Union Electric Steel forges and casts the massive steel rolls used to produce sheet steel, aluminum, and other metals for cars, appliances, packaging, and commercial construction.
The relationship between Catalyst Connection and Union Electric began when the company became interested in supervisor training. As vice president Vince Ricciardi explains, “The thing we wanted to gain was a solid foundation, which would allow all of our management people to communicate at the same level. In many cases, communication is one of the biggest problems in management, and one of the biggest complaints is a lack of it.”
We worked closely with Union Electric to explore training options. Vince’s team enrolled a cross section of key leaders — foremen, superintendents, managers and vice presidents — in a customized management training curriculum that we developed especially for Union Electric. “With all of us having the same training, it created a vocabulary that allowed us to establish the same communication level,” Vince says. “We also wanted to improve teamwork. A major goal that we met was to be able to talk about different management styles and their respective advantages and disadvantages.”
The results were exceptional. Union Electric has improved relationships between supervisors and hourly employees, increased cooperation, and amplified communications among its management team. Plant and office functions are better organized, Vince says, while the management team’s coaching skills have improved, and all leaders exhibit better listening.
Vince says the training Catalyst Connection provided is invaluable in two ways. First, “The presentations were a combination of lecture, exercises, and discussion,” an approach he calls superior to one-day seminars that lack personal attention. And second, our consultants returned to Union Electric to interview training participants and evaluate their implementation of self-improvement action plans. “It was very important for the success of the training,” Vince says.
Because, he says, he always sees room for improvement, Vince feels Union Electric is ready for the next step: lean manufacturing. In his view, our training has prepared his team for the lean philosophy. “That’s why we felt it was important to do the leadership training first,” he explains. “It set us on the right course.”