Managing Partner

Education

Mr. Rast has a Masters Degree in Economic Sciences, a Bachelors Degree in Mechanical Engineering, and an Associates degree in Information Systems Technology. He passed the Six Sigma Master Black Belt exam for process improvement with the ASQ (American Society for Quality). In addition, he is a certified Professional Engineer in the State of Ohio.

Professional Experience

His strengths include consulting clients in the DMAIC and DFSS methodologies with additional emphasis on Lean manufacturing. Part of his experience includes working with senior executives in:
  • Developing a path and plan for continuous improvement deployment that is designed for success
  • Demonstrating how continuous improvement methods and tools, in the hands of trained people, can enable corporations or business units to achieve previously unattainable levels of performance
  • Enabling the discovery of how the Secora method improves operating margins, top-line growth, process cycle time, throughput and yield, product/service quality and other aspects of the business
  • Setting financial goals, targets and limits for the initiative
  • Creating specific managerial guidelines to control the scope and depth of deployment for corporations or business units
  • Reviewing and examining key performance metrics to ensure the progressive utilization and deployment of the Secora method
  • Translating knowledge into action, with the focus on the steps required for successful project completion, including the phase deliverables and the appropriate use of continuous improvement tools
Mr. Rast gained valuable experience while working directly and indirectly with companies such as Compaq/HP computers, Magna, VW, BMW, Daimler-Chrysler, Coke-Cola, Bao Steel, Swiss Life Insurance, Bosch, SCA Packaging, Textron, UBS, Lonza Chemicals, Roche Pharmaceuticals, PentaPharm, and the US ARMY.

He has coached and developed various bold new business strategies for global companies in these turbulant times. Furthermore he has completed over 40 DMAIC and 15 DFSS projects with verified savings of over 250 million dollars, and has coached over 1500 projects as a Master Black Belt to a successful completion. He has instructed 220 Black Belts (DMAIC & DFSS) and equal number of Green Belts.

Mr. Rast is a citizen of the United States and can communicate in English, German, Swiss-German, and Swedish.

What Makes a Good Project Charter?

The main output of the define phase within the DMAIC methodology is the project charter. Without having a completed project charter starting the measure phase makes little sense. Even so the DMAIC methodology gives us our project path, the project charter is responsible for where the path is to lead us.
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Case Study - Laser Welding (Automotive)

A Tier 1 European automotive supplier had major issues on a newly launched product: Failure to meet customer volume requirements; Failure to meet customer quality requirements; Massive cost overrun. Using the SLIM (Lean) Methodology Secora helped the client to solve its most prominent operational effectiveness issues and reduce internal manufacturing cost to below the original target costing, without capital investment or design change.
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Averages Should Be Thrown Out The Window

Should you change your supplier based on average quality scores? Is one sales person better than the other based on averages? Should capital investments be made based on averages? Our tendency to oversimplify statistical analysis often amounts to sweeping critical business problems under the rug.
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