Meet the Experts

Adrian Messer is the director of US Operations at UE Systems where he assists and supports current customers, users of ultrasound technology to help improve overall plant and facility reliability. With over 17 years of experience working with ultrasonic technologies, Adrian holds a ton of knowledge on how these technologies can be used to positively impact maintenance teams everywhere! 

Alicia Washington is a Reliability Leader for Dow Chemical. She was recently named the Manufacturing and Engineering Recruiting Team Leader for Florida A&M University (one of Dow’s 5 strategic HBCUs), where she ensures the company is recruiting and retaining diverse talent into the organization.

Andy Gager has been recognized as an industry leading expert in facilitation, global implementations of maintenance systems, supply chain, and operations best practices with over 25 years of manufacturing experience ranging from warehousing operations to plant management. Andrew specializes in:

• Operations Optimizer
• International Training Facilitator
• Continuous Improvement Advocate
• MRO/Supply Chain Specialist
• Materials Management
• Maintenance Execution Best Practices
• Training & Education Evangelist
• Project Management
• Change Management Specialist
• Leadership & Supervision Development
• Organizational Development
• Operational Excellence 
  

April Johnson, CMRP, CRL, is an Engineering and Maintenance Manager at Pepsico, a global food and beverage leader with a product portfolio including 22 brands that generate more than $1 billion each in annual retail sales. She is passionate about the implementation and management of maintenance systems and processes in order to support the goals of her organization.

Blair Fraser is a technology evangelist with a natural curiosity to think differently and challenge current thinking. He is Director of Global IIoT Solutions for UE Systems, and the Co-founder and Advisor to many companies in the technology space.

Blair is a passionate reliability and operational excellence professional with over 20 years of experience in designing, commissioning, maintaining and improving manufacturing equipment and processes for the manufacturing industry. A Certified Reliability Leader (CRL) and Certified Maintenance and Reliability Professional (CMRP), Blair has dedicated his career to combining sound reliability principles and processes with the latest technology to improve asset performance and uptime for customers across the globe.

Bob Latino is the CEO of Reliability Center! He is an internationally recognized author, trainer, software developer, lecturer and practitioner of best practices in the field of Reliability Engineering, and specifically in Root Cause Analysis (RCA) and Investigation Management. Bob has been facilitating RCA and FMEA analyses with his clientele around the world for over 35 years.

Bryan Bieschke, CMRP, is the Director of Maintenance and Reliability at T. Parker Host, a total solutions provider for the maritime industry, specializing in agency services, terminal operations, stevedoring and marine assets. His expertise is in…

• Heavy equipment maintenance and troubleshooting.
• Establishing maintenance programs for high pace operations.
• Leading people by connecting them to their input and outcomes of the maintenance process.
  

Cliff Williams is a huge wealth of knowledge in the maintenance and reliability space. Currently, Cliff is the Principal Advisor on Maintenance and Reliability at People & Processes, a global consulting and education services firm focused on the full spectrum of physical asset management. He is also a member of the Board of Directors for the Plant Engineering and Maintenance Association of Canada! 

Charli K. Matthews is a thought leader for social media and marketing in the pump industry with more than a 17 years experience connecting pump professionals around the world. Charli is the Founder and CEO of Empowering Brands that help customers and users to make valuable connections.

Dane Boers is the Founder and Consultant of MODLA, an online platform for advanced asset analytics, collaboration and expert knowledge capture. His expertise is in…

• Reliability maths, which is the development of analytics software using deterministic reliability statistics.
• Value frameworks, which is the development of risk, cost and benefit frameworks to make strategy driven decisions.
• Asset modeling, which is end to end, data to decision making. Includes everything from condition assessment (IoT/PdM etc), to RCM, to portfolio level decisions.

Garret Earl is a Reliability Engineer at Cargill, E.I.T., where he is responsible for ensuring that the facility is operating at maximum efficiency with minimized downtime and total cost of ownership.

Throughout his time at Cargill, he has learned how to manage and provide direction to a diverse team of millwrights, electricians, engineers, analysts, data collectors, and technicians. He also is skilled in performing various reliability processes, such as RCA and PdM; as well as safety practices, such as SIF Risk Assessment and HOP Training.

George Williams is the Founder and CEO of ReliabilityX, a maintenance and reliability consultancy. After a long career practicing reliability, George found a new way to put his many, many industry certifications to good use and started his own reliability consultancy. Reflecting on why he is proud of his career and his work in maintenance, George shared: 

“Anyone in maintenance can relate to the feeling you get when you troubleshoot and repair equipment. When you step back, the pride you feel is what we strive for. As my career has progressed, it is still that feeling I strive for. It just comes in different ways. From seeing a team click and make a difference, to investigating an issue to root causes and making the problem go away, to teaching students and seeing their progression professionally. It is that sense of pride that motivates me.”

James Reyes-Picknell is the Co-founder and President of Conscious Asset and Conscious Reliability, both specialist consulting and training firms. He has led a global consulting practice (PwCC / IBM), done contract engineering and reliability consulting, and so much more to accumulate over 40 years of experience in Maintenance and Asset Management. He also has the credentials to back it up:

• Certified Management Consultant (CMC)
• Licensed Professional Engineer (Ontario, Canada) (P.Eng.)
• Certified Maintenance and Reliability Professional (CMRP)
• Certified Asset Management Assessor (CAMA)
• Certified Blockchain Professional (CBP)
• Member of Institute of Asset Management (MIAM)
  

Joel Levitt is a leading trainer of maintenance professionals. He has trained over 17,000 maintenance leaders from 3000 organizations in 39 countries in over 600 sessions. Since 1980 he has been the President of Springfield Resources, a management consulting firm that services all sized clients on a wide range of maintenance issues.

He has 25+ years of experience in many facets of maintenance, including as a process control designer, source equipment inspector, electrician, field service technician, merchant marine worker, manufacturing manager, and property manager.

Radar Huntsinger is the MRO Manager at Great Lakes Cheese! He has over 30 years of experience in the maintenance and reliability industry. His expertise is in:

• MRO Material Management
• Data Analysis
• Reliability Center Maintenance
• Continuous Improvement

He is also passionate about educating others on the benefits of Reliability Centered Maintenance, along with communicating the next steps needed to close the increasing skills gap between the past and future states of maintenance.

Ricky Smith, CMRP, CMRT, CRL, is the Maintenance Expert in Residence at UpKeep and Consultant at World Class Maintenance. He’s held a wide range of roles from maintenance supervisor, to maintenance manager, to maintenance company commander while in serving in Iraq. Ricky’s wide global experience has brought him a unique perspective that “Maintenance is maintenance, it doesn’t matter where you go.”

Ryan Chan, CMRP, is the CEO and Founder of UpKeep Maintenance Management, the leading mobile-first CMMS/Enterprise Asset Management System helping maintenance teams deliver reliability for their facilities. He is also a part of the SMRP Membership Committee, as well as the Forbes Technology Council!

Rob Kalwarowsky brings years of unique experience with a background in Mechanical Engineering from MIT, as well as experience in economics and maintenance. After working as an Economist, Rob transitioned to working in Reliability Engineering. Today, Rob is an Asset Management Specialist at Enbridge and is breaking new ground on the grassroots maintenance movement. He is also the creator of Rob’s Reliability Project, a maintenance content website that produces video, audio, and visual information to spread the word of reliability.

Shadrach Stephens is an Award-Winning Engineering Leader, Community Advocate, Mentor and Founder of Re.engineer. He has made an impact within his profession by creating value in every role that he has served in. As a Reliability, Maintenance and Engineering Leader he develops and energizes teams that are committed to changing the current reality and are focused on delivering value. Throughout his entire career, his improvement teams have generated over $90 million of value creation.

Throughout his career, Shadrach has established reliability and improvement programs that have made significant impact while also innovating new technologies and work processes to deliver bottom-line growth. In his latest combined role of Global Improvement Leader and Reliability Director he supports the capital and reliability improvements for 15 sites and $6B of physical assets across the world.

Outside of his corporate engagements, Shadrach started the Re.engineer initiative, which is a community of professionals that collaborate, share and leverage value added solutions and innovations. As the founder, he aspires to create a bridge between advanced and junior level professionals, one that enables them to leverage solutions, techniques, innovation, technology and overall leadership perspectives.