Bob Gelina--"A Rock in Your Shoe"
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Dr. Robert Gelina, the founder and principal of CCQI, will be working closely with ContiBeef over the next two years. |
It's
8:00 a.m. on day two of the ContiBeef Managers' meeting, and Bob
Gelina, in a white shirt and firmly knotted red tie, is getting ready
to speak.
He puts up his first slide and soon is warming to some favorite topics: throughput and operating expense, systems
and bottlenecks. He's also asking lots of questions, looking for ideas and feedback rather than giving a lecture.
What most stands out, however, is the personal side--the fact that he knows everyone in the
room, is familiar with their jobs and backgrounds, and understands the
special features of their yards. Clearly, he's gotten to know ContiBeef
people as individuals and not simply as members of a large
organization.
In large part, this is because Bob spends much of his time at the yards themselves, learning
about the operations firsthand. He also consistently emphasizes
real-world applications in addition to classroom training.
"34 hours in a class isn't that much, let's be honest," says Bob, noting that people also need
help with implementation. In the end, his goal is to help ContiBeef
managers combine CCQI methods with their own experience and technical
know-how.
"I don't have the technical knowledge of cattle feeding," he notes. "What I do bring is knowledge
about systems, and that's what I'm trying to get into the hands of
people here."
Bob concedes that some people resist this effort and question what an outsider can really
bring to the business. At the same time, he stresses that he has
encountered resistance--at least at first--in nearly every one of the
ninety-plus companies he's worked with. And besides, asking people
tough questions, or as he says, "putting a rock in their shoe," is a
key part of his job.
"I'm not antagonistic by nature," he says with a laugh. "But I also don't want to be the kind of
consultant who just comes in and says 'give me your watch and I'll tell
you what time it is!'" This kind of approach would provide no real
value to the company.
As part of his work with ContiBeef, Bob notes that he will also be providing managers with help
in applying the leadership principles of management authority Stephen
Covey. These principles are more than generalities about leadership, he
says, and are in fact crucial to any organization that wishes to
achieve higher levels of quality and efficiency.
This part of the program will get more attention in the second year and will focus on such Covey
basics as "breaking down silos," moving from independence to
interdependence, and modeling the Seven Habits of Highly Effective
People.
Bob notes that ContiBeef does well in some of these areas, such as setting goals, but could in
his view do much better in others. "I want to be truthful about what I
see, and this is not to be critical. It shows that we have
opportunities and potential," says Bob, who clearly has great
enthusiasm both for his assignment and for the people of ContiBeef.
"I'm a big fan of the yards and I think you can see that. I'm pulling for them in every way I can!"