Communication skills advance project capabilities

When it comes to being agile and nimble in the automation industry, everyone has to be able to speak the same language, said today’s keynote speaker at the 2008 Siemens Automation Summit in Chicago.
To be reactive to the marketplace, you have to be able to communicate with your suppliers, said Eric Cosman, engineering solutions IT consultant for Dow Chemical Co.
“We found at Dow we had our own language and when you work closely with suppliers you have to speak the same language,” Cosman said. “When you come into a situation (with a supplier) speaking ‘Dowspeak’ then there is a problem. You have to be able to speak the same language.”
Cosman said about 10 years ago Dow decided to adopt an industry standard for language and that has helped them when dealing with people and companies outside his organization.
In short, that communication level allows a company to remain agile. “You have to move quickly in the industry,” Cosman said.
Cosman talked about a scenario where Dow and Siemens worked together on a project and one of the keys to the entire project was communication.
“Work closely with suppliers and you can feed your needs and goals back to them and they can deliver even better products,” he said. “It truly ends up being a win-win situation.”
Afterall, companies are changing all the time with all the mergers and acquisitions occurring.
“We are in the midst of a huge transformation in our business,” Cosman said. “It is a very dynamic business climate.”