Four Successful Financial Turnarounds, Operational Excellence, Strategic Planning,Broad leadership, Innovatiive, Team leladership skills, accomplished executive with domestic and international experience . My background includes P&L responsibility,multi-channel distribution and sales and marketing. Diverse Industries |
JAMES W. BITTO JimBitto@aol.com
209 N 7th Street Wilmington, NC 28401
910-233-0659
SENIOR-LEVEL OPERATIONS EXECUTIVE
Outstanding track record of success streamlining operations, maximizing productivity, and leading companies to record profits. Accomplish four turnarounds successfully.
Exceptional strong negotiating and deal-making qualifications. A resourceful problem solver and decision maker that combines strong leadership and organizational skills with the ability to direct high-level business affairs. Excel in the establishment of outsourcing venues with the emphasis on growing profit margins and gaining market share. Additional core competencies include:
•High-energy manager with a balanced sense of urgency to swiftly improve the infrastructure design, production maximization, and cutting-edge processes and procedures.
•Market planning /analysis, pricing strategies, new product development, introductions and launches.
•Sourcing, purchasing, quality assurance warehousing, distribution and inventory control.
•Team building, human resource development labor relations and organizational change management.
•Long term strategy development and leadership of complex capital investment projects.
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
General Manager - Consultant
Penco Products - 2005 to present
•Recruited by the Chairman of the Vesper Corporation as a consultant, and challenged to reverse 5 years of operating losses at one of their manufacturing facilities.
•Facing deteriorating customer dissatisfaction with on time delivery, a daily “past due order” team was formed that met every day. The detailed discussions and subsequent actions resulted in a reduction of past due orders from over 300 to less than 10, a number which has been sustained for the past 8 months. This reduced the extremely high cost of credits and claims by 50%.
•In order to reduce lead times and attract more business, two (2) major constraints needed to be quickly eliminated. A task team was convened and within 3 months the constraints were gone and lead times were reduced by 50%.
•The cost of steel, which accounted for 40% of net sales, was reduced by 12% through a series of strategic organizations changes and “dog-fight” negotiations.
•Overhead costs were significantly reduced through numerous projects and control procedures.
•The labor force was reduced by 14%, while at the same time healing a degenerating labor management situation to where today relations are improved 100%.
•The company recorded a record profit in August 2007.
•Upgraded the Quality Control Manager with a more aggressive individual who took a personal interest in driving down customer claims and credits every day. Claims have been reduced by more than 50% since he started.
President - 1999 to 2004
Inca/Clymer Corp.– Lewisville, TX
Recruited to manage this $60MM multi-location warehouse, logistics systems, and capital equipment company.
• The company designs, manufactures and installs warehouse efficiency improvement equipment including, multi-level pallet and carton flow systems and electronic picking systems.
• Raised on-time delivery by 40% and reduced direct and indirect labor costs through implementation of constraint analysis and team productivity improvement projects.
• Initiated purchasing new automated equipment that increased key production velocity by more than 30%.
• Continuously assessed product offerings to lower material content where appropriate and bolster marketplace competitiveness.
• Reduced cost of a high volume product 25% through design changes.
President - 1995 to 1999
SMI, Inc. – Marietta, GA
P&L Responsibility for this $15million manufacturer of image/signage products.
• Rapidly affected a series of hands-on management, financial and manufacturing performance improvement initiatives to build a business infrastructure capable of supporting a higher level of sales and manufacturing activity.
• During the first year, revised the outdated accounting, costing and operations systems to improve the decision process at all levels of the company.
• Authorized purchase of a computerized vertical router that dramatically improved the quality of exterior image panels and increased output by 10 fold.
• Slashed average time to process sales quotes from 2 days to 2 hours through the design and implementation of an Excel spreadsheet quote program.
• Developed an International business alliance with a foreign group of investors that resulted in building a number of modular restaurants for export.
• In 1999 the business was sold to a competitor
President / COO - 1991 to 1995
AWH Corporation, Winston-Salem, NC
Recruited to execute complete financial turnaround of this $80MM, 4-division holding company and facilitate eventual senior management transfer to owner’s son.
• Re-established profitability and positive cash flow in less than 1 year while revitalizing banking relations that resulted in more favorable financing costs.
• As major change agent, developed and implemented a series of consolidation strategies for 2 unprofitable divisions resulting in reduced operational overheads of more than 50%.
• Improved sales of the 2 profitable divisions to offset revenue losses of the 2 under-performing divisions.
• Significantly improved 1 plant’s manufacturing efficiency through the introduction of cellular manufacturing principles, modern materials requirement planning techniques, and employee involvement team problem solving strategies.
• Set up new productivity standards and established work cells that boosted quality and output by 30%.
• Initiated and managed successful ISO 9001 certification process.
President - 1989 to 1991
Harvard Industries, Union, New Jersey
Recruited to reverse severe financial losses ($3MM annually) at the Aerospace Parts Manufacturing Division.
• Returned division to profitability in less than 6 months and delivered a profit of $5MM in less than 2 years.
• Solved numerous production bottleneck problems, realigned senior management team to focus on improving on-time shipments, and re-established credibility with major distributors, direct customers and US government contractors.
• Increased on-time deliveries from 35% to over 80% in less than 4 months, secured new order commitments increasing sales and shipments by more than 40% in less than 3 months, and initiated pricing changes to improve margins on proprietary product lines.
WORK HISTORY INCLUDES:
Hussmann Corporation a division of Ingersoll-Rand – General Manager
Lozier Corporation – Plant Manager
Zenith Electronics – Manufacturing Engineering Manager
AFFILIATIONS:
Outside Director, GS Metals Corporation Board of Directors (1991 to Present)
Member Omicron Delta Epsilon – National Honors Society in Economics
Licensed General Contractor
Licensed Real Estate Broker
EDUCATION
MBA in Marketing –University of Phoenix - Graduated with Honors
BA in Economics - Loyola University - Graduated with Honors |
