
Corps as part of their
assault support role. Because the airplane is so old and in frequent need of
maintenance, anything over a single-digit number of airplanes on our hangar
deck meant that you took a shadow off the flightline.
If you took a shadow
off the flightline, that meant they didn’t have an airplane to do their mission.
Our negotiated norm for turnaround time was 130 days, and on average we
were somewhere between 190 and 205 days.
DW: Sounds like you had a problem.
RL: A problem, yes. So we implemented critical chain, and ultimately cut the
number of airplanes in flow from 28 to 14. We were able to sell that to our
customers. And the turnaround time went from 200 days to about 135. Now
that in and of itself is probably a significant improvement. But at the same
time
we were starting the process, they added 30 days more worth of
corrosion work to be done to the cabin. We accommodated the 30 days
within that 135-day delivery. So we went from what would have been about
