Northwest Aerospace News Issue No. 26 April | May 2022 | Page 10

The book , “ Good to Great ” by Jim Collins , was written in 2001 and has sold over four million copies . To some , the book may seem outdated , but Astronics PECO of Clackamas , Oregon said that it is as relevant as ever to their teams and approach to working with customers . Customer Success Manager , Geri Beasley , said that they had a book club a couple of years ago and the employees really embraced the principles in the book . From it , they developed one program called , “ Fix What Bugs You ,” which is an employee feedback program where they can make suggestions to implement . Suggestions can range in scope , from a simple straightforward activity to a more complex suggestion that requires a cross-functional team to implement . One example of a simple suggestion dealt with the myriad of clocks throughout the factory .

During a time change ( like Daylight Savings Time ), it was observed how much effort it took to go around and change the clocks — the innovation was to replace all analog clocks with atomic clocks — problem solved !
Beasley has been with the company for 12 years and said that not only is it one of the cleanest and most organized places she has worked , but she loves the employees and customers . She said that one of their primary customers , the Boeing Company , sees them as an extension of their engineering department .
This was echoed by PECO ’ s Director of Engineering , Paul Trese , who has been at the company for eight years and has been working in aerospace for 37 years .
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