Culture Immersion Industrial Engineering and Management Day 3
Reflection
Wednesday, August 31, 2016
Getting inspired by experts
Today we spent the day interviewing experts who work in the field of Industrial engineering and management. We prepared these interviews by researching their backgrounds and coming up with questions that relate to their job. After gaining a lot of interesting information and advice based on their experience and views, we now have to come up with our own definition of what Industrial engineering and management is.
A summary of some of the interviews (5 out of 7): *Note: You can look these people up on www.linkedin.com to find more information about them.
Ben Blocks explained that as an industrial engineer and manager you are capable of understanding the different positions in a company. He gave the example of putting a product on the market and having to find a compromise between the engineers who want to use the best (and most of the time most expensive) materials to create it, and the finance department that wants to make as much money as possible. The problem is that less people would/ would be able to buy a very expensive product. Your job is thus to work on a product that is of both good quality and price.
Ben Blocks’s advice to future industrial engineers and managers is: “Think about something that you would be happy to wake up to do, and that’s the direction you have to go in. Have your eyes and ears wide open to how people act and why they act the way they do and lastly: You can find your passion, but can’t learn to have passion.”
Ramon Vullings stated that there is no typical Industrial engineer. IE&M in his view is a way of life. We asked him how he became as successful as he is and he told us that in order to be successful, you first have to define your own success. To him success means “joy and freedom”, but everyone is different.
Ramon Vullings’s advice to future industrial engineers and managers is: “ Have a good attitude and an open mind because reality is as you perceive it and everyone perceives it differently. Be delicate about change because people think differently and everyone does what they do because they think they are doing the right thing.” “My quote would be: Stop searching, start creating”
Max van Kruysdijk had some trouble speaking english, but still managed to make the following points:
IE&M makes/ fine tunes processes to make products First be effective than efficient (First do a good job at something and than do it efficiently) You have to be able to put yourself in someone else's shoes to create a product that others like.
Max van Kruysdijk’s quote: “Be nice to people”
Daniel Legarde talked all about creative problem solving and thinking outside the box. He explained how judgements are also called ‘idea killers’, because the moment you say that an idea is bad, it stops being an idea (it is forced away/forgotten) that can be brainstormed about and built upon. He said that it is best to have as many ideas as possible, so that you can use them to be creative and come up with an amazing product.
Daniel Legarde’s advice to future industrial engineers and managers is: If you keep doing things the same way, you will always get the same outcome, whereas you can achieve more by being creative, thinking outside the box, and coming up with new ideas.
Pedro Sterken’s definition of IE&M: IE&M is a way to get an understanding of the whole company; how it works, how you can grow the company, and why the company is in a supply chain and not the company alone.
Some wise words from Pedro Sterken: - Keep an open mind about innovation - Keep challenging yourself, because you are better than you might think you are - Focus on the enjoyment that comes with the process of doing things - You can keep changing your goals