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Springfield, MO

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A Conversation With ... Jeff Lambeth

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What is Missouri Enterprise?
We are a nonprofit organization … based in Rolla. We have five strategic areas: supply chain optimization, technology acceleration, global engagement, continuous improvement and work force development. Our primary business is to assist any manufacturing facility. … We have grants that we can work on for a lot of the organizations, and also we have a paid-for service. … We come up with new products and new programs to help their businesses become more profitable. And we have certified trainers that go into these organizations and help them implement these programs.

What is your role with Missouri Enterprise?

I’m the face. From a sales standpoint, I seek new opportunities to help businesses. I might just walk down the street and into the company and say, “Who’s your owner or your president, or who’s in charge?” And I build a relationship and see if there’s anything out there to help them. Then, I also manage those relationships and build a trustworthy rapport with manufacturers throughout southwest Missouri. … I travel 500 to 600 miles a week; it just depends on what different business is going on. I’ll typically go in and do a needs assessment with a company (and) a walk-through of the factory, just to get a good feel for what type of business (it is), what kind of market that it’s in. We typically have a program that can help them out, because we want them to either become profitable, or become more profitable, and become more competitive. I come back with my notes and create a scope of work (for them). Then I assign one of our project managers from throughout the state.

You started with Missouri Enterprise in September. What drew you to this job?
I’ve always been able to build real strong relationships, and this is going to allow me to touch so many different companies and help so many aspects of business throughout southwest Missouri. I’ve had enough different types of experience in the manufacturing sector that I have a pretty good feel for what a business might need, and I can build a relationship pretty quick. The stability of working with SRC is awesome, but this is allowing me to really broaden my horizon so much, and I have a lot of flexibility … and so many new friends and contacts I’m going to be making.

What hurdles to productivity do you see most often?
The ones that I’ve worked with that are struggling because of the recession, what I see is that they’re waiting for the recession to end instead of creating what’s needed to get them out of the recession. Make a plan, stick to it, change it when needed. But you’ve got to stay aggressive … to keep your business going.

What might be an untapped area of opportunity in the marketplace?
If there’s a will and a way, it can be done here. We have the work force. … With everyone wanting to go green, manufacturers are going to be needed to supply products for that particular market.

What challenges are southwest Missouri manufacturers facing?
Job training. A lot of the manufacturers are hungry for quality job training that can be applicable to their jobs. Not just for (hourly employees) but their supervisors and managers. Then, they all want to be as lean as possible with the competition. Everybody’s worried about exporting of their particular products to another country, so they have to be as lean as possible to keep their costs down to keep their jobs from going overseas or their customers from sourcing what they do for them out of country.

What feedback do you get regarding how the manufacturing sector is doing overall?
I’ve probably been to 25 different companies now in my first six weeks, and the majority is very strong right now with their business. Many of them are hiring, and some are actually expanding their shifts. They’re not scared to hire … but probably what’s keeping a lot of our manufacturers awake at night is, “Gosh, I don’t want to bring them back in only to tell them to go home again.”

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