All aboard for improvements

VOLGREN’S Peter Campbell is Victoria’s Young Manufacturer of the Year for 2007.
Dr Campbell, 33, was given the honour at the Victorian Manufacturing Hall of Fame Gala Dinner in Melbourne on Monday night.
He holds a PhD in engineering and has worked as improvement manager at Volgren Australia in Hammond Road, Dandenong, for the past two years.
In that role Dr Campbell works to improve the manufacturing processes at Volgren, a company that is Australia’s largest manufacturer of bus bodies.
And while the bus industry is booming, Dr Campbell’s job is far from easy.
“We have a current situation where the bus market is going crazy,” he said.
“I am trying to work out ways to satisfy demand and while it is easy to ramp up production, we have to be mindful that the bus industry goes through a period of growth before returning to a base rate.
“I have to make sure we are capable of ramping back down.”
Dr Campbell said his career in manufacturing was not planned – he instead fell into it after studying for 12 years at university.
“When I graduated from my undergraduate studies I ended up getting a postgraduate job working with Ford, the Australian National University and Deakin University in the Stamping Technology in Automotive Manufacturing Process research group, and that got me into manufacturing.
“It was never planned but I certainly enjoy what I do.
“I am very lucky to do a job day-in, day-out, that I absolutely love.”
Dr Campbell said the greatest satisfaction came from seeing shop floor staff implement improvements with his encouragement.
“I teach them how to (improve processes), give them the tools and resources to do it, and get the hell out of the way,” he said with a laugh. “As a result there have been massive changes in certain areas and it is satisfying to see the guys on the floor take ownership of their improvements.”
Dr Campbell gave an example of one employee’s ability to reduce the time it takes to produce a bus chassis.
“One of our employees, Kevin ‘Spider’ Smith reduced the cycle time in chassis production by more than 30 per cent over a six-month period,” Dr Campbell said.
“That is just one example of numerous improvements from the shop floor.”