2010 Award Recipients
The Race to Excel Awards Presented To:

2009 Award Recipients
The Race to Excel Awards Presented To:

AzulK
AzulK

USMC Maintenance Center Albany

2008 Award Recipients
The Race to Excel Awards Presented To:

Dr. Gary Wadhwa
Adirondack Maxillofacial Surgery Center
Through the implementation of continuous process improvement techniques, normally associated with manufacturing plants,
Dr. Wadhwa and his team were able to dramatically improve the effectiveness of their surgery center by increasing the number
of patient visits by 60% in a 5 year period, while simultaneously increasing healthcare quality and patient satisfaction, with the
same amount of physicians and resources. AOMS was also able to increase the amount of money collected from patients by
78% and the charge per patient by 28% over the same time period.

These incredible improvements were the result of implementing a collaboration of organizational improvement philosophies
comprised of the Theory of Constraints (TOC), LEAN, and Six Sigma, normally used in business, into the medical world.
AOMS was able to properly identify and effectively exploit three of the most common struggles in the Health Care industry;
collections, patient recruitment and proper use of the doctors’ time.

Delta Airlines Technical Operations Team
Delta Airlines Technical Operations Team was awarded with the prestigious Robert E. Fox Award in recognition of their
remarkable improvement in their performance. Delta’s application of the Theory of Constraints (TOC), Six Sigma and LEAN
improvement techniques, took an area of their company that was actually a cost center, and with no additional resources,
dramatically improved it to the point that it became to a money making branch of the company by contracting work for other
airlines.

The implementation of these improvement techniques became $312M in revenue in 2006 and revenues are projected to
reach $514M in 2008. All from an area of the Airline industry that had traditionally been considered a drain on company
profits and one that management would not typically consider as an option to increase already struggling revenues.

2007 Award Recipients
The Race to Excel Presented To

First Solar, Inc.
First Solar was purchased when it was very shaky – at one stage they were the last company still trying to make CdTe solar
panels commercially viable. The COO recommended the Theory of Constraints (TOC) as the management philosophy for
the company. TOC was adopted with the support of the CEO. Active participation and support by the management team is a
key ingredient for the success of TOC at First Solar – as it would be in any implementation. The Theory of Constraints was
supplemented with the 6-Sigma and Taguchi (Lean) robust engineering toolsets.

Everyone read ‘The Goal’ and participated in the production and project management simulations (1). Weekly meetings were
held until TOC was real – became part of the First Solar culture. As TOC became part of First Solar culture, the focus moved
from one of “turning knobs” (making changes within the noise?) to a focus on the constraint of the organization. Key was
sufficient management attention and training to make sure the necessary TOC paradigm shifts became a permanent part of
how First Solar operates.

The Theory of Constraints puts the priority of a company on Throughput  (defined as Sales less total variable cost) while
common practice is the Cost World – where costs are the priority. Management, at First Solar, is convinced that a Throughput
mindset contributes more to the success of an organization than one that is more concerned with cost minimization. The priority
in the Throughput World is 1.) Throughput, 2.) Investment, 3.) Operating Expenses (cost) while in the Cost World they tend to
be reversed.

Hill 571st AMXS A-10 Aircraft Maintenance
HAFB’s 571st AMXS was honored for its use of integrated methods, particularly a TOC technique called Critical Chain Project
Management, which helped reduce the number of A-10 Warthogs on the ground for maintenance and retrofitting.

In accepting the award on behalf of the aircraft maintenance group, Greg Hoffman, 571st AMXS director, said improvement
efforts have decreased operations time on each aircraft by almost 20 percent. More importantly, throughput has increased by
36 percent while simultaneously increasing overall cost performance by 130 percent.

The process improvements have increased the A-10 warfighter’s operational readiness in supporting the war efforts in the
Middle East, by returning the airplanes quickly, and in the most current configuration.