Photo courtesy of Sperry & Rice
Stress Testing on a Loop: When the Hits Just Keep on Coming By Liz Stevens, writer, Inside Rubber
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very manufacturer does disaster planning, which, by definition, is designed to address the unusual, the unexpected and the unpredictable. When circumstances cause a manufacturer to roll out the disaster plan, both the plan and the company undergo a stress test. Did the plan hold up under pressure? What aspects should be rewritten for a better response next time? Did the company’s collective action support the operation through the crisis? What could management and staff have done differently, to greater effect? Each company faces an occasional calamity and learns lessons from the experience. But what happens when companies must implement disaster plan after disaster plan because before one disastrous episode ends, a new and different one rolls in to swamp the operation? That predicament – a series of episodic complications, setbacks and reversals – is what industry has faced for the last couple of years. Take an industry sector and hit it with a global pandemic, then either shut down production entirely or turn it up to full blast for old or brand new “essential” items, and then complicate it all with an employee exodus. Just as the industry settles slightly toward normalcy, throw in an avalanche of new
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orders for commodity goods, toss in a new virus variant outbreak, and then factor in a global supply chain meltdown and record inflation. When things are nominally back under control, it’s time for a double whammy – a humanitarian catastrophe caused by a war and another wallop to the global supply chain. For the rubber industry, there was more. Polymers and other ingredients fell into short supply but at premium prices, and domestic and international deliveries were drastically delayed while shipping costs skyrocketed. Semiconductor chip shortages delayed the production of new manufacturing equipment as well as auto industry production, and the labor shortage/drain hit rubber manufacturing hard. This has been a series of stressors to test even the most resilient company. So, how have some rubber manufacturers passed the test and come away with lessons learned that will make whatever stressor hits next more manageable? Inside Rubber spoke with two rubber manufacturers to hear how they met the challenges of the ongoing multi-episode stress test, and how their experiences have prepared them for future stressors. Randy Dobbs is president and CEO of Sperry & Rice, LLC, a Brookville, Indiana, maker of custom extruded
