Ray O’Cinneide | Tyndall

What aspect of innovation/developing new products do you enjoy most and why?

Working in a close team to develop something which will improve the world in a small way gives an immense sense of satisfaction.

Which part is the most challenging?

It’s important to know what the market will want from technology, but the market really has no idea.

So even with thorough market research and potential customer interactions, there is still a high probability that a project may not end up in a major product. It’s tough when all the hard work goes nowhere.

What is the most inspiring product you have developed/work on?

Throughout the years I’ve worked on the development of around 15 ‘computer chips’ for various applications, but the most inspiring is the current smart glove project which may really help people in numerous application areas. 

What advice would you give a manager in a manufacturing site to improve innovation/new product development?

Get everyone to feel like they are an owner of their role.

Give them the authority to think and question, and a mechanism to implement improvement so product quality is kept consistently high.

What was the single best piece of advice you received in your career?

Focus on doing what you are naturally good at. A hard worker may become good at something s/he is not a natural at, but will never excel like the hard-working natural.

What one change would you like to see in the research/new product arena?

More international collaboration would improve everyone’s success. Lots of time is wasted by competing groups working on the same solution.

What was the most surprising discovery on the Haptic glove journey?

That there is so much opportunity for the development of new ideas.

Fiona Buckley

What was the most rewarding professional work you have undertaken?

Delivering and teaching on corporate training programmes where I know I have made a real difference to people.

What was the biggest catalyst for change in your career?

 When I took redundancy and set up my own business after 15 years of working

What is the best tip you ever received for managing employees?

Don’t expect everyone to like you!

Who do you look up in the industry?

Sheryl Sandberg.

Do you have any daily rituals that help you get things done?

Weekly goal setting on a Sunday evening/Monday morning is crucial for me. I then filter this down into daily goals and priorities. Without doing this I don’t think I would get half as much done. It keeps me focused.

If you had a magic wand that could solve all HR problems, what would you use it to do?

Create better people managers

What one change do you think managers should undertake?

Put yourself in the employee’s shoes regularly.

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John Quirke | SA Partners

What is the most enjoyable part of your work?

After working with clients, we often carry out follow up assessments with companies when they have their own ‘wheels’ under them.  It is fantastic to listen to the teams explain what they have done and how they have improved things. It is a special place to be when operators and team leads are talking about and showing you the Improvements they have made by applying their ideas.

What parts of problem solving do people find the hardest?

Looking at the process and understanding it without the baggage of older thinking.  When solving a problem teams must investigate and understand what is really happening not what they think is happening.

Where do they fall down?

Ignoring facts or maybe not setting up experiments to test the ‘facts’ they have.  It’s like the old story of the guy looking for his keys in the dark. He only searches where the street lamp is shining!

What is the biggest challenge you face when you work with an organisation?

Fear. This can be fear of change or real tangible fear resulting from years of poor behaviours and disrespect.  If this is present in an organization it must be addressed before any CI progamme is initiated. If it is not it creates a hollow, tick the box effort that only perpetuates an already in unhealthy environment.

What advice would you give to senior managers in the manufacturing sector?

Get your ‘cunning plan’ or ‘Skunk’ strategy together for your site.  I don’t care if the site is part of a global corporation. The senior team need a strategy for their site.  To address questions such as: How do we remain relevant to the organization? What technologies and skills will we need in the future? How do we influence key stakeholders? Who do we really need to be competing against? How will we add value in five years time?

How advanced are Irish companies in implementing lean and critical thinking methodologies?

Getting better.  But there can still be an over focus on tools without sufficient thinking on ideal culture and  behaviours.  For example, if I’m an operator working on a medical device manufacturing line,  is it acceptable that I don’t really have an understanding of how the process works.  I will know I have to put this bit here and that bit there and press this button and I’ll know a good sample and a bad sample.  But really that’s not enough? If that is the extent to which I engage operators in the process then I am limiting the ability of the organization to tap into the ‘minds of gold’ of the people closest to the work.  So we need to look at the behaviours that encourage learning, inquisitiveness, improvement, along with adherence to well defined standards that I as an operator have been really involved in their development. We need behaviours of respect and humility to ensure the suggestions and concerns of operators are listened to and respected.  We need more of this.

What was the best piece of business advice you ever received?

It’s only work! Work is not life!

Sure it’s important but if we are not balanced in ourselves it is hard.  In my job this is a particular challenge and one I need to constantly check in on!

Kevin Eyres

What role do managers struggle with?

Managers struggle to coach (although they often mentor) and they struggle also to provide effective correction preferring to avoid tricky situations.

What makes a really good manager?

Sometime who listens and observes well in order to understand what might be going on.

What do you enjoy about the consultancy/work with managers?

Seeing people get better at their craft

How well do Irish managers compare with other countries?

Favourably; there is a depth of ‘social capital’

If you had a magic wand what aspect of managing would you change?

Eliminate easy prescriptions of what it means to be good.

What was the best piece of business advice you ever received?

Do what you love doing.

Gerry Cahill | Roche Ireland

What was the best productivity improvement measure you have ever witnessed or initiated?

Time saved was the best measure implemented – everyone can relate to having more or less time and through LEAN programs making more time available, people can see a real tangible benefit. 

What were the key drivers of productivity?

Having an improvement mindset, knowing what to focus on and being relentless in achieving improvements

How important is the technology component?

Very important as are the people managing the technology. Key is to have an aligned technology strategy that supports the manufacturing processes. 

What advice would you give a senior manager in dealing with a change journey?

Be very clear on what you want to achieve i.e. define what a successful outcome is before you start any change journey. 

What was the most difficult part of closing a facility?

Not knowing how people would react to the news of the closure

How optimistic are you about Ireland retaining its manufacturing base?

I am optimistic once we don’t get complacent where we must maintain a high level of competitiveness by being the best at manufacturing coupled with having a highly skilled and a flexible workforce. 

If you had a magic wand what aspect of manufacturing in Ireland would you change?

Inform key decision makers around the world about the manufacturing capabilities within Ireland – I keep meeting people who do not know what capabilities are available and what has been achieved 

What was the best piece of business advice you ever received?

Hire the best people 

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Siobhan Geary | Boston Scientific Clonmel

What is the most satisfying aspect of training a diverse workforce?

Seeing people who work hard grow and develop both professionally and academically.  Seeing their confidence and skill set develop and that person flourishing and achieving more then they originally thought themselves capable of.  Having diversity from both a geographic and background perspective brings new ideas and approaches to every day challenges.  

How different is multigenerational training – do you take a different approach to millennials etc?

Our training approach continues to develop based on the business needs. We don’t specifically take a different approach based on generational differences as we feel equality and standardisation of the training and messaging is important.  However, training approaches evolves with technology and we are now developing more Computer Based Training (CBT’s) and app’s.  A recent app TAP, Talent Assignments & Project allows Boston Scientific employee to have visibility to projects across the network.  If there is a topic of interest or if you have a skillset that would allow you to assist, you can TAP and engage in the project.

What is the biggest impact that training delivers?

From a Business perspective standardization of a common language and consistence of purpose in a regulated environment.  From an Employee perspective, information and guidance and a how too guide for a new job initially.   Defining a pathway to future development.

What advice would you give to a manager dealing with training?

Customise for your audience. Understand the “What’s In It for Me” (WIIFE). Change the medium every 15 minutes to keep your audience engaged.  Finally, you can never go wrong with Chocolate!

If you had a magic wand what aspect of the training world would you change?

What is the key message you want to audience to walk away with.  A lot of training gets lost in the detail and the audience do not walk away with a very clear simple message.

What is the best piece of business/work advice you ever received?

Don’t rule yourself out of opportunities  – say yes – you will gain value knowledge from the experience and you might even surprise yourself

Cormac Ó’Conaire | Design Partners

What was the most satisfying product you ever worked on?

Logitech G’s flagship gaming product, the G900. There are many ways designing a product can be satisfying: working with great teams, having a eureka moment, winning design awards or getting positive customer reviews. For the G900 it achieved all the above. There is extreme pressure on any design team when replacing a ‘hero’ product but our previous collaboration with Logitech resulted in the world’s bestselling gaming mouse, so we had earned great trust with the client.

How important is trust in the design process?

Trust is very important when it comes to our line of work. It gives our design and engineering team autonomy to work at their best as well as the incentive to create incredible work for our clients. The G900 was a huge commercial success, professional gamers used it to win major gaming competitions and PCGamer said they couldn’t find a single flaw with it. I’m very proud of the team that was involved in its success.

How much of the success of a new product is gut feel versus structured assessment/research?

There is an expensive and inefficient trend in our industry to over-prescribe research. Clearly, saying, “it feels right” is not a justifiable argument to a client’s brief, so many design agencies end up trying to validate every decision with some additional research. When research is used to define every single aspect of a product experience what’s left is a perfectly usable product that nobody wants to use; one that lacks any meaningful innovation or emotional connection. When we, as consumers, make any purchasing decision, regardless of how rational we think we are being, our brains use a combination of logic and emotion. A great design process mirrors this approach with a careful balance of focused research and design intuition.

The more experience you have the more instinctive your ideas become. You build an innate sense of what is right and wrong for each project. Our gut feel comes from a ‘second brain’ in our bodies called the enteric nervous system, made up of various neurons lining our stomachs, and is informed by our collective subconscious and unconscious experiences. So, once our designers have a deep understanding of the end users (and the brands) they are designing for, we encourage them to trust their instincts to produce beautifully functional solutions. 

How advanced are Irish companies in developing new products?

Ireland is booming with great entrepreneurial talent, but we have a way to go before our nation becomes world renowned for developing new products. Design Partners is one of the best consultancies in the world at designing new products and experiences. We see is a clear difference between the approach of the larger brands we work with (e.g. Huawei, Samsung, LG, Panasonic, HP, Google…etc.) and many of our Irish clients, but their ambitions are the same.

What should change?

Firstly, we need to educate people on the design process. There is a naivety in the value that design can bring to the product development process. Many companies still consider design as an afterthought; something that can be applied at the end to make their offering look better. But design is a carefully considered process that can bring a differentiating competitive advantage, it can build brand equity, it can make sales’ job easier, it can create happier customers. The Design Management Index released figures showing a 150% greater return in profits for companies that had integrated design into their development process and Irish companies who embrace that approach will set themselves apart.

What advice would you give to managers who are trying to introduce innovation in their organisations?

Begin with a vision. A vision paints a positive picture of the future you want to create and helps get people behind you. Humans are storytellers and if you can find the right way to articulate your vision people will follow.

8.00am-9.00am

Registration

Rathasker Suite Reception.

Tea/Coffee available on arrival.  Network and meet our exhibitors.

9.00-9.15am

Welcome

Eamonn Murphy | ICBE

Welcome address

Eamonn Murphy, ICBE will outline the focus of ICBE and its view on the challenges and opportunities ahead.

9.20-9.25

Kick off

Matt Cooper | MC

Orientation

Matt Cooper will outline the day’s proceedings, the focus of this year’s conference and set the scene for the group sessions.

9.25-9.45

Problem Solving.

John Quirke | SA Partners

Problem Solving

John Quirke, SA Partners will discuss how to get the maximum from the conference and bringing critical thinking and problem solving to the group discussions.  In this pragmatic session our expert speaker will give practical tips, structures and insights that will power the group discussions following each set of presentations.  John will also address problem solving as a core employee engagement tool for organisations.

9.45-10.05

Productivity 

Judith McMullan  | Abbott

Our Journey to Excellence

Judith currently manages the Shingo program across Abbott Nutrition Supply Chain (ANSC), where they have a number of sites challenging for the Shingo Prize over the next three years.  In October 2017, Abbott Nutrition, Sligo were the first site in the ANSC network to receive the prestigious Shingo prize.  Judith will share their journey to excellence and how they have aligned the ANSC Management Operating System (MOS), and their ANSC Pledge Behaviours with the Shingo Model to drive people engagement, productivity and drive a culture of accountability, continuous improvement and problem solving.

10.05-10.25

Productivity – Casestudy

Gerry Cahill | Roche Ireland

Productivity in Crisis – Sustaining productivity in an era of change

Gerry will share his personal journey and how Roche reached new levels of productivity.   Gerry is currently closing Roche’s facility and is leading the divestment activities to ensure a safe and successful closure. With a significant interest in Leadership, Learning and Change Management he is leading the site on a LEAN journey to help prepare people for life after Roche whilst delivering better than target results for the business. This is to help people upskill themselves and be able to tell their stories about how they improved both themselves and the business by the applicationof LEAN principles and therefore make themselves more employable. This journey is basically one of leadership, people engagement and effective project execution to ensure a successful outcome.

10.25-10.30

Productivity Challenge

Group Challenge

Matt will explain the challenge for the group session.

10.25-10.50

Productivity – Group Session

Group Challenge

Think, Pair and Share session on a challenge raised by our speakers.  Work as pairs before sharing insights with the group

10.50-11.20

Break

Network and meet our exhibitors

11.20-10.40

People Expert

Kevin Eyre | Kevin Eyre

The Real Challenge for Managers

The demands on managers and leaders (from crises management to being an effective coach) are ever greater requiring them to play a multitude of roles. In this session Kevin will illustrate how a focus on the development of ‘skilful dialogue’, on the range and repertoire of talk-in social interaction, equips managers to better meet these ever increasing challenges.

11.40-12.00

People – Casestudy

Siobhan Geary  | Boston Scientific Clonmel

People

Developing internal talent to meet the challenging needs of the business.

Siobhan will discuss how Boston Scientific assesses future skill needs for the business.  She will also share how the company invests in its people by developing programmes which meets the individual and business needs, drives engagement and delivers results.

12.00-12.25

People – Group Exercise

Think, Pair and Share session on a challenge raised by our speakers.  Work as pairs before sharing insights with the group

12.25-12.45

People – Expert

Fiona Buckley

10 Ways to Retain Key Talent

In this practical session Fiona Buckley will focus on the top ten ways to retain key talent in your organisations in 2018. Challenges will be discussed alongside best practice on what other organisations are currently doing. This session will focus on some quick short term solutions you can put into practice right away with some longer term activities to consider.

12.45-1.45pm

Lunch

Lunch, networking and meet our exhibitors.

13.45-14.05

Technology – Expert 

Cormac Ó’Conaire | Design Partners

Designing Success

Cormac Ó’Conaire from Design Partners will map the process of creating, developing and bringing a new product to market.

14.05-14.25

Technology – Casestudy

Ray O’Cinneide | Tyndall

Design Lessons for Industry

Ray O’Cinneide will discuss how design expertise turned research into something people actually want and bring us through the journey of the Smart Glove (Haptic Human Computer Interface System for VR/AR and robotics).

14.25-14.45

Technology – Expert

Barry Kennedy | IMR

Technologies Driving Factory 4.0 in 2018

In a world of change, isolating the technologies that matter, identifying the ones that have reached maturity and knowing which ones to invest in and when is a difficult task.  Barry will share the insights from IMR, exciting projects they have worked on and trends to watch in 2018.

14.45-15.10pm

Technology – Group Exercise

Think, Pair and Share session on a challenge raised by our speakers.  Work as pairs before sharing insights with the group

15.10-15.30

Break

Network and meet our exhibitors

15.30-16.30

Key Note Speaker

Dr Niamh Shaw

Recently voted one of Ireland’s leading science communicators and STEAM specialists

Keynote Address : Perceptions of Self and Success

16.30-16.50

Feedback from Group Exercises

Views from the Tables

Matt Cooper will extract the best challenge reactions from the room and discuss the approaches, solutions and ideas from the floor.

16.50-17.00

Q&A and Wrap Up

Wrap Up

David Dunne, Kerry Foods & ICBE Chairman will formally wrap up the conference and announce details of next year’s conference.