President’s Blog

I was out visiting our customers and thankfully had time to tour four of our aerospace manufacturing plants. It then occurred to me that things are never as they seem. Current news reports would lead us to believe that the American aerospace industry is tumbling on fears from Europe’s apparent poor economy. However, from what I saw and from what our customers tell me, they’re so busy that they can barely keep up with demand.

America has a unique way to continue to grow and prosper, without care to what the rest of the world is experiencing. This current situation is one of those marvels. In fact, so is the entire American aerospace industry. It has never worried what’s going on or what the rest of the world is doing. They just put their heads down, continued to work, and as a result – we are world leaders.

During my tour, they informed me of their plans to hire over the next few months….Who says things aren’t what they seem? I just hope they don’t turn CNN or Fox news on us

So I was at a barbecue the other day, making idle chit chat and explaining what I did to some people. I quickly looked around me. As manufacturing ERP software doesn’t always ring a bell, I always try to grab something that has been manufactured and show them how this magical object didn’t just randomly appear at your neighborhood Walmart. It still fascinates me to think of the brains and effort that go into the things we buy. We often forget to think of how things appear on our shelves and instead expect that they are always readily available.

People forget that many hands went into the design and engineering of a product. It starts with the hands on collection of the raw materials. Design and engineering teams create a manufacturing system to machine, stamp, and mold this material into products we can use.

A whole other world is in charge of assembly and distribution. People often forget this. And contrary to popular belief, we’re still manufacturing here in the USA. We’re pretty good at it too! When you hop in your car, turn on your barbeque or your stove; think about what you’re using. Sure, maybe we didn’t make that Barbie you just bought. American manufacturing is all about quality and workmanship. Next time you step onto an airplane, or your car, think about where those parts came from…

Ms. Antonia Spitzer is the President of COSS Systems. Spitzer’s thorough product knowledge combined with an in-depth understanding of the manufacturing sector has resulted in hundreds of COSS installs with companies ranging in size from $2M to $100M in sales.

Antonia Spitzer is a Certified Management Accountant (CMA) and holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from McMaster University.

Throughout the last 18 years, she has logged thousands of hours on the shop floor assisting the implementation staff with clients. She listens to every employee, from the shop floor to the boardroom and translates that knowledge through to the programming staff. This results in providing an ERP software designed for you, by you.

It dawned on me today as I had the honor of walking through one of our customer’s shops that I get to see it happen. A day doesn’t go by when I don’t get to say “wow you’re the ones who make that”.. It is amazing to see the small elements of manufacturers and knowing that this component is going into that component and eventually the products that you and I buy are produced. Constantly things are being improved and you and I as consumers sometime just take it for granted. Let’s see, we can fly from New York to Singapore directly now in around 18 hours. This is a recent phenomena that comes from the continual engineering that goes into the materials used to produce aerospace parts. The lighter the parts, the longer the flight and the benefit to you and I.. More direct flights. So next time you jump on a plane think about the hundreds of American engineers who worked constantly together to improve each and every parts on that plane. The results, you will get back and forth faster and safer than ever before.

Time and time again I hear the same issues that American manufacturers are having and sometimes I simply want them to turn off the CNN and Fox News of this world, pull up their socks and remember what made this country great. It wasn’t by listening to media tell us all that we can no longer manufacturer efficiently or that all our jobs are going overseas. We need to look in the mirror and remember that we can make things, and get out and make them. I will never forget the line from the movie, Pretty Women where Julia Roberts turns to Richard Gere and says “but you don’t make anything”… And she was right, he made his money breaking up companies and selling the pieces. The point is, we need to make things.. anything just start the machines back up and starting manufacturing. We have seen our automotive go to Mexico, but slowly it is returning as the quality in the US is far superior. But what we need to learn and take away from the last few years, we need to work smarter and take care of clients, employees and the environment make then we did in the past. We can’t make the same mistakes again, and if we simply think out of the box, wind our sleeves up things will be churning again in no time.

As we begin to recover from the last few years of economic turmoil, we as the American manufacturing sector need to take a good hard look at our businesses and really understand what we did in the past and ask ourselves if that is how we want to go forward. Many of our small manufacturers have had to reduce staff and are operating leaner than they have had to in many years. We can get down and upset about the current conditions or we can simply look at the great opportunity it gives, as we see the light at the end of the tunnel. With the reduced staff, you can take a serious look at areas where you were running, maybe a little inefficient and start to put procedures in place to correct. Here at COSS we coach people on how it is the perfect time to implement a new system. Use the structure of your ERP software to eliminate bad habits and start to fully understand what your software can do. And when the time is right to hire again, you will put the correct people in place to run the software to the fullest. By doing this, your business is poised to grow efficiently and profitably.