Multisorb Technologies engaged Straight Forward Consulting in the Fall of 2017. Specifically, we engaged John Hogg at Straight Forward to evaluate our materials management and logistics functions including planning, procurement, transportation, and warehousing.  We considered John to be our “outsourced” Chief Logistics Officer throughout the engagement.  Together we established specific goals which included the evaluation of our existing team members (including our functional leadership), our deployed technology, and our operating processes.  Within a very short period of time, John created an action plan that was well thought-out, concise, and most importantly, measurable.

John’s efforts resulted in significant operational improvements which included a radical inventory reduction of nearly 50% and an annual cost reduction of our transportation spend in LTL and ocean freight by 30% and 50% respectively. John also had a significant impact on our organization as he helped to identify team member changes to leadership, reporting structure changes, and he assisted in the identifying and the addition of new talent, which continues to pay dividends today.  John also helped us “to see” hidden talents in several of our junior team members which resulted in their individual career advancement.

John also introduced purpose-driven supply-chain training and education to our workforce.  We identified twenty employees from various leadership roles from across the functional organization and enrolled them in an intensive 15-week class covering all aspects of the supply-chain.  No doubt that this was a tremendous value to Multisorb as it helped all participants understand the “value-stream”, and how their work impacts the rest of the other functions/processes within a given “value-stream”.

In our opinion, John Hogg stands out from other supply-chain consultants because he is a hands-on leader and a practical practitioner.  We were confident that the suggestions and guidance that he provided were ‘tried and true’ and because his knowledge, experience and his engaging style, we were able to achieve quick as well as significant positive ROI and cash flow generation.

Without question when we think of what we need in a supply chain consulting company we think of John Hogg and Straight Forward Consulting.  We strongly recommend John and his firm as we will continue to engage him for all our consulting needs here at Multisorb.

Eric Armenat               
President & CEO
Multisorb Technologies

Mike Lippa
Chief Operating Officer
Multisorb Technologies

 

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"I highly recommend John Hogg if your company is having issues with manufacturing or logistics. We had John come into our company when we were in the middle of a huge expansion of our businesses and his insights were tremendously helpful. He was here for 2 weeks (not every day) and in that time he keyed into the major strategic problems that were hurting us and he provided sound tactical solutions many of which we able to implement quickly. He had a better plan for us in 2 weeks than I was able to develop in the 2 years I had been here."

Fred Doxbeck
Vice President Operations at NutraBlend Foods Inc.

 

 

 

 

"John's vast knowledge in supply chain and its specific relationship to operations and lean manufacturing techniques were outstanding and struck just the right balance. His personable approach with our associates enabled him to gain trust and buy-in which are critical factors in the successful implementation of any project. John's flexible work schedule allows him to align well with the resources we had available and enabled him to meet specific deadlines. I would highly recommend John to any company who is interested in any array of continuous improvement projects."

Gary Thompson Sr. Director - Supply Chain- Cliffstar/Cott Beverages

 

 

I worked with John Hogg at Baillie Lumber where he was a key contributor to our SAP S/4 HANA implementation. John was brought in and recognized as a process expert to help our business team prepare consistent Business Process Procedure and Business Process Flow documents. John established overall workflows across all functions. His ability to draw out clear process understanding from users was a great help. John helped set the foundation for our overall testing effort, worked with our Test Manager, Program Manager, and our System Integrator to ensure we reduced our risk of moving to a new ERP. John took a special interest in our manufacturing process and worked with the Director of Yard Operations to provide support for the training process and change management. We implemented many of our current processes but look forward to engaging John again when it comes time to improve efficiency and drive more value from our investment in SAP. Thank you for all you did for us.   

Gary Braunscheidel, Chief Technology Officer, Baillie Lumber Co.

 

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"John provides a creative, dependable external view of your operations, with high quality recommendations as to process change, organization change, and tech utilization recommendations that had tremendous input and improvement to our retail Supply Chain operations. I would give John Hogg the highest recommendation."

John Metzger- Director, Supply Chain, Pennsylvania State Liquor Control Board

 

 

Over the last couple of years, I have had the pleasure to work with John Hogg, President of Straight Forward Consulting.  John is an exemplary business consulting professional and the Supply Chain experience he was able to bring to our organization was first rate.  He immediately worked on creating relationships with the staff here and his professional and refined approach is the foundation to his success.  John’s approach was always consistent and well planned.  He would first approach the topic by mapping the current state and then determine with the team where the opportunities would be to create a future state map.  Using this method, we were able to devise several inventory strategies.  These strategies included supplier Kanban programs, Fix the Mix which relied on statistical data to right size inventory driving turns up from 5.5 to 12.  We also reviewed transportation spend which led us to partnering with a full-service logistics company driving LTL spend down by 30% and drove ocean costs down by 50%. I would highly recommend John and appreciate the time I was able to spend with him.
 
Regards,
 
Michael Lippa
Chief Operating Officer
Multisorb, Filtration Group
Making the world safer, healthier & more productive

 

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Straight Forward Consulting recently completed an intense engagement with Praxair. John served as our project manager for our financial integration that is a result of the merger between Praxair and Linde. Not only were we integrating the financial and accounting systems of the two companies, but we were also changing many of the finance and accounting processes. We had to migrate processes that were formerly enabled in Linde’s SAP system over to Praxair’s JD Edwards’ system, for over a dozen unique business units. John did an outstanding job of managing relationships among a broad constituent base, from VPs and directors, to contract employees. Not only was John able to engage with employees who were leaving, to map their current processes, but he was also able to provide a regular cadence for the individual business units to maintain progress towards very aggressive SAP to JD Edwards migration timelines. This wasn’t easy, as all of the employees have ‘day jobs’ and other commitments to the existing business. As the project lead from the Praxair side, I can attest that John worked very well with myself as well as my counterpart(s) from Linde, providing the main content and running the twice-weekly status update meetings. He was very frank, transparent, and straight-forward. He has a knack of focusing on the big picture and kept us cohesively working towards our goal. I would not hesitate to recommend John and Straight Forward Consulting for any process or integration efforts. 

Michael Cucinotta, Director of Financial Services, Praxair Inc.

 

 

Montana International has gotten great value from our relationship with Straight-Forward Consulting. A few years ago, John Hogg showed me how I could save a lot of money in our less than truckload (LTL) transportation spend. It sounded too good to be true, but because I trusted John, we were able to save 51% on our annual LTL spend.  As owners, this savings went right into our  pocket! Their program is very flexible, and the “Save as You Go” approach allowed us total flexibility in how and when we used the program.  I would recommend any company who is looking to save money on their transportation give Straight-Forward a call!”

Cyndy Montana, Vice President, Montana International

 

John Hogg is an exceptionally strong over-all logistics strategist and practitioner from both an expertise and execution standpoint. He promotes a strong partnership approach, utilizing well-honed people and team-building skills. He establishes a solid set of numbers-based deliverables for his engagements (which he meets), yet is able to make mid-course adjustments as the client's changing circumstances dictate. He has an extensive reach to other experts in the field and doesn't hesitate to bring them into play as situations may dictate. I have engaged John in several projects over many years and easily give him an unqualified endorsement for his logistics consulting professional world. I have been involved for over 40 years in manufacturing and logistics operations, at executive levels for most of that time"

Mike Bingham, VP Supply Chain, Kiss My Face

Straight-Forward Consulting developed and implemented custom forecasting algorithms to enable improved strategic and material planning across Kiss My Face’s supply chain processes.

 

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"John has been a valuable resource to Medical Acoustics. His deep domain expertise and extensive connections in logistics resulted in the design of efficient packaging and pallet configurations. John also negotiated a 71% savings on LTL shipments on behalf of Medical Acoustics

Frank Codella, President and CEO, Medical Acoustics.

Straight-Forward Consulting redesigned packaging for Medical Acoustics’ finished goods, as well as realized significant annual LTL savings for them.

 

 

"I have engaged John at several companies for Lean training and assessments. His subject matter expertise is excellent, and he does a great job tailoring his training to the experience level of each audience. Feedback from the associates interacting with John was consistently positive, and in my dealings with him (personally and professionally) I have always found John to be fair, honest and highly responsive."

Rob Drago, former CEO, Costanzo’s Bakery

Straight-Forward Consulting conducted lean workshops at two food companies which were run by Mr. Drago.