For Bruce Johnson, "guanxi" skills are at the heart of how he leads Lubrizol Deer Park each day. Simplified, the Chinese term translates to fostering and building relationships.
"Guanxi includes strategic and tactical thinking, mentoring and coaching," Johnson explained. "It is about building relationships and ensuring you understand others. I use the premise of servant leadership -- really understanding your customers' needs, as well as your employees' needs.
"It is all about people. They are really the success of the business. It is critical to build those relationships within so that we can, in turn, build strategic relationships with our customers and help progress the company.
"The future of our industry rests on new value-add innovations. Enabling our customers to further develop their business allows Lubrizol to expand."
Though new to the works manager position at the Deer Park facility, Johnson isn't new to the site, to Texas or even to the lead role. In fact, his first position with Lubrizol was at the Deer Park plant 16 years ago.
Johnson graduated from Tuskegee University with a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering. He has 27 years of manufacturing experience in the specialty chemical and petrochemical industry, serving in multiple career-building assignments. His assignments have spanned the world in the areas of production, maintenance, engineering, supply chain and process technology transfer.
A career highlight came for Johnson when he served as an expatriate project director, where he was responsible for providing overall leadership for the design, build, commissioning and successful start-up activities for the single largest grassroots investment in Lubrizol's history: a multiunit, world-scale, multimillion-dollar lubricant additive facility that spans 100 acres in Zhuhai, China, in the southern Guangdong province.
In 2013, Johnson accepted his w orks manager role with Lubrizol and led the Bayport, Texas, facility for three years before becoming works manager of the Deer Park facility in July 2016.
"With my previous work history at the Deer Park facility and established relationships, the transition to Deer Park has been smooth," Johnson explained.
Johnson's goals for his new position are focused on continuous improvement in the areas of safety, operational discipline and securing future growth.
Lubricants additives
Lubrizol owns and operates manufacturing facilities in 17 countries around the world. Built in 1950 by Lubrizol, the Deer Park site is the world's largest lubricants additives manufacturing facility. Lubrizol Additives is a pioneering global supplier of chemical additive technologies, including additives for engine oils, driveline applications, gasoline and diesel fuel, other transportation-related fluids and industrial lubricants.
"Our additives deliver value-add, innovative and practical specialty chemical solutions that help our customers meet their toughest challenges," explained Johnson. "Our additive chemistry helps improve the performance of fuels and lubricants."
Lubrizol's Deer Park site has had several recent expansions and upgrades in product lines to meet industry needs. Its complex batch and continuous operations require a great deal of technical competence.
"As the Deer Park works manager, my role is to understand our customer needs and engage my team in safely producing high-quality products that help our customers succeed," said Johnson.
That includes aligning the organization to face challenges from globalization of the additives market.
"Over the course of any manufacturing enterprise, there are always cost pressures and competitive pressures," explained Johnson. "We face demographic changes and real generational differences in our changing workforce. Over 60 percent of our workforce has 0-10 years of experience."
Johnson uses Lubrizol's ORMS, an operations and reliability management system, as a mechanism to face tough challenges and continually improve the business. ORMS is an integrated management system designed to sustain continuous improvement across Lubrizol globally.
"ORMS is based on five reliability pillars, with the aim of improving reliability in all phases of our manufacturing enterprise," explained Johnson.
The five reliability pillars are:
- Reliable profit and growth.
- Reliable health, safety, environment and security (HSES), and compliance.
- Reliable organization.
- Reliable quality.
- Reliable supply.
- These pillar principles are in place to support challenges we will face,â said Johnson.
The future
Johnson believes Lubrizol's future is bright.
"We have some of the brightest people in the world working toward a common cause," he said. "Collaboration and transparency in our organization will help secure our future. Will it be a challenge? Yes, but our organization is prepared for it.
"First and foremost, ensuring the safety of everyone here at the Deer Park facility is my No. 1 priority. I want to be sure our employees who come to work at our site safely leaves work the same way they entered. I am focused on our values and beliefs regarding safety and focusing on continuous improvement in this area. We are always seeking out ways to improve through collaboration with our workforce."
That emphasis on safety and employees affects the community as well.
"It is very important that we gain the community's trust as a responsible company by demonstrating our responsiveness to address health, safety, environmental and security concerns, as well as play an active part in helping the community flourish from an economic perspective," said Johnson. "As works manager in Bayport, I was heavily involved in the community, and I will continue to do the same in my new position here in Deer Park."
Johnson's involvement includes plant manager networks, emergency planning and citizen advisory committees, Habitat for Humanity and more.
"Community initiatives and collaborative relationships between industry and the community are important," he said. "The relationship is multifaceted."
LCE, or Lubrizol Community Engagement, is a companywide initiative designed to nurture efforts at the local level that add value to overall company growth objectives. The target of LCE is to:
- Enhance and strengthen Lubrizol's reputation and manage company risk.
- Provide a positive impact on talent management.
- Build and enhance community goodwill.
- Position and demonstrate Lubrizol as a good corporate citizen.
- Increase employee morale and teamwork.
- Enhance Lubrizolâs brand with customers and stakeholders.
"Building strong relationships and fostering collaboration in our internal Lubrizol organization and externally with our customers and our community partners are key to the success of our business," said Johnson. "I like where we are positioned."
Lubrizol launches new lubricant market advocacy website
The Lubrizol Corp.'s Lubrizol Additives business segment has launched a new, all-encompassing industry insight website: https://LubrizolAdditives360.com. The website serves as a convenient single source for content that covers the entire lubricant market.
Key features of the site include announcements on the latest engine oil specifications, information on advancements in passenger vehicle technology, reports on new trends in automotive gear manufacturing, intelligence on driveline and engine oil lubricants and fuels, and insight into innovative solutions for off-highway vehicles.