Folks,
Let's see how Professor Patty is doing...
Professor Patty Coleman stared out of her office window at the waning remnants of snow on Ivy University’s campus. She was bummed that when the snow completely melted and golf courses opened, Ivy U’s golf course would not be one of them. The administration decided to close the course permanently a few years ago to make room for more dorms. She couldn’t imagine an Ivy League school not having a golf course.
Her phone rang, startling her from her daydreaming.
“Patty Coleman speaking. How may I help you?” Patty cheerfully began.
“Professor Patty, it’s Mike Madigan,” the caller responded.
Mike was the CEO of ACME Assembly Solutions, a company Patty worked at almost 10 years ago. She and Mike were very close.
“What’s up?” Patty asked.
“One of my friends owns Liberty Electronics. It is a small shop, with only four lines. Recently their profits are down 10% and they would like to know how to fix it,” Mike explained.
“Have they made any recent changes?” Patty asked.
“This one won’t surprise you, they changed to a cheaper solder paste,” Mike elaborated.
Patty groaned, “Why do people not understand that saving a few pennies per gram on solder paste is a bad idea if it performs poorly?”
“Anyway, could you look into it and see if you could help them?” Mike asked.
Patty quickly thought that this could be a good project for one of her grad students.
“Sure thing!” Patty responded.
Mike gave Patty the needed contact information.
Fifteen minutes later, PhD candidate Maria Gonzales knocked on Patty’s door.
“Pasa, es un placer verte María. ¿Cómo estás?” Patty said to Maria.
“Estoy bien profesora, gracias por preguntar,” Maria responded.
Figure 1. Professor Patty Coleman (right) chatting with her graduate student Maria Gonzales (left).
Patty was proficient in Spanish and Mandarin and like to keep these language skills sharp. The remainder of their discussion will be translated for those of our readers who are a little rusty in their Spanish skills.
Patty explained the Liberty Electronics situation to Maria and asked her to perform an audit to determine why profits were down.
“It is tempting to think that the reason for the decrease in profits is due to the change in solder paste. However, please perform a thorough audit so that we consider all possible causes,” Patty summarized.
Two days later, Maria was at Liberty Electronics, ready to start her audit. Her host was Jose Castellanos. He was delighted to meet Maria, and even more so to find out that she spoke his first language: Spanish.
Just about everything was covered in the audit, from the receipt and storage of components, PWBs, to materials such as solder paste. Maria and Jose went through the assembly process starting with the stencil printer and ending with the final test. They studied the production figures, such as the number of PCBs ordered and the number shipped.
Finally, a little exhausted, Maria summed up, “You are shipping about 5% less product and only one thing seems to have changed.”
Jose anticipated what she was about to say, “Yes, only the solder paste has changed. Well, actually, two things changed. The new CFO and the solder paste. He insisted we use a paste that is 2 cents a gram cheaper.
Why did the new solder paste cause profits and productivity to decrease? Stay tuned to find out.
Cheers,
Dr. Ron