Industry Week articles from May 2004

Industry Week archives from May 2004

Online poll.(Brief Article)(Illustration)
May 1, 2004... What single factor deserves the most credit for the rebounding U.S. economy? IndustryWeek.com readers respond: Tax Cuts 25% Low Interest Rates 28% Dollar's Declining Value 8% Other 3% What Rebounding Economy 36% ...

Putting offshore outsourcing in perspective: U.S. Companies succeed when they focus on innovating for their customers, period.(Editor's Page)
May 1, 2004... SOMETIMES THE ANSWERS to the most difficult questions, and the solutions to the most intractable problems, are fight in front of our eyes, and we don't acknowledge them. Instead we come up with reasons why a particular solution won't work for...

NAFTA's casualties.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... I had to send you a brief note or just burst! There are no winners as a result of NAFTA [Re: "Rougher Ride After NAFTA," February 2004, Page 39]. Americans are out of work. Americans are in most cases making less money. Americans have lost...

Make manufacturing relevant.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... Great article ["Impatience As A Virtue" March 2004, Page 66]. Most CEO/executives view manufacturing as a necessary evil as opposed to a financial opportunity. They see adding $1 in sales that drops 30 cents in profit [to the bottom line] to be...

The best role models.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... I can honestly say that the best bosses/leaders that I've had have been a solid combination of parental/ coaching management styles, and I've tried to model my approach in the same way. ["Parenting Your Company to Profits," March 2004, Page...

FASB options rule draws rants, Raves: tech firms would be particularly hard hit, lobbying groups claim.(Accounting)
May 1, 2004... MANUFACTURERS AND OTHERS HAVE until June 30 to comment on the Financial Accounting Standards Board's (FASB)proposed rule changes for booking stock options and other share-based payments. It appears they won't need that long. Reaction to...

More public meetings planned.(ASAP)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... The Financial Accounting Standards Board says it plans to hold several public roundtables to discuss its proposed rule change. They are tentatively scheduled to take place at the end of June in the San Francisco Bay area and in Norwalk, Conn....

Make that Cincinnati Milacron: Milacron Inc.'s chairman and CEO Ronald D. Brown lets his customers and employees win the name-brand game.(3 Quick Questions)(Interview)
May 1, 2004... Founded in 1884 as Cincinnati Screw & Tap Co., this production-machine maker transitioned to Cincinnati Milling Machine Co. in 1889 and Cincinnati Milacron in 1970. Following the sale of its machine tool business in 1998 to concentrate on...

Meetings makeover.(Book Shelf)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... The connotation of the title of Patrick Lencioni's new work, "Death By Meeting, A Leadership Fable" (2004, Jossey-Bass) is so familiar to so many knowledge workers that it might do the book a disservice. One could easily dismiss Lencioni's...

CFO survey: up, up and up; expect a wave of capital spending, jobs and tech spending.(Economic Outlook)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... THE FOLKS WHO HOLD THE CORPORATE purse strings expect those knotted cords to loosen up over the next 12 months, according to a recent quarterly survey of chief financial officers. Some 69% of the CFOs expect capital spending to grow over...

Clear as mud: many workers don't know their company's goals.(Strategy)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... ONE THING IS PERFECTLY CLEAR: Organizations are doing a poor job of educating their workers about their companies' strategic goals. So suggest the findings of a recent survey of workers commissioned by FranklinCovey. According to the study: ...

At 20, Dell's magic continues.(Time Machine)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... In November 1998 INDUSTRYWEEK wrote of Michael Dell: "There are any number of good reasons to choose Michael Dell as INDUSTRY WEEK'S CEO of the Year for 1998--or almost any other year this decade." On the eve of Dell Inc.'s 20th...

"Notable quotable.".(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... "This offshoring of high-paying jobs may look good on the bottom line of a quarterly financial report, but it's certainly not good for the skilled technical professional who can't find a job." --John Steadman president. The Institute of...

Report outlines foreign trade barriers: 500-page tome presents problems, progress.(Trade)
May 1, 2004... IT ISN'T LIGHT READING AT SOME 500 pages, but the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative's annual report on foreign trade barriers to U.S. exports may be a "must read" for manufacturers operating in international waters. And for those thinking...

2004 survey under way.(Census Of Manufacturers)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... Some 30,000 manufacturing executives now are receiving the INDUSTRYWEEK/Manufacturing Performance Institute 2004 Census of Manufacturers questionnaire in their mailboxes. If you are a recipient, please complete and return the questionnaire by...

Lift trucks--the new decisions; will it be internal combustion, electric (DC or AC?), and what is the wireless strategy?(Emerging Technologies)
May 1, 2004... WHEN SHANKAR BASU BEGAN HIS career in the lift truck industry 30 years ago the buying process was different, if not simpler. "Since then all the rules of thumb have changed, notes Basu, now president and CEO for Toyota Material Handling Inc....

IndustryWeek'S 2004 Technology & Innovation Awards call for entries.(Emerging Technologies)
May 1, 2004... Each year INDUSTRY WEEK'S Technology and Innovation Awards celebrate outstanding achievement in technology. IW invites readers to nominate candidates for the 2004 INDUSTRYWEEK Technology and Innovation Awards, which will be profiled in the...

Monster movie madness! What's really behind our fear of China Inc.?(brandt On Leadership)
May 1, 2004... IT SEEMS I CAN'T TALK TO ANYONE in manufacturing without discussing the threat of Chinese competition. I don't know about you, but I've seen this movie before. In the late 1980s, you couldn't pick up a financial newspaper or business...

How many masters: particularly with Sarbanes-Oxley imposing added costs on public companies, being private can look increasingly attractive to U.S. manufacturers. But the situations is not that simple, and especially for innovators, being private may not be the best option.(Management Strategies)
May 1, 2004... RICHARD C. COOK figures that U.S. manufacturers doing under $100 million in business annually "probably" can't afford to be publicly traded. Compliance costs associated with the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act, federal legislation designed to...

Getting real with real time; manufacturers achieve real-time goal by focusing on slices of key data, not the entire enterprise.(Information Technology)
May 1, 2004... AS MANUFACTURERS RESPOND TO increasingly volatile demand for a greater variety of products, the need for real-time business information continues to grow. And while few manufacturers actually need to know everything about their operations...

The smart road to manufacturing success.(Calendar)
May 1, 2004... * SMART/mfg's meticulously selected keynotes, sessions, workshops, and networking events will show you how American manufacturing companies like your own have found practical ways to sell more, lower costs, compete more successfully with...

Lean, green & smart; what's in store for tomorrow's factories? Process intelligence tools, outmaneuvering costly regulations and machine tools that learn their lessons well.(Plant Strategies)
May 1, 2004... WARNING! Don't begin planning your factory of the future until you're ready to start revising yesterday's presumptions about optimization and efficiency, the environment, and machine intelligence. Traditional manufacturing...

Help wanted: manufacturers will be hiring more in 2004, but their employee-oriented programs could use a makeover.(Labor Management)(Illustration)
May 1, 2004... IN A TELEVISION ADVERTISEMENT AIMED AT UNSEATING President George W. Bush, no fewer than 10 images of production workers flash across the screen. It's all about manufacturing jobs. Where have they gone? Why don't we have more? Will they come...

Supply-chain superstars: squeezing the supply chain to reduce prices isn't a novel idea. Harnessing it to cut system-wide costs and bolster revenue growth is. These high-level supply-chain executives are leading the way.(Leadership)(Cover Story)
May 1, 2004... EARLY LAST YEAR THEY WERE CALLING HIM "The $5 Billion Man" and wondering what he was going to do for an encore. This year, he reported more than $7 billion in productivity gains, streamlined efficiency and other cost savings over the course of...

Gimme e-shelter: the internet is losing the battle against e-mail bombing.(E Commentary)
May 1, 2004... CALL ME SHRAPMAILED. Shrapmail is so ubiquitous, so insidious, that not even Bill Gates--the richest man in the world, founder and top dog at Microsoft Corp., and considered by some as one of the most technologically savvy people in the...

Small-tech attraction: lab-on-a-chip technology developer stays put in Ann Arbor, Mich.(Sensicore Inc.)
May 1, 2004... Old-line industrial states seeking to diversify their economic base would do well to follow Michigan's lead and start small. Sensicore Inc.'s lab-on-a-chip sensor falls into what some dub "small-tech," a sector that encompasses microtechnology...

Lower energy prices? Fall from high prices is forecast.(Costs)
May 1, 2004... IN THE SHORT TERM, HIGHER ENERGY prices, along with rising prices for commodities, are "the No. 1 concern" as the U.S. economy recovers from the 2001 recession, contends Jerry J. Jasinowski, president of the National Association of...

Productive investment.(Bottom Line)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... Renewed confidence in the future growth of their industries is causing a significant number of manufacturers to invest in new technologies they expect will improve productivity and efficiency and expand capacity. A recent survey sponsored by...

Silicon Valley strategy: an old-line, low-tech parts maker reinvents itself as a high-tech "solution provider.".(Best practices)(Engineered Machine Products)
May 1, 2004... IT SOUNDS SO EASY WHEN YOU LISTEN TO David Alien, vice president of product development, tell the story of Engineered Machine Products' (EMP) turnaround. As he describes it, the transformation of the Escanaba, Mich.-based maker of diesel engine...

Beating the Baldrige blues: you won't find any one-hit wonders among the 2003 winners.(Continuous improvement)
May 1, 2004... 'DOES ANYONE CARE ABOUT THE Malcolm Baldrige Award anymore?" a friend asked when I told him I was considering attending the Quest for Excellence conference this year. I couldn't honestly say. So I decided to go and find out. With 2003...

Inflation, then rising rates: if finished-goods price increases stick, sharply higher interest rates will follow.(Evans On The Economy)
May 1, 2004... SUPPOSE I TOLD YOU THAT SINCE the middle of last year, the rate of inflation has been 39.2%. You d probably assume it was a pretty bad joke. Nonetheless, the U.S. Labor Department's core Producer Price Index (PPI) for crude materials,...