Mike Taubitz spent 43+ years with General Motors in a variety of engineering and human resource positions. He held every safety position from plant safety supervisor to Global Director of Safety and Ergonomics. In the late 90s, he learned lean and continuous improvement thinking for office and business systems and used that as a foundation when he developed and led GM's emerging issues process from 2000 until retirement in 2008.

He is a frequent speaker at professional and industry group meetings and is often referenced in articles, magazines and technical papers. He is co-chair of the National Lean & Safe Network. Mike joined FDR Safety in 2010 where he manages issues impacting continuous improvement and sustainable growth.

As President and General Manager of Detroit Public Television, Rich Homberg oversees one of the largest public television stations in the country and an organization that was recently honored as "Detroit's Best-Managed Non-Profit" by Crains Detroit Business.

Homberg joined DPTV in early 2008, after a long tenure as Vice President and General Manager of at CBS's all-news radio station in Detroit, WWJ Newsradio 950. In over 30 years in broadcasting, he developed a track record of success for companies including CBS, Viacom, and Westinghouse Broadcasting.

Rich is the Chair of the Cultural Alliance of Southeast Michigan, the region's leading non-profit culture organization. He is a board member of the Detroit Economic Club, the Detroit Metro Convention and Visitors Bureau, and the Friends of the Detroit School of Arts. He was also a member of the Super Bowl XL Host Committee. A graduate of Leadership Detroit, Rich recently became a member of the Citizens Advisory Council at the University of Michigan Dearborn and a board member of the Major Market Group of Public Television.

Special guest Mike Rother is an expert in Toyota Kata. Rother investigates issues of management, leadership, improvement, adaptiveness and change. The findings explained in the book Toyota Kata will change how you think about lean, innovation and management. His website is a companion to the book; a place we put things we're learning. Toyota Kata is about what to practice in order to develop habits of continuous improvement and adaptiveness in any organization. Today's solutions aren't the ones that will meet tomorrow's challenges. So it's not solution themselves that provide sustained competitive advantage. It's the degree to which the people in your organization practice and master a kata for developing fitting solutions.

Bob Hemrick, Director, Continuous Improvement Strategy Group, DTE Energy. Bob is the Director of Continuous Improvement and the CI Strategy Group at DTE Energy. He has over twenty 24 years of experience in varying industries from aerospace, manufacturing and energy, having been previously employed with General Dynamics, Westinghouse, Dana Corporation and most recently DTE Energy.

He has held positions in product engineering, manufacturing engineering, quality assurance, and operations management. Before joining DTE, Bob was the Global Director of Operational Excellence responsible for the development and deployment of the Dana Operating System that included over 100 facilities across 26 countries. In 2008, Bob joined DTE Energy bringing his most recent experience in applying continuous improvement, where he was helping companies across the automotive industry as the Co-Chairman of the BAMA Education Committee. At DTE Energy, Bob is responsible for the continued development and deployment of DTE's continuous improvement methods defined in the DTE Operating System framework. Bob works with and guides DTE's extended CI community of 100 plus professionals in their pursuit of bottom-line savings through improvement of safety, customer satisfaction, and operational performance.

Additionally, Bob supports, guides and coaches c-suite executives and operational leaders towards the development of a distinctive CI culture at DTE Energy. During Bob's career he has served as a Malcolm Baldrige type program Examiner, Lead Examiner and Associate Judge for both Dana Corporation and the state of Oklahoma. He holds certifications as a CQE and a CQA from the American Society of Quality and is a certified Six Sigma Black Belt. Bob's diverse background includes degrees earned in Manufacturing Engineering (BS) and Business (MBA).

Todd Jacobi, Director of Manufacturing, Delta Faucet Company. Todd Jacobi joined Delta Faucet Company as a Manufacturing Engineer at the Greensburg, IN plant in 1993. He joined the Advanced Manufacturing Group working out of Indianapolis in 1994 and assisted with the startup of the Jackson, TN facility. From 1997-2000, Todd worked in Materials Management positions in Greensburg and Indianapolis. From late 2000 to 2005, Todd served as Plant Manager of the Jackson, TN plant, partnering with Masco to launch the first lean initiatives at Delta Faucet. He has served in his current role since 2005.

Lisa Satawa is the founder and CEO of The Droste Group. With over twenty years of business experience, including large scale turnarounds and start ups with Fortune 500 organizations, Lisa has developed a profound understanding of how to balance people, production and service delivery through her extensive work with executives, including international leadership.

Lisa has coached and consulted at all levels of management in both large and small organizations within a range of industries including not-for-profit. She has worked extensively with executive teams in developing accountability, execution and change leadership. Some of the client organizations Lisa has worked with include Department of Defense, PolyOne, Credit Acceptance, Ford Motor, Pulte Homes, Ilitch Holdings, Aisin World Corp. of America, Vulcan Materials Handling, Faurecia, Federal-Mogul, Durr, Boston Scientific, Sprint and Verizon Wireless.

Click to read more about all the presenters from the 2011 MLC Conference...

Joyce can show you ways to help teams synergize their power to new levels by guiding you though conflict negotiation... designed to create new levels of productivity and profitability.

As a coach, leadership consultant and facilitator, Joyce has used her extensive professional experience with companies like Ford Motor Company, US Army Reserves, BAE Systems, Spectrum Health and Blue Cross Blue Shield to provide bold solutions for individuals, corporations and associations.

Joyce attained her Master's Degree in Guidance and Counseling from Oakland University and sits on the Board of Directors for the School of Education and Human Services in Rochester, MI. She maintains her certification as a "Best Practices Company."

An author, speaker, trainer, Joyce is the top choice for large and small companies across the globe who understand the power of creating a balanced and conflict free team environment, how to work through conflict to create high level collaborative work teams that help people and companies engage in the mindset.

I am best known for co-founding the Lean Learning Center with partners Andy Carlino and Denny Pawley in 2001. I did this after leading successful lean journeys with several companies and many operational roles. I also co-wrote The Hitchhiker's Guide to Lean: Lessons from the Road, with Andy Carlino. I founded the lean website The Lean Library, and write a column for Assembly Magazine titled "Leading Lean."

In addition to co-founding the Center, I also co-founded Rev! Motorcycles in 1999, and the investment and advisory firm Old Dutch Group in 2004. Old Dutch Group includes active investments in Flinchbaugh Engineering and Cobra Sport. I also serve on boards of directors and advisers, including S&S Cycle.

I have always believed that an education, whether formal or not, is the best investment one can make. I chair the Board of Advisors of Oakland University's Pawley Institute. I also serve along with my wife on the Lehigh Leadership Council. At Lehigh I have been an Entrepreneur-in-Residence, delivered an Honors Convocation Keynote Address, and began the Donald E. Flinchbaugh Memorial Scholarship. I was proud to receive the Lehigh University Alumni Award in 2004. My brother and I also support York, PA educational efforts through the Alethea and Graham Watts Memorial Fund.

I started in June, 1996, wandering aimlessly looking for general ways to cut waste, define responsibilities and establish a culture of accountability. You can imagine how well all that went over coming from a guy with a degree in electrical engineering (from Michigan Tech University), 5 years of experience in aerospace electronics, 2 in commercial electronics and zip, zero, none in precision machining. In October, 1997, I was put in the position of plant manager and immediately started to look for ways to eliminate my job (I was successful about 2 years ago, but don't tell my boss, shhhh). In 1999, as ISO rep, I led the company through certification. In late 2000 we officially kicked off our lean journey. Since then I've facilitated the management team, which is responsible for development and deployment of the company's strategic plan and company-wide key performance indicators. I also facilitate the weekly production team meetings and audit the daily 5-minute huddles. In 2009 we were awarded the Shingo Silver Medallion for Operational Excellence - one of only 19 companies on the planet.

Prior to starting Lean for Everyone, I was interim President/Partner of Scented Pens. In addition, I was employed at Asterand plc for 8 years in various senior roles including Director of Lean Six Sigma and Director of Production. During my time at Asterand, the company grew from sales of $100K to $22 million and was the top performing stock on the London Stock Exchange in 2008.

Education and Training:

BS in Biology from Michigan State University College of Lyman Briggs

Certified in Lean Business Processes

Certified in Design for Six Sigma (DFSS)

Certified Six Sigma Black Belt

PMP Training

Click to read more about Debra Levantrosser Setman...

Mr. Sutherland is currently a Lean Six Sigma Coach for the Operations Department of Housing in HUD. Mr. Sutherland chose to retire from Ford Motor Company after many years of service and devote himself to his passion for teaching and mentoring Lean systems. Mr. Sutherland has won numerous awards for production and quality improvements as both an engineer and manager at Ford Motor Company.

I have over 33 years of experience in education in public school teaching and administration and higher education teaching, service and research. My career has included major high restructuring projects as well traditional school management and teaching. I am interested in leadership development, online learning and continuous improvement in schools. Although, these three topics may seem disparate, they tie together very well for me .I have done extensive research in leadership learning schema, which lead me to consider organizational learning schema and continuous improvement. In turn, I became interested in the application of lean thinking and tools for school improvement. So, I am now active in the "lean" community and have completed several research projects through the Pawley Lean Institute. In addition, I became interested in online learning and have developed a fully online Education Specialist degree for my department and am currently developing 3-D simulations and enterprise architecture solutions for K-12 schools.

Click to read more about Gerry Anderson...

Mark Graban is a Senior Fellow at the Lean Enterprise Institute and is the author of the book Lean Hospitals: Improving Quality, Patient Safety, and Employee Satisfaction, winner of a 2009 Shingo Research and Professional Publication Award. He is the founder and lead contributor of LeanBlog.org, started in January 2005.

Click to read more about David Meador...

Click to read the agenda from the Russ Scaffede event...