Lean Accounting Summit Presenters
The Lean Accounting Summit has a reputation of drawing the world's most recognized lean and lean accounting thought-leaders.

Bruce Baggaley

Bruce Baggaley, Senior Partner, BMA, Inc., specializes in the development and implementation of management processes that incorporate Lean Accounting and lean performance management systems. His functional expertise includes the development of management information for operational and financial planning and control, in implementing financial accounting control systems, and in applying activity-based management principles to reengineering operating processes. He has extensive experience in aerospace and defense, public utility, telecommunications, semiconductor manufacturing and service industries. Prior to forming his own firm Mr. Baggaley was a Accounting and Audit partner at KPMG responsible for strategic planning for the firm and a managing associate in the management controls consulting practice of Coopers & Lybrand in New York, and was a Professional Accounting Fellow at the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Mr. Baggaley received an AB in Economics from Dartmouth College and an MBA in Finance from Columbia University Graduate School of Business, where he was a member Beta Gamma Sigma honorary society and is a Certified Public Accountant. Mr. Baggaley is a frequent speaker on lean accounting and the management of lean companies and is co-author of the book Practical Lean Accounting about implementing Lean Accounting.

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Michael Bremer

Michael Bremer is a managing partner of the Chicago office of The Cumberland Group, and an Adjunct Senior Project Manager for Motorola University and Oriel/Stata-Matrix.  He is a nationally recognized speaker on process improvement, lean manufacturing, leadership, and management team effectiveness.  He has thirty years experience including director of the information systems group for a Fortune 25 company, Chief Financial Officer for an international association and President of several new business start-ups.  

Michael has been a speaker for the American Quality & Productivity Center, the Association Manufacturing Excellence and spoke at the White House Conference on Productivity. He serves on the national board of the Association Manufacturing Excellence and is a past board member of the Strategic Management Association and Board President of Old Town School of Folk Music. 

Michael has a Bachelors of Science Degree in Business from the University of Missouri – St. Louis, he is a Six Sigma Master Black Belt, Lean Bronze level certified (SME), CPA, and CMC.  He has published a number of articles on process improvement, corporate strategy and performance metrics. He co-authored the “Six Sigma Black Belt Handbook,” was lead author for “Six Sigma Financial Tracking & Reporting” both published by McGraw-Hill; his new book (2007) is on Innovation.

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David Cochran, Ph.D.

Dr. David S. Cochran is the founder of System Design, LLC (2003). He was on the Mechanical Engineering faculty at MIT from (1995-2003). He established the Production System Design (PSD) Laboratory at MIT (1995) and his company (2003) to advance the science of system design and integrated performance measurement which provides a roadmap for advancement beyond the success of “lean” and the Toyota Production System. He is a two-time recipient of the prestigious Shingo Prize (2002 and 1989) for manufacturing excellence for his work in the design of “lean” systems. He received the Dudley Prize for best paper from the International Journal of Production Research in 2000 for his work to integrate system design theory. A special issue of the Journal of Manufacturing Systems (v. 20, No. 6 2001/2002) highlights his work in developing the MSDD (Manufacturing System Design Decomposition) and case study research with the Automotive and Aerospace industries.

Dr. Cochran has developed the Collective System Design (CSD) methodology for advancement beyond the results achieved with lean and six-sigma (while not replacing the fundamentals of lean or six-sigma). CSD codifies the leadership and technical principles that bring success to companies like Toyota, Honda, GE and Southwest airlines through a language for system design. It integrates change leadership through dialogue, a diagnosis to design process to identify and resolve problems, principles for designing effective systems, a language for system design and tools to take thinking from structure to action in many applications including government, industry, service and cross-sector systems in scope.

Dr. Cochran is facilitating system design change with major Aerospace, Automotive and Consumer Products companies. His work is presently focused on the Collective System Design of enterprise, and integrated product design and delivery systems with THAAD, Lockheed Martin, Visteon and Hewlett Packard.

Dr. Cochran has consulted Lockheed Martin (F-22, JSF, Space Systems, Missiles and Fire Control: PAC-3), NASA, Visteon Automotive (6 divisions including Electronics, Plastics, Climate Control, Glass, and Chassis components), Robert Bosch Corp.(2 divisions: AB and AP), Ford Motor Company, Dell Computer, and Kinetic Systems. Prior to joining MIT, he worked for Ford Motor Company (Electronics and Automotive Components Division), Lord Aerospace and the US Army Corps of Engineers, Systems Engineering Division.

Dr. Cochran is adjunct faculty at Meijo University in Nagoya, Japan in the Production Engineering - Management Program and is guest lecturer to the Production Engineering Institute (TUT), Tampere, Finland. He is a Board Member of the Greater Boston Manufacturing Partnership and is affiliated with the Society of Organizational Learning founded at MIT. Dr. Cochran received his Ph.D. in Industrial and Systems Engineering from Auburn University and M.Sc. in Manufacturing Systems Engineering from The Pennsylvania State University.

For articles by Dr. Cochran and more information click here

Learn more about Dr. Cochran's Cost Management and Lean System Design Simulation bonus event on day 2 of the seminar

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Jean Cunningham

Jean Cunningham, founder of Jean Cunningham Consulting (JCC), is internationally recognized as a pioneer in the Lean Accounting field.  In addition to an extensive speaking schedule, Jean also currently serves as the CFO of the Association of Manufacturing Excellence as well as the CFO for Stiles Associates, an executive retain search firm focusing on Lean and Six Sigma.

Jean is the co-author of the acclaimed book, Real Numbers: Management Accounting in a Lean Organization, an essential text for learning Lean Accounting.  She has also recently co-authored another book, Easier, Simpler, Faster – a book about Lean and Information Systems.  Both books have been awarded the Shingo Prize, which Newsweek magazine referred to as the “Nobel Prize of Manufacturing.”

Jean was previously the former Chief Financial Officer and Vice President of Company Services at Lantech, LLC and Marshfield Door Systems, Inc..  It was during these tenures that Jean launched her Lean career, driving Lean from the manufacturing floor into the backoffice functions to include Finance, Information Systems, Human Resources and Telecommunications.  

Prior to joining Lantech, LLC, Jean was a finance professional with Digital Equipment Corporation and Westinghouse Electric, holding a number of senior Controllership and Treasury positions.

Jean has a BS in Accounting from Indiana University and an MBA from Northeastern University’s Executive Program.  She and her family reside in the Chicago area.

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Orry Fiume

Orest (Orry) J. Fiume was vice president of Finance and Administration and a director of The Wiremold Company, West Hartford, CT, which gained international recognition as a leader in lean business management in “Lean Thinking,” by James P. Womack and Daniel T. Jones. Orry was Wiremold’s senior financial officer from 1978 until his retirement in 2002. Before that, he was an audit manager with Coopers & Lybrand.

Orry led Wiremold’s conversion to lean accounting in 1991 and developed alternate accounting systems that supported the company’s entire lean business efforts. He went on to install lean accounting at more than 20 Wiremold acquisitions. Orry has studied lean production in both the U.S. and Japan and has been a guest speaker at many conferences throughout the U.S. In addition, he has taught courses on management accounting in a lean business at The TBM Institute, The University of Dayton Center for Competitive Change, The Center for Lean Business Management, MEP’s in five states, and numerous companies. He also was a member of the People to People Program’s Economic Management Delegation to China to discuss U.S. financial management practices. More recently, Orry has co-authored the 2004 Shingo Prize winning book, Real Numbers: Management Accounting in a Lean Organization and was inducted as a Life Member of the Shingo Prize Academy, which has been referred to by Business Week as the Nobel prize in manufacturing.

Orry has an MS in Management from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and a BBA in Accounting from Fairfield University. He is a certified public accountant, and a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and Financial Executives International, where he is a past president of the Connecticut Valley Chapter. He also serves on the Board of Directors of several companies.

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Michael Hoseus

Mike is Executive Director for the Center for Quality People & Organizations (CQPO). Mike Hoseus brings both manufacturing operations and specialization in Human Resource experience to CQPO. CQPO is an organization developed in 1999 as a vision of Toyota Motor Manufacturing to share Lean Quality philosophy and human resource practices with education, business, and community organizations. CQPO current projects with Toyota include New Hire selection and training process, Team Leader and Group Leader post promotion training, Quality Circle Leader and Manager training, and Global Problem Solving for all levels. Mike is an adjunct professor with the University of Kentucky’s Lean Manufacturing Program. Mike is co author with Dr. Jeffery Liker (Author of the Toyota Way) of Toyota Culture. Mike is an adjunct professor with the University of Kentucky’s Center for Manufacturing and a member of the faculty of Lean Enterprise Institute. Mike is also president of Lean Culture Enterprises.  

Prior to CQPO, Mike was a corporate leader for 13 years at Toyota Motor Manufacturing’s Georgetown, Kentucky, plant both in Human Resources and Manufacturing. As Assistant General Manager in Human Resources, his responsibilities included personnel, safety, HR development, employee relations, benefits, training, and manufacturing/human resource teams for a plant of 8000 team members. His major initiative was development of the enhanced relationship between Human Resource and Manufacturing Mike’s operational responsibilities in manufacturing started in 1987 as a front line supervisor in vehicle assembly. This included all aspects of safety, quality, productivity, cost and morale for operations. With experience as Assembly Plant Manager and eventually Assistant General Manager, his responsibilities increased to include both assembly plants including operations, maintenance, and engineering.  

Mike currently supports organizations with Lean Culture transformations focusing on the roles of Executive Management and Human Resources and how the quality people value stream connects to the production value stream. 

Mike has served and contributed to numerous community boards such as the Kentucky Community and Technical College System and the Lexington Mayor’s Partnership for Youth. Mike has degrees in Business and Psychology from Xavier University and a Masters of Arts in Counseling from Asbury Theological Seminary. Mike’s wife, Suzy and he are co-founders of CMH, Inc. and Life Learning Ministries and have three children, Ben, Leah and Lindsay.

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Nick Katko

Nick joined BMA in 2002 as a senior consultant after a career as a manufacturing CFO & controller. As CFO for E.D. Bullard Company, a privately held manufacturer of personal safety equipment, Nick led the company in the implementation of lean accounting techniques – this includes implementing performance measurements, value stream costing, lean decision making and the elimination of Bullard’s traditional standard cost system.

Nick is a featured speaker on lean accounting at the University of Kentucky’s Lean Manufacturing Leadership Institutes and the Lexington, KY APICS Chapter.

Nick has a BS in Accounting and MBA in Finance, both from the University of Kentucky

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Frances Kennedy

Dr. Frances Kennedy teaches managerial accounting at Clemson University in the School of Accountancy and Legal Studies. She earned her Phd in Accounting from the University of North Texas in 2001 and has been at Clemson ever since. Dr. Kennedy’s 13 years of experience in public accounting and at industry enriches her teaching as well as informs her research. Her experience at Rubbermaid includes plant financial and inventory management, corporate reporting and new product team analyst. 

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Glenn Marshall

Glenn Marshall brings over 30 years of hands on experience in the development and deployment of a  Value Stream Management  approach to leading and sustaining a Continuous Improvement System (CIS). CIS integrates Lean and Six Sigma methodology, principles, with other CI tools to sustain ongoing continuous improvement cycles.

At Northrop Grumman Newport News, Glenn is the Sector Benchmarking Champion  and  works at all levels of the corporation to develop cross functional teams that take a value stream approach to identify and eliminate waste, defects, variation, and performance gaps from core business processes. Benchmarking is use as a key CI tool to identify “best practices” and then share knowledge to rapidly close gaps in value stream performance.

The goal of these teams is to use value stream mapping and management to identify key constraints and use Lean Six Sigma to drive continuous improvement results. In addition, he has help design and deploy CIS  to achieve higher efficiency and maturity levels across the enterprise. Glenn is both Lean and Six Sigma Certified.

Glenn was an Operations / Site Manager with Texas Instruments Defense Systems working at multiple sites including supporting international partnerships. In that role he championed continuous improvements initiatives, led the design and deployment of integrated factory systems. Glenn was one of the leaders in TI becoming the first defense company to win the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award.

Glenn is actively involved with professional and learning organizations:

• Association for Manufacturing Excellence - National  Director at Larger

• US Senate Productivity and Quality Award Examiner for Virginia 

• Hampton Roads Quality Management Community Steering Council - Community of Practice

• AME National Chair – Growth and Visibility Committee

• Lean Accounting for Defense Industry - Community of Practice

• Virginia Business Excellence Consortium – Steering Committee

• Northrop Grumman Corporation - Process Excellence  Community of Practice

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Brian Maskell 

Brian H. Maskell, President of BMA Inc., has more than 25 years experience in manufacturing and distribution industry. He has held a variety of management positions from the shop-floor of an electronics company to Manager of European Inventories for the Xerox Corporation to Vice President of Product Development and Customer Service of the Unitronix Corporation. Over the past fifteen years Mr. Maskell's consulting practice has taken him to many manufacturing and distribution companies in the United States, England, Mexico, Australia, South Africa, and Europe. In recent years BMA Inc has specialized in the changes required to accounting, control, management, and measurement methods for companies pursuing lean transformation. Mr. Maskell is regarded by many as a leading expert in Lean Accounting.

A sought-after speaker, Brian Maskell is the author of six books including; Practical Lean Accounting (2003), Performance Measurement for World Class Manufacturing (1991), Software and the Agile Manufacturer (1993), New Performance Measures (1994), Making the Numbers Count; the accountant as an agent of change (1996), and Life's Little Lean Accounting Instruction Book (2006).  Mr. Maskell's works address the needs of manufacturers as they move into the increasingly competitive 21st century. Mr. Maskell conducts seminars and workshops around the world on such subjects as Lean Accounting, Performance Measurement for World Class Manufacturing, Value Stream Cost Management, Target Costing, and Lean Accounting Processes; Transaction Elimination.

Mr. Maskell has an engineering degree from the University of Sussex, England. He is certified with the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) in London, and the American Association of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). He is a Fellow of the American Production and Inventory Control Society (APICS). Mr. Maskell also teaches at the Wharton Business School at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia PA. He is the author of numerous articles and papers and regularly presents papers at national and international conferences.

For articles by Brian Maskell and more information, click here

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David Paino

Prior to joining BMA, Inc., David was the Vice President of Operations with an auto-parts remanufacturing company in Philadelphia.  David was the driving force behind the introduction of lean manufacturing and other lean methods that – according to the company’s President – saved the company in these increasingly competitive times.  David has also served as President of an industrial parts distribution company and is very experienced with warehousing, distribution, and inventory planning methods.  Prior to moving into production operations, David did his MBA work at Villanova University as a finance major and worked as a plant and corporate controller.

David is currently working on Lean Accounting projects with the Boeing Commercial Aircraft Company, a multi-national defense equipment manufacturer; a Maryland pre-fabricated building products company, and a division of the Ingersoll Rand Corporation.  David also specializes in quick & easy kaizen methods that are used to motivate and empower the entire workforce for lean improvement.

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Steve Player

Steve Player, CPA, serves as the North American Program Director for the Beyond Budgeting Round Table, an international network focused on improving planning and control, and Managing Director of The Player Group. He has over 20 years experience in implementing cost and performance management, strategic planning and process improvements. Some of Steve’s clients have included American Express, Colgate Palmolive, Hewlett-Packard, The Covey Leadership Center and World Vision. He is the co-author/editor of four books on Activity-Based Management including, Lessons from the ABM Battlefield. He founded and runs the Activity-Based Management Advanced Implementation Group, whose members include Bell South and Bell Canada. Steve has served on the Board of Directors of the Consortium for Advanced Manufacturing - International (CAM-I) and provided insight for the AICPA Industry and Management Accounting Executive Committee. Steve is a frequent speaker and media resource.

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Jerrold M. Solomon

Jerry Solomon has had a unique opportunity to implement Lean accounting and manufacturing techniques as he’s simultaneously held the positions of Chief Financial Officer and Vice President of Manufacturing at three middle market manufacturing companies.  In his dual role he was able to cast aside traditional departmental barriers and galvanize the accounting and manufacturing areas to develop timely and actionable information. 

While CFO and VP of Manufacturing at PACE, Inc., an electronics manufacturing firm providing equipment to the telecommunications, consumer electronics, automotive, computer and medical industries, Mr. Solomon led PACE’s Lean transformation resulting in customer lead-time reductions of 75%, productivity improvements of 64%, space reductions of 50%, quality improvements of 100%, and a doubling of inventory turns.  In addition to the improvements taking place in manufacturing, the cost accounting system was simplified and the use of MRP for executing the production plan was eliminated in favor of a pull system with electronic links to all suppliers.  As a result of these efforts, PACE, Inc. was certified as a World-Class company by the Maryland World Class Manufacturing Consortium, the first and only company to be awarded this distinction in the Consortium’s twelve year history. 

Currently Mr. Solomon is the Vice President of Operations – Hunt Valley, for MarquipWardUnited, the largest division of the Barry-Wehmiller Companies Inc., the Western Hemisphere’s leading packaging automation and converting group.   

Mr. Solomon has a B. S. degree from Clarkson University, an M. S. degree from Michigan Technological University and an M. B. A. degree from the University of Chicago.  He’s served on the Board of Directors of Vermont Castings Inc. as well as the Green Mountain Economic Development Corporation and currently is on the Board of Directors of the Maryland World Class Manufacturing Consortium.  

Mr. Solomon teaches Lean Accounting in association with a number of Universities and has delivered keynote addresses to a variety of companies and organizations.  He has also been featured on the Lean Accounting video published by the Society of Manufacturing Engineers and has presented Lean Accounting on a national web cast sponsored by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. 

Mr. Solomon is the author of the Shingo Award winning book, Who’s Counting?, a highly acclaimed business novel focusing on the interaction of the manufacturing and accounting functions during a Lean transformation, and Leading Lean, a novel about a three day Lean event.  In collaboration with Professor Rosemary Fullerton, Mr. Solomon has also written, Accounting for World Class Operations, which has also won the Shingo prize.  

Mr. Solomon brings a truly unique perspective to the requirements of manufacturers in their quest to achieve World-Class performance.

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Steven J. Spear

Steven Spear, five-time winner of the Shingo Prize for research excellence and recipient of the McKinsey Award, is a senior lecturer at MIT and former assistant professor at Harvard. A senior fellow at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, he is the author of numerous articles appearing in academic and trade publications, including the Harvard Business Review, Annals of Internal Medicine, Academic Medicine, The Boston Globe, and The New York Times. An active public speaker, he has addressed audiences as diverse as the Association for Manufacturing Excellence, the Shingo Prize Annual Conference, and the Institute of Medicine.

In his consulting practice, Spear works with organizations to develop the capabilities of high velocity about which he writes.  This involves developing senior leadership’s understanding and training a cadre of internal process experts whose system expertise compliments the functional expertise that exists within specialties and disciplines.  His clients span a broad range of industrial, high tech, software, service, and healthcare organizations.

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