Joseph J Swatt III

Results-driven, highly accomplished Global Manufacturing Executive - BS, MS, and an Executive MBA with vast multi-site manufacturing experience with start-up, change management, revitalization, and turn-around operations; that has seen accelerated revenue gains of $2.6B by energizing cross-functional, multi-site originations with the utilization of cutting-edge technologies.
 

A certified Six Sigma Master Black Belt (SSMBB) and Lean Sensei (LSSS) with operational quality excellence, hands-on, proactive leadership, and mentoring approach; that has achieved a career-high of $880M in the reduction of scrap and customer defects (CoPQ), downtime, missed shipments, and turn-over rates by implementing proven Continuous Improvement techniques, and Lean Innovations.
 

Combined strategic sales, business, and astute financial skills; multi-lingual in English, French, German, Spanish, and Mandarin Chinese. Decisive and innovative recipient of multiple sales, quality, and operational achievement awards; who is highly valued for his expertise in the development of valuable relationships within American, European, Asian, and Latin American corporations for ensuring premium quality at the lowest possible cost while exceeding productivity, meeting on-time delivery and surpassing the customer’s requirements.

Vice President / Director of Quality, Operations, Continuous Improvements & Lean Innovations
AO/QS Advanced Operations and Quality Services | 1999 – Present | Global
AO/QS LLC is a privately owned corporation that provides advanced Executive Management services for manufacturing in the fields of Operations, Quality, Engineering, Supply Chain, Training, Sales, Continuous Improvement, and Lean Innovations within the Automotive, Commercial Vehicle, Aerospace, Military, and Agricultural industries.
 A key executive in the development and driving of corporate KPIs for several of the leading global manufacturing industries.
 Decreased customer warranty costs by over $10M with the placement of in-line Poka-Yoke fixtures and camera vision systems with ZERO increase in production takt time.
 Reduced scrap totals by over $7M and improved downtime by 80% with the implementation of laser measuring equipment for real-time SPC data, value stream mapping, and ready-made change-over carts.
 Doubled production yield and throughput with the design and training of several Kanban (JIT) systems.
 Decreased production PPM by 50%-80% at 9 different companies at 87 locations in 10 countries.
 Implementation of dual-sourced purchasing and cost-down projects that reduced downtime by 70%, saving $26M in overspending, achieved and sustained an on-time delivery rate of 99.9% for 9 different Corporations.
 Corporate Expert who cultivated and motivated hundreds of cross-functional Kaizen teams to address strategic and financial objectives for mission-critical issues and the transformation of several businesses into profitable facilities within one year by executing turn-around strategies and Lean Six Sigma-based continuous improvements.
 Analytic, results-oriented, and the ability to predict customers’ needs by discovering business opportunities and delivering creative ideas with value-added solutions, which has resulted in securing the trust of several multi-million dollar contracts and savings of $100’sM in Corporate lawsuits and Warranty recalls.
 International and Domestic start-up and new product launch experience as Vice President and Director of American, French, German, Japanese, and Chinese parent companies by overseeing factory construction from a green-field site to over $2.6B in new contracts within 24 months.
 Trained, mentored, and certified 100+ Green Belts, 80+ Black Belts, and 40+ Lean Experts to deliver over $880M in operational savings.
 Quality and Operational levels of achievement received under my direction: J.D. Power, Volvo Best Supplier of the Year, Daimler Outstanding Performance, GM Performance Excellence, GM Supplier of the Year, Chrysler Gold Masters of Quality, Lincoln Silver, Freightliner Masters of Quality, Honda Excellence in Quality and Delivery and Ford Q1.
 

* Corporate Executive positions with objectives and results listed below from October 1999 - Present
 

Director of Quality, Continuous Improvements & Lean Innovations 
* Two-year assignment | Connecticut, North Carolina, Michigan, France, Germany, and China
This assignment is a $1B privately owned global leader and manufacturer of innovative high-performance acoustic and thermal management insulation solutions for the automotive/commercial vehicles, aerospace, and agricultural industries.
Objective: Design and implement a new global KPI system, reduce warranty costs and customer defects, oversee the Quality transition from TS16949 to IATF16949, restructure and streamline the APQP process and procedures, and increase revenue.
 Reduced internal PPM by 8K, decreased scrap by $18M, and resolved over 90% of warranty returns, which increased revenue by $68.9M.
 Designed and implemented the new Global Quality Management system and transitioned multiple facilities to the new IATF16949 Quality System with only minor findings during re-certification.
 Created the new global computerized dashboard to standardize in real-time the 18 known KPIs that drive an organization.
 The implementation of several electronic Poka-yoke vision systems to reduce CoPQ by $18M and eliminated over 95% of customer defects and 60% of scrap.
 Championed Kaizen events which streamlined the APQP and PPAP process by remapping all gates.
 Restructured the audit process on Customers for competition evaluation, better positioning, and to help in overall Customer satisfaction, 3-step process for Suppliers, and the Layard process audit process with Gemba walks.
 Raised Quality awareness and cultural change on the production floor by providing Quality Pillar training, hourly Quality Tech process audits, pre-shift weekly Quality huddles, Voice of the Customer whiteboards, and the development of the computerized cross-functional metric boards for employee training of process and procedures.

Director of Quality and Operational Excellence
* Two-year assignment | 26 Global Operations
This assignment is a $7B global manufacturer and Tier 1 supplier of injection molded, forged, and metal components to 
the automotive, aerospace, and agricultural industries.
Objective: Design and implement a new Global Quality System, reduce customer defects, redesign the CAR/8D process, oversee 
the Quality transition from TS16949 to IATF16949, and increase revenue.
 Reduced internal CNQ from 6.7% to < .2%, decreased scrap by $6M, DMRs by 79%, and negotiated all procedures to satisfy Customer’s requirements to eliminate previous 3rd party sorting.
 Transitioned the first eight facilities from TS16949 to IATF16949 with only minor findings.
 Implementation of several work cells with laser measuring equipment, and camera vision systems which reduced Customer 
defects by $4M.
 Directed the roll-out of the new Global Quality System (GQS) for real-time statistical data to help drive corporate KPIs.
 Mentored numerous cross-functional improvement teams, resulting in a 33% increase in manufacturing throughput.
Director of Global Quality, Continuous Improvements, Lean Innovations, and Operational Excellence
* Two-year assignment | 14 Global Operations
This assignment is a $1B global manufacturer and Tier 1 supplier of electrical components for the automotive/commercial vehicle, military, aerospace, marine, and agricultural industries.
Objective: Increase revenue by executing turn-around strategies to sell this Corporation.
 Reduced internal PPM by 13K, decreased scrap and warranty returns by $12M and increased revenue by $91.2M.
 Restructured the current SPC and KPI system for real-time statistical data.
 Implementation of electronic vision and KanBan (JIT) systems which reduced CoPQ by $5M.
Executive Vice President of Global Operations and Quality Excellence
* Two-year assignment | Shunde, China / Taishan City, China / Western Europe / North & South America
This assignment was an $8B Global Corporation that is a Tier 1 supplier to the commercial 
vehicle, marine, agricultural and industrial industries.
Objective: Direct the green-field start-up of a new state-of-the-art 11M square foot facility in rural China, created a new global Quality system, and secure new contracts from EU & US Corporations.
 Created the new global KPI, APQP, SPC, MRB, 8D, PPAP, PFMEA, and DFMEA systems that were TS16949 compliant which included a real-time computerized metric production board.
 Implementation of a complete bilingual TS16949 and ISO14001 Quality systems with process and procedures.
 Helped secure $2.6B in new contracts by installing in-line laser measuring equipment, camera vision systems, and Poka-yoke fixtures into the design of the work cells to eliminate current competitors’ defects.
Director of Global Quality and Monozukuri (Continuous Improvements)
* Two-year assignment | Osaka, Japan / Alabama / Illinois
This assignment is a $100M Corporate Tier 1 supplier to the automotive, aerospace, and agricultural industries.
Objective: Train North American facilities to the new Monozukuri system (TPS) to increase revenue, reduce Customer defects, and dual source suppliers.
 Championed the President’s cost-down project saving $15.4M indirect materials.
 Designed online training courses that certified 14 Black Belts and 26 divisional Green Belts.
 Mentored numerous cross-functional improvement teams, resulting in a 21% in increase in manufacturing throughput.
 Reduced internal defects by 1.7M, decreased scrap and warranty by $4.9M and increased revenue by $21.2M.
Director of Operations, Quality, and Continuous Improvements
* Two-year assignment | Michigan / South Carolina / Georgia
This assignment is a $14.9B Corporation which is one of the world’s largest Tier 1 suppliers to the automotive and commercial vehicle industry.
Objective: Oversee the start-up of four gray and ductile iron foundries in South Carolina and Georgia, implement a robust TS16949 
Quality system, and secure new contracts from Daimler Chrysler (now FCA), Mercedes, Ford, and GM.
 Successful start-up at $4M under budget and set new standards in the forging industry. Engineering to signed PSWs with <30 PPM within 3 months for 18 high-running production models.
 Designed new procedures using cutting-edge technology for the reuse of scrap and the collection of real-time KPIs.
 Implemented a complete TS16949 Quality system to include all processes and procedures. 
Corporate Quality and Operations Expert
* Two-year assignment | Ingwiller, France / North Carolina / South Carolina
This assignment is a $7.1B (60 facilities) Corporate Tier 1 supplier to the commercial vehicle industry.
Objective: Consolidate three manufacturing facilities into one state-of-the-art facility in North Carolina, oversee the Quality transition from ISO9001 and the EU Quality standards to TS16949, reduce Customer defects, and increase revenue.
 Successfully consolidated manufacturing facilities from South Carolina and a manufacturing facility from France into one
state-of-the-art integrated facility in North Carolina three months ahead of schedule with an $82M budget savings.
 Reduced customer defects with new facility from > 6% to < .2% PPM and internal scrap by $1.8M.
 Implemented a new TS16949 Corporate Quality System and created a metric-driven organization by designing the “MOS” chart for real-time KPIs.
Corporate Quality and Operations Expert
* Five-year assignment | Gerlingen, Germany / South Carolina
This assignment is a $13B Corporation, one of the largest Tier 1 suppliers to the automotive /commercial vehicle industry.
Objective: Brought in as an Expert to investigate reducing Customer defects due to a $200M lawsuit that was brought against this 
Corporation due to a thermal event, oversee the Quality transition from ISO9001 and the EU Quality standards to TS16949
 Cost savings of $160M from the $200M lawsuit by designing and implementing several computerized quality inspection stations resulting in an 80% reduction in internal quality defects and a 25% improvement in manufacturing throughput.
 Implementation of an ISO18001 clean room to assemble internal components within a diesel fuel injector.
 Designed and implemented new gauge calibration software and observed a 90% decrease in overdue and lost gauges.
 Helped implement the new TS16949 Corporate Global Quality System and created a metric and data-driven organization by designing the “BOS” chart for a real-time computerized KPI dashboard.
Senior Manager of Engineering, Quality, and Continuous Improvement
Oakwood Homes Corporation | 1990 – 1999 | North Carolina, Tennessee
Objective: Hired soon after College as a Senior Engineering Architectural Draftsman for 1 location and promoted 6 months later 
to the Engineering, Quality, and Continuous Improvement Manager for 4 facilities.
 Tripled production in 4 manufacturing facilities by rewriting Quality procedures and redrafting 120+ models in production.
 Helped design the ECN network in AS400 that connected Corporate to all 43 manufacturing facilities and 580 Sales centers.
 Reduced annual scrap by over $4M and customer defects by over $20M.

Executive MBA
Health Safety & Environmental (HS&E) / 
Advanced Quality Management Systems with ASQ Certifications
Medical University of South Carolina
1999 – 2005
Master of Science
Management / Engineering / Quality 
Management Systems with ASQ Certifications
University of North Carolina
1991 - 1994
Bachelor of Science
Computer Science Emphases in Engineering / Quality Management Systems 
Minor in International Finance
Pace University
1986 - 1990