The presentation will explain what Destination 971 is and how it was developed. It will look at the importance of goal setting, how to measure those goals consistently, and how the results were achieved and the employees recognized. Floor improvements will be discussed, highlighting the discipline of tracking results and promoting Continuous Improvement. A discussion of the successes and failures will conclude the presentation.

The agricultural industry is flourishing all over the globe. There hasn’t been a year offering such opportunity industry-wide since the 1970’s. Honey Bee was sold-out and looking for more capacity and was faced with meeting the demand to take advantage of this once- in- a- lifetime opportunity without an abundance of human resources.

As of November, 2007, Honey Bee Manufacturing Ltd was sold out for the ’08 season when it found another 200 machines HAD to be manufactured. How were they going to do it when a second shift, insufficient human resources, and turning down orders was not an option? The result – Destination 971!

Destination 971 is the production program that Honey Bee implemented to answer the increased demand. It is an 8-month production program that is designed to transform the culture and expectations for Honey Bee, its customers, and employees. This presentation will give you the history leading up to Destination 971, as well as the execution, successes, and failures of this Lean journey.

Honey Bee Manufacturing is a fully integrated manufacturing company developing and producing harvest equipment for the agricultural industry worldwide. There are over 160 people employed at Honey Bee which is recognized as an industry leader in the development of harvesting equipment for a variety of agricultural crops.

Jamie Pegg, Manager of Support Services

Jamie Pegg came to Honey Bee Manufacturing as a Training coordinator following a career as a Sales and Management training consultant.

It was while Jamie was training on the floor and learning the operation of the production equipment that he realized there was a better way to accomplish this process. Jamie developed into a Leader for Lean Manufacturing implementation while coordinating these efforts with consultants. In the last year Jamie has been promoted to the Manager of Support Services and oversees Lean, ISO, HR, Safety and IT operations. This portfolio was created to support the company’s efforts to become Lean.

Dale Hughes, Manager of Support Services

Dale Hughes is the plant manager at Honey Bee Mfg. His 26 years of experience in the Agriculture industry has been a huge asset in understanding and implementing the Lean process at Honey Bee.

The first four years of Dale Hughes’ career were spent in design and implementation at Friggstad Mfg.. Following this time at Friggstad, Dale spent 16 years at Flexi-coil holding the positions of Design and Plant Engineer as well as Technical Service Manager. Flexi-coil was taken over by Case New Holland (CNH) which gave Dale more exposure to some of the new models for workplace efficiency.

After 4 years at CNH Dale decided to accept the challenge of Plant Manager at Honey Bee Mfg.