This article reveals João Carvalho’s journey and the five pillars that underpin excellence at The Light Rebar Company®, showing how planning, rigor, creativity, replicability, and teamwork come together to create strong processes, shared knowledge, and superior results.
João Carvalho, 28, Senior Technician in Industrial Design and Machining (CNC) at IPCA in Braga with 10 years’ professional experience.
Throughout my career in civil and mechanical locksmithing, I have had the good fortune to learn from masters – experienced men who, throughout their lives, have loved their professions and practiced them with true excellence.
Much of that journey was spent on the shop floor, where I saw that same excellence mirrored in the hands and attitude, now in the brain, of those who work and make things happen. However, it often contrasted with the institutions in which they worked – companies that, despite the talent of their people, didn’t believe in or cultivate these values.
That apprenticeship led me to The Light Rebar Company®In this organization I have found these values, and I am carrying them over into my sector of responsibility. The legacy left in me by these masters perfectly matches the Mission, Vision and Values of our company, which allows me to develop professionally in an environment of exceptional quality. and I can pass them on to the team under my charge without any barriers, which means that teams and I personally are more capable and differentiated professionals.
As Maintenance Manager, I have five fundamental pillarsin my daily life that I follow to the letter:
1. Planning
The basis of everything: PLANNING
When any piece of equipment is purchased, a preventive maintenance plan is developed in advance, based on the initial information and training provided by our suppliers and on actual operating conditions.
Together with the production department, the downtime days for each machine are planned, what we call, scheduled maintenance windows. These programmed windows aim to minimize the impact on line availability and ensure the strict execution of planned tasks
Using advanced industrial ERP software, we communicate with the purchasing and logistics department to ensure that our stock of spare parts is always properly stocked. In this way, we guarantee that all the components to be used in these maintenance operations are already in place well in advance, so that they can be properly analyzed and, if necessary, tested.
WE WON’T STOP!
2. Accuracy
There is no room for failure on a production line where everything is controlled by an MES system (Manufacturing Execution System) integrated with the ERP, and where every minute counts.
Each intervention must be carried out quickly and rigorously, following all the standardized Checklists and Work Instructions. With these technical documents previously established and standardized, we define the method, tools and parameters to be respected, eliminating any variations that may exist.
Always within what we define in our ISO 9001 certification
It is this method of constantly working in detail – with precision and responsibility – that is leading us to the so EXCELLENCE.
OPERATIONAL QUALITY!
3. creativity
It’s a real utopia to think that there won’t be challenges that test us, that we’ll always have everything under control, or that unexpected maintenance won’t have to happen, no matter how well the structure is oiled, these challenges make our ability to respond increase and so does our range of knowledge.
This is when creativity comes into play, when we must rely more than ever on the experience of the operator, or the experience of the technicians. It is they who, with their art and ingenuity, they won’t let the line stop, they won’t let production fall.
We must always be on the alert and maintain a creative spirit, which will translate into increased attention. The first enemy of reliability is overconfidence.
Creativity is therefore between Planning and Rigor, it is their invisible link. It’s what turns real problems into solutions, that passes those solutions on to PLANNING and that will be carried out with real RIGOR in the next scheduled maintenance.
MAN AND MACHINE – TOGETHER
4. Replicability
Our main objective will be for all our equipment to be replicable anywhere in the world, all elements such as operation, design, final product, maintenance and reliability will be the undeniable mark of quality of any equipment from The Light Rebar Company.®.
We keep detailed records of all the interventions carried out on our equipment, thus creating a veritable technical collection of each asset.
Through post-intervention meetings (de-briefings) with everyone involved in the process, we analyze what worked, what should be improved and how this knowledge can be applied even in other situations. Everyone’s knowledge is only useful if it is shared, so we promote training among senior and junior technicians, as well as training with our external partners.
Through all this sharing, and all the standardized documentation I’ve talked about throughout this article, we ensure that technical knowledge doesn’t just depend on individual experience, but is passed on to everyone in a simple and clear way.
We make the methods clear, and with transversal knowledge of all the elements, the whole process becomes more predictable and reliable. Once the processes and concepts have been created, tested and approved, we repeat them in full at every scheduled moment.
Replicability is nothing more than the ability to repeat a good result and we all know that’s easier said than done.
1+1= 2 !
5. Team
The fifth and final pillar is the one who endures the stressful moments, who feels the heat of sweat, and takes all the processes forward with effort and dedication.
I believe that maintenance should not be an isolated department, but should at all times be intertwined with production and the quality sector. This connection between technicians, operators and supervisors is what we cultivate at The Light Rebar Company ®allows rapid and precise intervention when something is needed.
A strong team is a team that grows togetherTherefore, we invest more and more in internal and external training, promote professional pride and encourage the sharing of knowledge, especially between generations.
There’s no room for fear here, we encourage open communication and the sharing of information, even if it’s not so positive, because when communication flows, maintenance increasingly stops being reactive and becomes preventive.
We know that we have people who follow the standards to the letter, EXCELLENCE IS NOT AN AMBITION, BUT DAY-TO-DAY.
In my case, as the person in charge of this department, I’m extremely happy to see that the thinking and goal is the same in the team I lead and that we hold hands at all times because no one is left isolated with a problem to solve.
Our priority is to achieve a product of excellence every day, and our spirit of mission personally and professionally is 100% aligned with that of our company. Looking back and seeing that we started out with a completely new product – with equipment and software created truly from scratch and with processes that were not yet consolidated, I feel proud to see all that we have achieved.
We have just one purpose: to apply excellence to everything we do. In every strand of thread woven, in every fiberglass pulled, in every drop of resin cured, every every day in a consolidated and consistent way.
Excellence is not an end in itself, it’s JUST EVERYTHING!
As Aristotle said, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act, but a habit “.
This habit has always been part of our culture and identity.
Of all ONE!
The Light Rebar Company®
Changing The World one Rebar at a Time.