This week was my first at Hyster-Yale Group! I have LOVED spending time working and shadowing various people at the manufacturing plant. Monday started out with a tour of the plant, followed by a safety class. After that I attended a DFT (Demand Flow Technology) workshop that basically described how and why the plant runs so efficiently. The plant runs on DFT, 6 Sigma, and the 5S system. All of these systems help to keep the plant organized, efficient, on schedule, and utilize resources properly (I will definitely be putting up some of the posters I’ve seen in the plant on my the walls in my classroom)! Tuesday I spent all day on the production line. HYG has three lines running in the plant and produces on average 160 lift trucks each day. I walked through the plant multiple times this week seeing the trucks from a pieces of steel to the final product, and each time I’ve seen and learned something new! It’s so amazing how they work! Wednesday morning I spent the day with Stores seeing their entire inventory process. I was amazed at how complex their system was! I spent that afternoon with the Environmental Health and Safety team learning about how HYG is working on being an “Earth friendly” company and trying extremely hard to reduce their carbon footprint. I learned that over 90% off their materials are recycled! That’s crazy (in a good way)! I also learned that their monthly power bill is generally around $175k :0 Thursday was an interesting day as well because I was able to spend the day with an electrical engineer. He was working on a specific part of the lift truck all day so I shadowed and observed him in his office and in the lab. I even got to practice crimping wires and creating circuits! Overall I had an amazing week!!! Next week I’m supposed to start on my own project so stay tuned…