Wes Turner

Wes is a highly experienced engineering and operations leader with a record of developing and supporting high return projects and solutions. He has 20+ years of experience providing hands-on operational leadership in manufacturing, engineering, and continuous improvement. His areas of expertise include lean manufacturing, lean product development, management system implementation, project management, cost reduction, facilities management, value stream and process mapping.

He spent the bulk of his career in progressively responsible roles at Dana Holding Corporation staring as a manufacturing engineer and application engineer. Wes quickly advanced into leadership roles as a Manufacturing Manager, a Global Director of Engineering Services, a Senior Manager of Global Operations Excellence and ultimately as the Global Director of Manufacturing Engineering with responsibility for global best practices and standards.

Some of Wes’s key contributions include:

• Spearheading the creation of a global talent assessment and implementation for 93 manufacturing facilities.
• Developing a global best practice for predictive and preventative maintenance.
• Creating a plant layout and factory simulation process.
• Leading a team to develop the Manufacturing Execution System (MES) roadmap that would be implemented in a new state-of-the-art manufacturing facility.
• Providing strategic direction and leadership for the implementation of the Dana Operating System (DOS) for the Global Technical Centers.
• Developing and deploying continuous improvement systems and tools to drive engineering, manufacturing, and office productivity in 16 tech center and five manufacturing facilities in China.

Wes earned a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University and a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Toledo. He completed training in Lean Six Sigma, Six Sigma Green Belt and Lean Six Sigma Black Belt at Villanova University. He also completed a Lean Product Development Program from the University of Michigan. Wes studied the Toyota Production System at the Bluegrass Automotive Manufacturing Association (BAMA).