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Reprinted with permission from The Manufacturer, October 2001



Continuous improvement is a simple philosophy but a difficult task, as Colin Browning found out when he talked to the top team at the Alinabal Group.

Manufacturing as a business is under pressure across all the countries of the industrialized world. High domestic labor costs and stiff competition, both locally and from the emerging economies, have combined to make the operating environment ‘interesting’ to say the least. This is not to say that there is not money to be made and success to be had, it just requires a little more hard work than it used to. One of those that enjoy this challenge is the Alinabal Group, based in Milford, Connecticut.

Alinabal, a diversified manufacturer of precision stampings and assemblies, spherical rod end bearings and linkages as well as specialty printers, can draw its lineage back to 1913 when it supplied laminated materials for the Henry Ford Model T. The automotive industry remains a major destination for Alinabal products but over the years the company has expanded its horizons to become a player in the aerospace, defense, industrial, recreational and medical sectors. Alinabal’s CEO, Sam Bergami described the business as being: "A broadly diversified manufacturing group of companies. We may only have 325 staff but we are more like a mini conglomerate with three autonomous business units." ‘Mini’ may be the term chosen by Sam, but between them these units still generate revenues in excess of $40 million a year.

In many respects, Alinabal occupies a unique position in the market in that it is capable of handling a huge variation in production run requirements. As Kevin Conlisk, the chief financial officer explained: "For example our precision stamping business parts catalog runs to tens of thousands of separate items, which are produced in any number of lot sizes. Our short run department is capable of making single items while our long run section has orders that can be of a magnitude of tens of millions. We have been in the low volume business since the very beginning and have been doing it for so long that we have become very good at it. The high volume side of the business evolved over time."
"When we are looking at such big numbers," added Conlisk, "we are getting into the parts management business. As well as investing in the necessary high speed tools to enable us to complete the actual tasks, we have put in place the sophisticated systems needed to service to the customer."

However simply being good, or indeed in the case of Alinabal, excellent at what you do today is no guarantee that the customer will be back tomorrow. Considering that Alinabal’s customers include names such as IBM, United Technologies, Harley Davidson, John Deere and Polaris Industries, as a company it needs to offer something beyond mere price competitiveness and it has chosen to focus on continuous improvement. The company logo even includes the phrase "Achieving Excellence – Worldwide" and the common aim of the entire workforce is to find ways of doing things better.

Alinabal has changed from a labor force to a brain force. Since Alinabal embarked on its unique TQM Process known as "ATIP" (Alinabal Total Improvement Process), the company has documented a dramatic increase in productivity and product quality as well as a decrease in employee turnover, absenteeism and workman’s compensation claims.

The push for continuous improvement began in January of 1991 when a new team of managers took the helm at Alinabal. The question put forth by Management was "How do we make our employees care about quality and service?" They knew that the company’s success would ultimately depend on the development of a comprehensive quality system – one that would be ongoing.

What is ATIP really all about? At the cornerstone of Alinabal’s quality infrastructure is their quality policy: To continuously improve our products, processes, and services in order to meet or exceed our customers’ needs and expectations". ATIP is the vehicle by which all employees can apply their individual and collective efforts and resources to support the process of continuous improvement in every aspect of their business.

ATIP has many components. Heading it all is the ATIP Steering Committee, a diversified employee group that meets weekly and is chaired by the company president. This group basically forms quality improvement policy and maintains and active directional guidance for the overall process.

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