GENERAL MOTORS New plant manager reaches out to people

A former hockey player sets simple goals as he takes over the Lordstown plant.
By DON SHILLING
VINDICATOR BUSINESS EDITOR
LORDSTOWN -- Look for the new plant manager at the General Motors Lordstown complex to start showing up more in the community.
John Donahoe said he doesn't want to stretch himself too thin, but he intends to join the boards of three or four organizations that he feels are making a difference.
So far, he's limited his community involvement as he tries to understand plant operations.
One of the organizations he has met with already is the Youngstown Steelhounds. Donahoe has taken an interest in the minor league hockey team not only because he thinks the team and the new downtown convocation center will be good for the area, but he also was a hockey player himself.
Donahoe was drafted into the National Hockey League, played two games and then spent two years bouncing around the minor leagues.
"I was too slow," the Montreal native said Friday at his first news conference since taking over the top job at the Lordstown complex in August.
Donahoe is a big sports fan, and he and Jim Graham, president of United Auto Workers Local 1112, recently were on a team that won a United Way golf outing.
But he has other community interests as well. His last job was in Mansfield, where was on an economic development committee and was a board member of a United Way foundation and a clinic that provides health care for the uninsured.
Graham said he's excited about Donahoe's potential to make an impact on the community.
Graham recalled how he and former plant manager Herman Maass stressed the value of education when they spoke together to civic groups and at schools. Maass also was involved with area economic development groups.
"John could be Herman Maass' son," Graham said. "He's very community oriented."
Jim Kaster, president of UAW Local 1714, predicted that Donahoe will top past plant managers with his community involvement.
Union leaders know Donahoe because he worked at the Lordstown metal fabricating plant for seven years and was assistant plant manager from 1994 to 1998. In Mansfield, he was plant manager of GM's largest fabricating plant.
Donahoe returned to Lordstown to replace Maureen Midgley, who became executive director of GM's Manufacturing Engineering Paint Center in Michigan.
Management style
Donahoe, who has an industrial engineering degree, said one of the first things he did on his new job was to cancel a weekly meeting with his staff that could last for hours. Instead, he attends the daily operational meetings that are briefer.
He said he spends about 80 percent of his time talking to people in their offices and on the plant floor.
"I don't like meetings. I manage by walking around," he said.
Donahoe said he tries to learn the names and family details of as many people as he can, although he admitted that would be a daunting task at Lordstown, which has 6,000 employees.
Donahoe said he has tried to simplify the goals of the organization -- keep people safe, build great quality and make production schedules.
Lordstown is beating a quality target set by GM by about 15 percent, he said. The company gauges quality with internal measurements that mimic those used by J.D. Power & amp; Associates in a national quality survey.
Also, the plant has been meeting production schedules of 1,300 Chevrolet Cobalts a day, Donahoe said.
The key to improving productions is not to look at problems as bad things but instead to see them as opportunities to improve the process, he said.
Donahoe, 53, spent the early part of his 28-year career with GM at an assembly plant in Lansing, Mich., where he became superintendent of production. That experience and his work in stamping plants make him feel comfortable in Lordstown, where he is in charge of both operations. GM recently combined the management of the fabricating and assembly plants.
"I'm extremely excited," Donahoe said. "This is where I want to end my career."
shilling@vindy.com