10 more fired at O'Sullivan Industries

The year-long effort to sweep O'Sullivan Industries clear of Lamar influence continued today with the firing of 10 more Lamar-based officials, The Turner Report has learned. At the same time, and with much fanfare...memos circulated around the company welcoming two new officials, one of them, of course, coming from Newell Rubbermaid, the previous stopping place for million-dollar CEO Bob Parker and most of the new executives he has brought to this now-Atlanta-based company.
Seven employees, each with more than 20 years of experience were fired...Larry Christie, George Dighero, Larry Edge, Walter Powell, Hal Sutton, Connie Montgomery, and Kevin Rook. Shawna Phipps, who had been there about a decade, also lost her job in the June 1 massacre. Two others were also reportedly fired.
Newly minted senior vice president, operations, Kelly Terry, another Rubbermaid refugee, sent out the memo welcoming another former Rubbermaid employee, Jimmy McAfee, who will serve as director of process improvement and quality "responding directly to me," according to the memo.
"He will be based in our Lamar, MO facility, but his responsibilities will span both the Lamar and South Boston, VA facilities. In his new role, Jimmy will focus on driving cost improvements in manufacturing, distribution, and purchasing through process improvements and the implementation of lean principles. (For those of you who are unfamiliar with such terms, don't worry. Most of the officials who use them don't understand them either.) A key area of Jimmy's leadership impact will be improving cost and consumer satisfaction by dramatically reducing our defectives and missing component occurrences. Additionally, Jimmy will develop and implement a robust cost reduction system that will be based in process improvement and waste reductions throughout our operations."
The memo continued, "Jimmy comes to O'Sullivan from Rubbermaid Commercial Products, a division of Newell Rubbermaid, where he was operational excellence manager. He was responsible for managing the company's lean manufacturing implementation and cost reduction efforts for their three facilities. Jimmy has held various other operations roles during his 12-year career at Newell Rubbermaid including plant manager, engineering manager, and production manager.
"Jimmy has a bachelor of science degree from the University of Tennessee in industrial engineering and an MBA from the University of South Carolina. He has a very broad operations background and will serve O'Sullivan well by leading our efforts to improve our overall cost position through process improvement. Jimmy, his wife Kim, and their two children will be relocating to the Lamar area in the near future.
"Please join me welcoming Jimmy to O'Sullivan Industries and wishing him great success as we strive for operational excellence...'excellence in everything we do."
It was signed "Kelly Terry, senior vice president, operations"
In a shock, the other person whose hiring was announced actually has a southwest Missouri connection, having received a degree from SMSU. That memo was issued by Brad J. Young, director of engineering.
It read, "It gives me great pleasure to announce that Steve Stansbury has been hired into the position of lean manager for O'Sullivan Industries reporting to me. In this role, Steve will champion the effort of driving lean principles throughout the O'Sullivan organization, particularly in operations. Steve will play a key role as we strive to achieve operational excellence in everything we do.
"Steve comes to O'Sullivan Industries from General Motors, where he was the global manufacturing system implementation manager. The GMS, used by General Motors, is synonymous with the Toyota Production System (TPS) used by Toyota and many other world-class manufacturing companies. At GM, Steve was tasked with implementing GMS at the Pontiac, MI assembly plant and the Lansing MI assembly plant. Prior to joining General Motors, Steve served in a variety of engineering roles at Butler Manufacturing Corporation, Custom Metalcraft, and Avatar Components. Steve holds a bachelor of science degree in industrial engineering technology from Southwest Missouri State University and a master of science degree in manufacturing operations from Kettering University.
"Steve, his wife Stasi, and his daughter Samantha (age 7) and son Zach (age 4) will be relocating to the Lamar area in the near future. Please join me in welcoming Steve to the O'Sullivan team." The memo was signed "Brad J. Young, director of engineering."
O'Sullivan's most recent moves come just two weeks after company officials issued a disastrous quarterly report. For more information about that, check out the May 16 Turner Report.