APM, FieldCore, and GE assembled as a One GE Field Service Solution to deliver full maintenance work to nine steam turbine rotors at APM’s Leadership Development Center (“LDC”) for two customers located at three separate sites. This is the first time APM has completed maintenance service of this magnitude at their headquarters located in Pasadena, Texas.
Read MoreThis past week we had the opportunity to engage with one of our most important stakeholders – our Customer (Exelon). The conversation provided an opportunity to give and receive candid feedback on things we do well and things we can do better. Below I share a few reflections from our conversation.
Read MoreThis week, the last week of May, is bookended by the Victoria Day & National Patriot’s Day holidays in Canada and Memorial Day in the USA. It marks the end of spring, school, little league baseball, and brings the attention to summer, pool parties, and vacations. It also usually brings to closure the spring outage season.
Read MoreWe are enormously excited to announce APM Boiler Canada as this year's repeat recipient of the Tripartite Zero (Recordable) Injury Turnaround Award! APM Boiler’s top-tier health and safety emphasis received major attention at the TransAlta Sundance – Unit 6 Turnaround where over 61,000 craft hours were completed – injury free.
Read MoreThis commonly stated quote was repeated in a meeting I joined in Atlanta this past week. The meeting was a review of recent safety performance. Using a lean tool called the PSR (Problem Solving Report), we dug into the data to identify trends, with the goal of (i) taking immediate action to prevent injuries today and (ii) taking long term action to get better at preventing injuries in the future.
Read MoreThis next week we devote our messaging to Lean. I encourage you to engage in the Lean messaging as Lean is permeating every facet of our business. If Safety is our keystone by which all other disciplines are rooted, then Lean is our operating system for how we execute the business.
Read MoreNext week is our bi-annual discussion with you about one of our core values, Integrity. Our discussion will include email communications, jobsite toolbox talks or pre-meeting culture moments, and daily OutageBuzz Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter social media profiles. Everyone in APM = YOU! are encouraged to engage in our discussion.
Read MoreAPM Gas Power Services in the South, led by Superintendent Daryl Hale, recently conducted an impactful STOP Event in March. Located in Louisiana, the Team’s work scope entailed a major inspection as well as an AGP upgrade.
Read MoreThese past few weeks have brought two realities to our APM. First, we are doing a lot of work. On average we are employing over 2500 craft working over 150K hours on over 200 job sites each week. Second, we have seen a cluster of injuries to our teammates. Fortunately all are recovering well…
Read MoreKaizen, Our Way of Life
What is Kaizen? It means change for better. It’s a Japanese term for continuous improvement and has been embraced by many organizations focused on delivering value to the customer, while eliminating waste, improving productivity, and achieving sustained continual improvement in their identified activities and processes.
Read MoreOne of the many reflections on the week has been a conversation I am having with Paul Balmert, our partner in developing the APM Leadership Tools. We ask our Superintendents to use in the Field. It was a meaningful conversation to tap into Paul’s decades worth of wisdom on leading with a safety keystone mentality, and sharing how our APM is using the tools in the field from the data you share.
Read MoreA strong questioning attitude and commitment to safety recently brought APM Steam Nuclear and site teams a valuable STOP moment at Canadian-owned Bruce Power, a nuclear generating station. This STOP moment allowed all teams to reconvene and reset safety as the primary goal during a critical lift.
Read MoreWe extend a hearty congratulations and THANK YOU to Alex Blas (Gas Power Services) for all he contributed to our APM success last year. We are very proud to have him on our front lines, leading our crew and representing our brand to the customers. He is a champion for our culture and role model for exemplary leadership.
Read MoreAPM Steam Fossil along with FieldCore, and supporting teams, ventured to ArcelorMittal Burns Harbor Steel Mill located in Indiana, to conduct a bearing inspection. As the team began their routine inspection procedures, removal of the turbine shell led to findings of mass damage that occurred due to high condensation in a steam admission line.
Read MoreI recently was asked a question about culture, specifically safety culture, and what is the catalyst for change and improvement. Is the catalyst one big sledgehammer blow from the top? -or- Is the catalyst one thousand continuous hammers at all levels? I have reflected on that question a lot, especially this week for reasons I detail below. My answer is YES…
Read MoreIt is not uncommon for our craftspeople to travel across the globe to deliver their expertise and first-class customer service while meeting new people and making new friends in the duration of a project or job. These new connections can last a lifetime. In addition to completing a highly successful outage in Japan, many lasting friendships were created during the outage, and solidified while participating in a local community service beach clean-up event.
Read MoreCBS … Its about people … We are a people biz!
Today, along with Katie Maldonado, Mike Bush, & Mike Kehl, we had the pleasure of welcoming 30+ new Superintendents to APM via a discussion of our Safety Keystone (i.e., CBS) philosophy. In preparing for the discussion, I had opportunity again to reflect on the impact our friend and mentor, Bob Veazie – the originator of CBS, had on our business.
Read MoreDuring the outage that began in September 2020, our APM Steam Team had 11 craftspeople conducting the day shift and 10 working the night shift. Our group of experts maneuvered around many schedule changes while remaining cohesive in communication. Lead by APM Superintendent David Baker Jr., the team utilized tools such as Safety Task Analysis cards, pre-job discussions, and refocus meetings to keep safety at the forefront of all tasks, delivering APM's standard of excellence for our customer.
Read MoreHopefully over the holidays you got time to relax, connect with family and friends, and enjoy some holiday traditions. One of our traditions is watching great Christmas movies like It’s A Wonderful Life and Die Hard and The Christmas Story. If you have seen the last one, you know exactly the context of the above exclamation from the hero, Ralphie. When asked by his saint of a mother, “Where did you hear that word?”, Ralphie’s inner voice responds, “Now I had heard that word at least 10 times a day from my old man.”
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