Old School

Thursday Think Tank - Old School

by Anna Biggins

At my age, thinking differently does not come easy.  As I try to do this, I find myself recalling all my years at PAI, or Paramount Cap as it was called back when I started.  In those days we were only doing cut and sew caps and hats and we had to walk 9 miles in the snow to get to work.  It snowed every day back then, and we didn't have fancy Nike shoes to keep our feet warm, we wore hat boxes strapped to our feet and secured to our ankles with binder twine and horse hair. Back in those days Paramount enjoyed large volumes of work, just like we do now, and we employed processes that helped make us successful.

One of our recent Lean Success Stories involved Derick Curtis in raw materials.  He came up with an idea to change how to stage shirts for screening.  Derick's idea was a great one but also happened to be one of the successful processes we had used in Cut cap staging all those years ago before Derick was even a glimmer in his daddy's eye.  This made me consider some of the successful methods we've employed over the years and wonder about their applicability today.

So the theme of this Thursday Think Tank is to challenge some of us old people around here...

 

...to remember the processes we have successfully used in the past and see if they will work in today's model.

“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.” ― George Bernard Shaw

Submitted by Anna Biggins