What does a Richmond credit card company have to teach the nation's largest shipbuilder? More than you'd think. On a recent report to Capital One Financial's Richmond operations center, leadership from Northrop Grumman Corp's Newport News shipyard and other Virginia enterprises gained insight into managing the flow of paper, reports the Daily Press in Newport News.
Capital One, it happens, is a world-class expert in paperwork, processing many thousands of credit card applications monthly. The shipyard, which tracks thousands of pages of construction drawings and other documents, has a lot to gain from boosting the productivity of its document handling processes.
Virginia companies can learn a lot from each other. That's the premise of a newly formed organization, the Virginia Business Excellence Consortium, a group of 22 companies operating in Richmond and Hampton Roads ranging in size from 14 employees to 21,000 at the shipyard. The group met Friday to share ideas and tour the shipyard and the carrier George H.W. Bush. In an upcoming meeting, members will tour the Ukrop's Super Markets' bakery operation to learn about "lean" manufacturing as applied to cake decorating, doughnut production and tunnel oven production. Lean tools that will be featured include 5S, Standard Work, Quality at the Source and One Piece Flow.
To become a member, the companies have to agree to host group meetings at least once every two years, share information about their business' processes and pay annual fees that range from $400 to $1,500, depending on the firm's size. The program was modeled after ventures in Florida and South Carolina that focus on increasing productivity.
Bacon's bottom line: Hear my mantra -- In a globally competitive marketplace, the only path to sustainable prosperity is through productivity and innovation. The Virginia Business Excellence Consortium is precisely the kind of new-era institution that the Richmond region needs to build in order to increase wealth and maintain living standards. I'll be profiling VCU's da Vinci Center, another cutting-edge initiative, tomorrow, and I'll follow up with a report on the Virginia Biosciences Commercialization Center later this month.