MRO Today - Pro of the Year 2007

Doug Geffe
Night shift lead line mechanic
Trident Seafoods Corp.
Anacortes, WA

Editor’s note: Doug’s All-Pro Team nomination was signed by no less than eight of his supervisors and coworkers – a first in our experience.

Trident Seafoods harvests, processes and markets seafood from Alaska, the Pacific Northwest and around the world. Its Anacortes, Washington plant on Puget Sound was built in 1989 and produces 60 million pounds of finished product per year, with production capacity expanding yearly. The plant employs 225 people. Doug Geffe has worked there for 14 years, currently as the night shift lead line mechanic at the Anacortes plant.

The plant, which performs batter and breading operations, has large quantities of anhydrous ammonia on site for its spiral freezers and cold storage warehouse. Doug is HAZWOPER certified as a first responder if there should ever be a leak requiring an evacuation. This duty is not in Doug’s job description; he does it voluntarily for the safety of the plant and his fellow employees.

Intuition and innovation
Doug is highly respected by both coworkers and managers for his skills and ability to solve equipment problems quickly to keep downtime to a minimum. In addition, his intuition often leads him to find novel solutions to problems that have confounded other mechanics on staff.

“One of Doug’s solutions literally doubled our production on a difficult product,” says Cathy Schanken, night plant superintendent. “We batter and bread frozen fish portions of various sizes and shapes for major chain restaurants across the country. This particular portion was a nugget size and had a tendency to stick together. Doug suggested that if we change out the batter applicator to another one with a slightly different conveyor curve then the pieces would stay more separated instead of floating together. We tried it and it was amazing. Our throughputs literally doubled because we could run at higher speeds without creating doubles, which were not acceptable. Everyone else insisted that all the batter applicators worked the same – Doug knew better.”

On another occasion Doug solved a nagging problem when a master case erector started having glue-up failures on box flaps. On every case, all the flaps held except one, the same flap every time. A number of mechanics, including Doug, spent hours trying to solve the problem. Doug finally decided that, despite the fact that all the other flaps on each case were sticking correctly, the cause had to be related to a new glue the operation was using.

As Doug searched for the root cause of the problem he determined that final flap got the least pressure and, since it was the last to be sealed, had the coldest glue line.

To test his theory he emptied the glue pot and refilled it with the old glue. It worked perfectly. The line switched back to the old glue and has had no problems since.

A plant-wide resource
Doug’s knowledge and experience with the plant’s equipment and processes is extensive and he regularly serves as a resource for new supervisors, managers and workers. Cathy Schanken counts herself as a prime example.

“When I became the night plant superintendent in April 2006 I was totally green about how things ran on the processing floor,” she explains. “Doug was great. He was never bothered by my questions and patiently answered them in detail right at the piece of equipment I was asking about so he could visually show me how it worked.”

Over the past two years Trident also brought on board three new night shift production line supervisors and Doug helped train each one on the operation of all the equipment, how to balance the fronts and backs of the lines and operational nuances such as how the saw speed in the front has a direct relation to the bagger speed in the back.

Cathy credits Doug with being a major factor in helping the night shift team transform itself from being “the ugly stepchild that lives in the basement” to being an equal producer with day shift.

“The whole crew is proud of what we’ve accomplished and we know that having Doug on our team is a big part of why we’ve succeeded,” she concludes. “I’ve been in manufacturing a long time and Doug’s attitude is rare. More often than not those with the knowledge don’t want to share. Either they don’t want to be bothered or don’t want anyone else to know what they know because they think it’s job security.”

Doug’s pride in the company and its products is undisputable, but above all he is recognized for his care and respect for fellow workers.

“Most impressive of all, Doug cares about the workers,” Cathy concludes. “He is their champion and does not hesitate to speak to someone in management for them if they have a problem. He treats them all with dignity and respect down the line. If ever there was a ‘plant floor hero,’ Doug is it. We have no hesitation in nominating him for the MRO All-Pro Team.”

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