Steven Sinn: Week 7 Post 1, Toyota Introduction

Toyota Power-train is one of Ideal’s plentiful,  and  unique jobs. This job falls under the General Contract category. This makes the team out here responsible for working with the customer while coordinating the construction of the project as a whole. While Ideal is part of the construction self performing Carpentry, Civil, and Steel Erection. While managing our self performing crews we also have the task of coordinating the subcontracts that have won the competitive bid. The job is unique in many ways due the new customer relationship and all of the advanced technology that has been incorporated into the design of the building. This job is different to me from last years experience, simply because of all of the different trades that Ideal has involved. The biggest change is acting as a General Contractor rather than a subcontractor, working directly with the architect, and being the middleman relaying the information from the architect to the subcontractors. Working with a new customer allows for the company to work through some learning curves. For example Toyota’s process of Kanban. This is Toyota’s formal way of turnover for all mechanical equipment. The process involves four steps, White,Pink,Yellow and Green. Each step involves a series of steps to safely apply power and make the equipment fully operational, simultaneously transferring ownership of the equipment from contractor to owner. Although like many of the other automobile manufacturers, Toyota has a strict no picture policy. Derek and I are in the process of obtaining approval from the customer to take pictures and post to the blog. And to end the post I would like to thank the team out at the DEEC for coordinating a tour with Tim Maguire. It was very exciting to see the progress, and to see the DEEC in a way I haven’t before.