Aurora has won an award for operational excellence from the Valley Industrial Association (VIA). VIA represents the manufacturing industry in the Fox Valley region of Illinois, an industrial area near Chicago and one of the larger manufacturing regions in the US Midwest. The award recognises leadership in operational strategic planning and implementation.

Aurora was a finalist for two of the Spark Award categories, social responsibility and operational excellence. The awards process included a detailed submission and a lengthy interview that emphasised Aurora’s continuous operational improvements. This includes utilisation of Kaizen Events and Green Belt projects, two of the key performance indicators used to measure operations effectiveness, as well as cross-training, on-board training for operators and benchmarking with other plants, according to a press release by the company.

“It was an honour to be nominated as a finalist in two categories from the VIA Spark Award committee, which recognised us for social responsibility and operational excellence. In 2015, we moved our operations from a 132 year-old plant in Aurora, Illinois, to our new facility in Yorkville and it was a challenge. Many improvements and adjustments had to be made in all aspects of our operations and moving took extensive cooperation, patience and know-how from our employees and management to make it successful. I’m always proud to give a tour of our new plant in Yorkville and show the facility to customers and partners. I’m equally proud to have our team and organisation recognised for operational excellence,” Marcia Ayala, president of Aurora said.

“This year the interviewers were looking for companies that have a systems approach to the best practices in the categories of the Spark Awards. The thinking is that having the right operation systems and disciplines in place is what helps take a company from good to great. And even though Aurora isn’t a large company with resources to easily implement these systems, they have made it a priority and invested the time and resources into this. They are an impressive group,” Kathy Gilmore, president of the VIA said.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (GK)

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