Keeping It Simple

Innovative facility design, believes Ulrich Rudow, is about simplifying processes. NGP spoke with the Vice President of Worldwide Engineering & Real Estate at Johnson&Johnson about raising the bar without adding complexity.

NGP. You initiated an engineering leadership development program at Johnson & Johnson. What does the program comprise?
UR. The idea came when I visited several deans at the engineering schools at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, and they were telling me that the engineers do not consider Johnson & Johnson (J&J) a technology company. When I came back from my visit, I found out that we employed over 4000 engineers in the US alone. They were spread over 200 different companies and there was no focus on ‘Engineers for J&J’.

We then created a department that looks at hiring high-potential engineers for J&J. And even though they work for our various companies, they are now under the umbrella of one program. We rotate them over a two year period and they work in a different company within J&J for eight months, so they get a pretty good look at the company and what it’s was all about.

The number one benefit is that we hire better people. Now, it’s not just Ethicon, LifeScan, McNeil or any of our companies who stand in front of graduation classes engineers, it is J&J. Our engineers have much more interest in finding out that they work for a big company and have the chance to rotate into different areas. We’ve found that we have some fantastic diverse engineers in our ranks, who will be our future leaders.

NGP. You were one of the judges of the “Facility of the Year 2007” awards. What were you looking for in the facility of the year?
UR. It was the third year we were doing that. And even though it’s a lot of work, it’s very interesting because it gives me the opportunity to do benchmarking. I’m learning about what other people are doing. And what is important to me is that we’re looking for simple solutions. The industry in general, and J&J is no exception, has gone too far over the years trying to outdo each other. As a result, solutions got really complex. So with the awards, I look for solutions that are simple and more cost-effective. We did not pick the biggest or the shiniest projects. We looked at innovation in terms of how processes and buildings can be simplified.

NGP. I’m interested in the winners in the categories ‘Equipment Innovation’ and ‘Process Innovation’. What can you tell me about them?
UR. Taiyo, the winner in the ‘equipment innovation’ category, had a purpose driven design. And they had built the facility around the equipment. We’re not always doing that. What we have to look at first is changing the processes and then build the factories. If you do it right, like Taiyo did, then the factories are going to be more efficient and smaller because you don’t build in the inefficiencies.

And Vetter, the winner in ‘process innovation’, has a very efficient way to do pre-filled syringes; they have perfected that science and handle it at a very high speed. Their plant does not pretend to do anything else, they are very focussed and very specific.

NGP. In how far do your own facilities reflect constant improvement?
UR. Improvements for us mean using lean methods, more standard platforms and making risk-based decisions. That means we are not doing ‘what we have always done’ or trying to out-do the competition. Making things perfect can be very expensive and is not always necessary. We have to realize that ‘good’ can be good enough. We must keep our costs down and that starts with our facilities.

NGP. Could you give me an example to illustrate this?
UR. Sure. I’m very much involved in J&J’s qualification efforts, where we have gone completely overboard in terms of the volume of paperwork and cost that we create that has absolutely no bearings on the quality of the product. Everybody would agree that we have gone way too far with this – we almost qualified the parking lots!

NGP. What are the innovations that will raise the bar in terms of facility design and construction?
UR. First, we have to standardize and modularize more, which we hear a lot about lately. And we, the engineering firms and the industry, should not strive for ever new designs. Let’s standardize more. Even within the industry, we can standardize, so the engineering companies don’t have to reinvent something that works well.

We have to use 3D because we have to reduce the amount of mistakes that are being made. 3D also makes it so much easier for non-engineers to understand the drawings and can therefore contribute to the design. For the US, we now look at Building Information Modelling (BIM), Virtual Design and Construction (VDC).  Both methods also refer to 4D, the fourth dimension being the schedule, as one of the tools. Construction has been a very conservative industry, not much has been going on. With these new methods, we may see some changes. 

NGP. Why has this been neglected?
UR. There are several reasons for that. Pharmaceutical companies weren’t really forced to cut costs because we were doing pretty well until lately. Engineering and construction companies have been extremely busy in other industries. They are very busy right now in the Middle East, China with the oil industry, for example. They’re not forced to change. But our industry – we’re forced to change. The health care industry is under tremendous price pressure. We need to get that message across to the engineers and contractors.

NGP. What is your engineering outlook for J&J in the near future?
UR. We have substantial growth ahead of us. We’re also going to have some competition. It’s going to be tough. But from an engineering point of view, we do benchmark. You really have to go on the outside and compare what other industries are doing, and we are participating in some organizations that do that.  We are constantly looking for improvements and for engineers and contractors who are also looking for improvements and who can give us a competitive edge.

Ulrich Rudow started his career with Philip Morris in Switzerland and Canada as an engineer, and later as production and packaging supervisor. In 1971, he joined Schering-Plough in Montreal as manager of engineering and moved on to become plant manager, director, managing director, and vice president of operations and engineering. In 1996, Rudow joined Johnson & Johnson. In his position of Vice President of Worldwide Engineering & Real Estate, he is responsible for all capital projects over $10 million. Each year, Johnson & Johnson spends an average $800 million on large capital projects.