Star Trek’s Leadership Lessons, Stellantis’ North American Challenge: IndustryWeek’s Weekly Review

The IndustryWeek manufacturing community turned its attention to those topics, as well as the increasing pace of manufacturing in July, AI in the supply chain, leadership and the andon, and more.

Welcome to IndustryWeek's Weekly Review. This week we are jumping straight into the Top 10 most consumed content over the past seven days. The Top 10 are: 

US Manufacturing Activity Grew at Fastest Rate in More Than Four Years, July ISM Report Shows: Growth expanded for the seventh consecutive month.

How Stellantis Plans to Get Back Its North American Mojo: CEO Antonio Filosa talked to analysts last week about his team’s plans to cut costs and improve efficiency at operations that account for more than 40% of the global auto giant’s revenues.

Supply-Chain AI: Now Breaking Down Silos: The technology has moved from improving individual functions to connecting and integrating capabilities.

Exploring Lean and Six Sigma Myths: Lean Only Applies to Manufacturing: Don't believe it, say the hosts of Behind the Curtain: Adventures in Continuous Improvement, who argue that lean applies to any process with inputs, outputs, suppliers and customers. That means health care, city government, schools and more.

What Semiconductor Supply Chains Can Teach the Rest of Manufacturing: They are managed with an engineering rigor, rather than handed off to procurement teams and revisited at a quarterly review.

Andon Is a Signal—But Leadership's Response Is the Critical Part: Creating conditions where people feel able to make problems visible is the real challenge of creating a culture of continuous improvement.

Lean Myth No. 3: Lean Belongs to Engineers: On the contrary, many disciplines can excel as lean facilitators. Qualities such as humility, critical thinking and the ability to work as a team are key, regardless of one's background or education, say the hosts of Behind the Curtain.

From 'Star Trek' to the Shop Floor: Enterprising Leaders Teach Without Realizing It: LeVar Burton's observation about positive on-set behavior resonates beyond the 'Final Frontier.'

ITW and Nucor See Tailwinds Sustaining Manufacturing Growth: Nucor’s president told investors that demand is “broad enough and strong enough in enough channels” to power gains for several more years. At ITW, every division grew more quickly in Q2 than historical trends.

Podcast: How Isla Talent Connects the Skilled Workforce of Puerto Rico with U.S. Manufacturers: In this episode of Great Question: A Manufacturing Podcast, Clay Martin, CEO and founder of recruiting agency Isla Talent, describes how manufacturers can address labor shortages by hiring blue-collar workers from Puerto Rico.

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