Nashville Food Bank

In December, part of our team met in Nashville to help out at a local food bank.  Our job was sorting and repacking.  After, we had dinner together to celebrate the upcoming holidays.

A Busy Week

I spent the first half of this week in Pennsylvania doing a site assessment of a distribution center that might be a future ERP deployment.  We wrapped up early and spent part of the afternoon touring Gettysburg....

After, we traveled to Tennessee for a manufacturing plant site assessment.  Behind this plant is a rather impressive solar farm that generates electricity.  What is not used by the plant is piped into the electric grid.  I'm not exactly sure why it's there as the company does not produce solar cells... I think it's more to show that we are a green company doing creative things with electricity.  

 

Project Kickoff in Nashville

This week, we kicked off a new sub-project to implement SAP at a company that we have acquired.  Even though the subsidiary is located in central California, our kickoff was held in Nashville, Tennessee.  We have team members here who flew in from China, France, Canada, Mexico, and all around the United States.  The total team probably consists of around 50 people.  In addition to plants in California, the scope could include distribution centers in Singapore, Holland, China, Kentucky, and Southern California. 

This evening, we took the entire team to the Wild Horse Saloon, a large country western place with live music and line dancing.  The alcohol didn't flow as freely as usual, probably because it's a new team and people are still afraid to let their hair down.  I'm guessing that in another month or two when everyone is feeling stressed that there will be more heavy drinkers. 

Vacation, two SAP role outs, and the Next Project

I know it's been a long while since I have posted.  I have spent many weeks in Nashville and a few in Iowa.  I didn't even think to take pictures in Iowa... There was not much to take pictures of there.... just lots and lots of corn fields.  I did however find an interesting section of Cedar Rapids which was settled by people from Czech and Slovakia.  I had a very nice Czech meal there at a place called The Blue Toad.

Recently, my family went on vacation at Sanibel Island near Ft. Meyers Florida.  My parents rented a house on the beach and we all had a good time.  Skylar, my four year old son was very excited to be riding an airplane again.  It was my other son Kadens first time flying.

SAP Go Live 2 happened back in July.  It consisted of 2 plants in Mexico and 1 plant in Lincoln Nebraska.  The three plants had very few issues and in no time at all was back up to their old production and customer service levels.

Go Live 3 will happen this week.  There have been more last minute data changes related to warehouse management than what I am used to.  This could impact my loading of inventory balances.  However, I expect things to go okay.  This go live consists of three plants.  I am based at my home in Lexington this week but supporting all three locations.

My next project will likely be for an affiliate based out of Fresno, California. I'm thinking about taking my family with me for a month in the Spring or Summer.  It would be a great base from which to do mini weekend vacations to San Francisco, the beach, and giant redwoods, skiing, etc.

St. Patty's Day on the Edge

Here is me and Jules on the "edge". Jules is whacked. You never know what she's going to do or say. And, I have no idea why she was playing with Richard's bananna in this picture.

BB Kings in Nashville

The Wendesday night team activity was to go to BB King... Everyone had a good time.

Paco's Bachelor's Party

Paco is getting married next week. So, we took him out on the town in Nashville.

@ Hooters

@ Coyote Ugly's

Can you guess what this fine young lady is holding? Ha, ha... Paco knows what it is.

Mardi Gras in the Office

I opted to work from home this week instead of going to Nashville. Not all of the team was to be present and every one of my meetings was to be a conference call anyway.... The downside is that because of the time difference some of my conference calls don't end until 7:30 PM. This is all the more reason to work from home rather than drive to the office. On Tuesday, I missed out on the office Mardi Gras party where everyone was supposed to wear masks... here is a picture that they sent me... "The Edge" is what we now call the collaboration area where around 100 of us sit together at huge tables in a giant room.

A Wild Night at the Olive Garden

"Sri", one of our consultants is getting married in India next month... In Huntington last month, we told him that we should throw him a bachelor's party. Because he is very conservative, we thought he'd shy away from the idea. Instead, he suggested we do so on February 10th which is also his birthday. Now, if you'll recall Sri had never had alcohol until we corrupted him on our Huntington trip... In Nashville, on February 10th, he had quite a bit to drink. He kept his cool the entire time, but I couldn't help feel a little guilty that we had corrupted him. Imagine if he became an alcoholic and we were the gateway.... He made it all of the way through college without drinking and then he met us... Anyways, Sri's a vegetarian so we started the night with a hardy meal at the Olive Garden. For a veggie-head, pasta beats salad any day... Afterwards, we had the traditional American bachelor's party. And, we made it home well before midnight... a promise that we made Sri.

Project coming along.

I've not posted in quite a while. It just seems that Nashville is not exciting as the rest of the world. But, I guess that's just a matter of perspective. I will be working in Nashville 3 weeks a month for the next year. I might take a couple trips to Mexico but will not likely be going back to France any time soon.

We have just added about 50 new people to the project team. These people are only on board until the first North American deployment, one year from now. Our office in Nashville has been re-arranged into one giant room with about a dozen large tables. We no longer have cubicles to work in. They say that this is to foster collaboration but really its the only way they could fit over a hundred people into the space available. The project is finally picking up some speed now. Next week, we begin conducting "business transformation" workshops. Essentially it's a fit analysis to insure that the core solution can work in North America.

As for the social life while in Nashville, it's rather droll. We wrap up work around 6:30 PM central time and meet up at the hotel around 7:00. Everyone groups up and heads out to eat. Mostly we go to large chain restaurants. Occasionally we venture downtown. Rarely we hit the bar strip in country music city USA. Next time perhaps I'll bring back pictures.

North American Team in Nashville, Tennessee

For the remainder of the year, I expect to be in Nashville probably 4 days a week, two weeks a month. This week in Nashville was rather dull. Meetings during the day consisted of topics such as our documenting our current reverse logistics (returns) processes, mapping master data, and identifying potential system interfaces. Between the boring content and my cold medicine, it was difficult to stay focused.

The first night, a large group of us went to Hooters. I've not been to Hooters in many years. Most of the guys in our group were quite rude and crude to our waitress. It was somewhat embarrassing. But at the same time, I think anyone who wants to be a waiter at Hooters is just begging to be hit on and picked on. It sort of goes with the territory & the uniform.

On day two a different group of us went downtown to the Flying Saucer. This is a huge bar with over 200 beers on tap. While there, I ate some white goat cheese pizza and had a few obscure beers.

Mark (Florida), Daron (Kentucky), and Cedric (France) at Nashville's Flying Saucer

On day three we went to a restaurant called Caney Fork fish camp. The atmosphere there is quite unique. It's rustic with stuffed animals everywhere you look. These animals range from a large moose to an assortment of coyotes and foxes. There was also a live blue grass band. I didn't think to bring my camera but could have taken some interesting photos if I had. My meal consisted of wonderful corn fritters, fried pickles, fried catfish, white beans with ham, and hush puppies. Yum, yum.

This Week in U.S.

I was in Nashville Monday and Tuesday. We were working on ironing out details for our U.S. project to implement SAP in standard product plants. Today, I'm working out of my house. When working at home, the majority of my time is spent collaborating via conference calls. Tomorrow, I'm going into the local plant. Part of the day will be spent helping them with stuff related to a job I held over three years ago. On Sunday, I leave for France. I'm taking family with me this time...