We’re doing 5S… Isn’t that Lean?

We’re doing 5S… Isn’t that Lean? Good news, bad news. The good news is that 5S (or 6S if you want to lump safety into the pot for convenience sake) is the traditional first step in many lean implementations. The bad news is that if you are doing it as a standalone without linkage to […]

The First Civilian Submarine

The Birth of the First Civilian Submarine While we were on our last trip, I stopped by a used book store and found a book that had been a part of my life growing up. In my Grandfather’s library was a collection of books called “Source Records of the Great War”. These books were collected […]

122 Years of Continuous Improvement

Continuous Improvement for over 122 Years While submarines have existed in one form or another for a very long time, the US Navy formalized the marriage of technologies that would lead to the modern steel warhorses that range the oceans of the world today. After a series of trials in the late 1800’s, a man […]

Liberty Call

The crew and I are making a liberty call this week to the location where my Dad’s old Boot Camp was once located near Geneva, NY on Lake Seneca. I wrote a book about his service in World War 2. The book was based on a collection of his letters we found after he passed […]

Prepare to Hover

Hovering Submarines are incredible machines that are designed to operate in a number of configurations. One of the difficult ones is something called “hovering”. A submarine has ballast tanks that control its buoyancy. To start descending, the submarine floods these tanks with outside sea water and to surface, you make that water leave in a […]

Divisions

Division is the title for people on a submarine who are assigned to operate together. If you think about it, that seems like a rather strange name for a “team” until you recognize that the divisions are all part of a larger team. A group of people who are assigned to function together will only […]

Happy Fourth of July

I had considered taking the day off today but was reminded that somewhere in the world at this very minute, a submarine is on patrol or special operation adding to the effort to keep us free. Those silent sentinels are never completely at rest and stand ready to perform the missions at a moments notice. […]

When nothing but 100% is acceptable: Trust

When nothing but 100% is acceptable: Trust There are times in life when we have come to expect less than perfect. It might be a grade in school in a very difficult course or a child’s performance in an organized sport. While there are some people who would flinch at accepting less than 100%, I […]

Deck Plate Problem Solving

Submarine wisdom: If you plan on travelling at 200 feet, you should make sure your boat is capable of no less than 400 feet. Smallwood Hall is an enlisted barracks in Pearl Harbor named in memory of Machinist’s Mate Third Class James E. Smallwood. Smallwood was awarded the Navy and Marine Corps Medal posthumously. He was supervising […]

The Right Team for the Right Mission

Submarine Wisdom: Just because you don’t see a problem doesn’t mean it isn’t there… being prepared for the unexpected is more than a slogan on a poster in the mess decks Submariners spend their whole careers preparing for the normal and abnormal. In a world where seconds can mean the difference of life and […]