Real-Life Decision Making
You're the industrial engineer at a forest products plant, and you have
a situation on your hands.
You've been away on holidays and there seem to have been some serious problems
during your absence.
It started with the high-pressure boiler that provides steam to a plywood
press. The flame within the boiler was unstable and had been causing small
explosions. The stationary engineer, a tradesperson trained and licensed to
operate boilers, felt obligated by law and safety to shut the boiler down.
That forced the mill manager to send the second shift of plant workers
home. Meanwhile, the maintenance foreperson arranged for specialist burner
mechanics to be flown in to fix the problem. The plywood mill lost three production
shifts at a cost of nearly $1 million.
You have to piece the story together based on conversations with supervisors,
millwrights and stationary engineers. You are also seeking advice and analysis
from the experts who are still in the plant.
There were a few problems that may have contributed to the dangerous condition.
The burner mechanic is not completely certain of the cause of the failure.
There is no doubt the stationary engineer made the right decision to shut
down the boiler. However, that same tradesperson had performed a major maintenance
job on the boiler just before the symptoms appeared. You wonder if something
he did caused this problem.
You must find out the cause of the problem. You don't want to risk offending
the tradesperson, who is also a union job steward. After all, he puts in a
great deal of overtime and has always seemed dependable. You could rely on
the report from the specialists, which should be arriving soon.
On the other hand, you want to be able to rely on your staff
to provide honest and accurate feedback. What are you going to do?