Good Managers Solve Problems for People, Speaker tells CEOs at ILC Power Breakfast

Continuous Improvement, Enterprise Leadership, Iowa Lean Consortium, Manufacturing

Maintaining competitive advantage in a growing business is a lot like finding yourself in a leaky rowboat 10 miles from shore, Jim Lancaster told members and guests of the Iowa Lean Consortium (ILC).

Business leaders tend to focus most of their energy on putting out the daily fires, Lancaster said. But a company can easily stagnate if no one works to push the operation toward a distant goal.

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A Good Elevator Speech Can Help You Maximize Opportunity

CIRAS NEWS, Government Contracting

All it takes is a few good seconds to make a positive first impression and grow your business.

However, those few seconds can require hours of preparation to look natural, confident, and enthusiastic. And even then, it doesn’t always work. For example, at most meetings, conferences, and networking events, people are asked to introduce themselves and talk about their company. This is their time to shine! But many miss their chance at free advertising because they are uncomfortable or have trouble explaining what they do or sell.

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 Leaning Together: Why ILC is Now Part of CIRAS

CIRAS NEWS, CIRAS Service Highlight, Iowa Lean Consortium, Resource Spotlight, Workforce

It’s the dawning of a new era for the Iowa Lean Consortium, and Teresa Hay McMahon is focused on a new world of service.

McMahon, executive director of the ILC since 2015, just finished leading the consortium through a new phase of its evolution. On July 1, the ILC formally moved under the CIRAS umbrella as part of a merger that’s intended to give both entities more resources to achieve their goals.

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Fort Dodge Finds Efficiency, Better Service Through Lean

eNews, Iowa Lean Consortium

David Fierke still remembers the 30-year public works employee who looked him in the eye at one of the city of Fort Dodge’s first Lean events in 2009 and asked what Fierke, the then-relatively new city manager, really thought he was going to teach a veteran about filling potholes.

Probably not much, Fierke acknowledged. But after Fort Dodge employees spent several hours that day looking for waste in the city’s pothole-filling process, they nevertheless managed to make it better.

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