Tag Archives: leadership

Jennifer van de Ligt, Food Protection and Defense Institute, University of Minnesota
FST Soapbox

The Changing Face of Leadership in the Food and Beverage Industry

By Jennifer van de Ligt, Ph.D.
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Jennifer van de Ligt, Food Protection and Defense Institute, University of Minnesota

Our food system is facing daunting challenges. We must adapt our food systems to sustainably feed almost 10 billion people by 2050 in a world with shifting climate and environmental pressures. In addition, we need to reduce the rising number of undernourished people (an estimated 821 million people in recent years) and confront the significant issue of more than 30% of food production being lost or wasted. Tackling these challenges will require collaboration across all aspects of the food system to assure that production processes, policies and regulations, food safety practices, and affordability align to assure we live in a food secure future. However, most of the current generation of leaders in the food industry has not approached leadership from the systems-thinking approach that will be required to succeed.

Thus, focusing on developing the right skills in the rising next generation of leaders in the food and beverage industry in order to solve these problems will be critical. We need people who can think broadly and are empowered to navigate the complexities of the global food system. Professionals in the food industry need to think beyond the specialties and silos where they currently work. Approaching food problems in an open-minded and cross-disciplinary way will achieve better results for business growth, population well-being, food production and planet sustainability.

In my decades of working in the food industry, I was acutely aware of the challenges that we would face in the future. Now, as part of the Integrated Food Systems Leadership program at the University of Minnesota, we are addressing these issues by helping to train the future leaders that will transform the food system. The following topics are just a few of the areas that we see as essential to develop the food leaders of tomorrow.

Next-Gen Leaders with a Holistic Approach

One of the key steps for new leaders in food and beverage industry is to adapt to food systems thinking. Most professionals were hired for their knowledge in a specific area. Now, to become next-gen leaders, they will need to think about the whole food production system and how all decisions made in this system, from sourcing and production to supply chain and retail sale, affect people and the environment.

Where we source our food and how we produce it is truly global and interconnected. The ingredient and material supply chains are vast and complex. We can no longer afford not to take into consideration where and how these items are being sourced and supplied. Additionally, we can no longer afford not to be responsible for the products produced and how they are affecting the health and well-being of consumers as well as the planet.

The next generation of leaders, no matter what part of the food system they are working in, will need to understand these relationships and think about how all these little pieces from production to marketing and sales work together. When one change is made to the system, whether the idea is from R&D or the marketing department or is caused by a new regulation, this will produce ripple effects across the food system.

True Leadership vs. Management in the Food System

Often times, the idea of leadership is thought of as just managing people—observing a team and making sure each person is doing their job. This is management and not a true definition of leadership. To be a leader means you have a vision and can paint a clear picture of what you see to others. Leaders build relationships with people who help turn a vision into reality. Leaders aren’t afraid to change the status quo and take risks if those risks will help the long-term plan. Leaders help their team achieve more than any individual on the team thought possible.

Leaders have many qualities. First, they have ideas that should be heard. However, in order for those ideas to see the light of day, professionals must know how to communicate so their opinions and thoughts are considered. Knowing how to package a vision and communicate it more effectively are critical to leadership development.

Second, leaders desire to have a meaningful impact in the world. To be able to effect change, seeing the bigger picture and understanding the interdependencies throughout the food system is paramount. As part of this, they want and need to help other people be heard to move the vision and plan forward. They will need the skills to foster collaboration and innovation within their teams and across disciplines to help everyone succeed in making the changes needed in the food system.

Third, although leaders want to grow their companies, they also want to grow personally. When a vision is created and steps taken to pave the way for that vision to come to fruition, a journey begins. Leaders know that any journey embarked upon is a life-changing experience, and they welcome that new stage.

Finally, it is important to note that leaders can be found in more places than the corner office. Leaders are not just CEOs, but come in varying roles and titles. Developing people’s leadership potential, style and goals for whatever capacity they work in is a critical part of leadership building. Leaders exist within every team, department and work group across a business. Finding them, to grow and foster their potential, is the challenge.

Fostering Professional Development in the Field

Food and beverage companies can do a great deal to address these pressing issues today by instilling a culture of learning in the organization. I have found, more often than not, people who enter this industry are passionate about it. However, when individuals enter a company, especially early in their career, they sometimes face a crisis of faith moment and question that their lifelong training has not prepared them for what they truly want to do.

Many times those in the industry feel like they have ideas or skills that aren’t being leveraged. They may feel like they aren’t being heard or that they’ve been pigeon-holed into one segment of or role in the business. These professionals could be the collateral damage of silo mentality and lack of a culture of learning and growth, especially when they are high-value and have specialized knowledge. Corporations have perfected efficiency by keeping certain departments, and individuals within them, separated in order to optimize their segment’s function. But slotting the business, and individuals, into distinct categories can hinder the ability of these organizations to see and understand the big picture.

By breaking down this silo mentality and promoting systems thinking, businesses can help their talented and dedicated people grow their career, become a better leader, and enable a move across the lattice structure within an organization. Many times these individuals feel a little lost in the mix and frustrated as a cog in the machine and are looking for growth opportunities. This doesn’t necessarily mean they want to move vertically within the organization, but rather learn and grow laterally or diagonally within an organization to both enhance their career and provide a broader benefit to the entire business.

When companies equip professionals with critical-thinking skills, they are developing their professionals who want to make a meaningful impact within their organizations as well as in the entire food system. This is true empowerment to improve the future of food and make companies viable and competitive for the future.

If a company doesn’t have this training ability internally, organizations can support programs that are helping to build these leaders. Programs like the new Integrated Food Systems Leadership are designed to help future leaders bridge the current skills gap in the food system. These future leaders will have the tools to drive the change critical for many companies to succeed while we feed the future.

Adam Serfas, R.S. Quality
Food Safety Culture Club

Step Back and Assess Your Food Safety Culture

By Adam Serfas
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Adam Serfas, R.S. Quality

Fostering a strong food safety culture is one of the most important things those in leadership in the food manufacturing and processing industries can do. Whereas laws dictate the food safety regulations to which food manufacturers and processors should adhere, facility food safety and color-coding plans dictate how those regulations should be followed, and it is the inherent culture of the facility that ensures these guidelines and procedures will be followed. A facility’s culture is made up of the shared values of the company, the unwritten norms—good and bad—that ultimately influence the behavior of those in the company. It most often stems from those at the leadership level as they set the tone and expectations for the organization.

Most importantly, however, is the understanding that culture is fluid. Be-cause it is not defined but rather just is, a culture can morph over time in a ripple effect manner. If those in leadership begin to place a higher emphasis on food safety, middle level managers will take note and those sentiments—consciously or unconsciously—will be echoed to those lower in the company’s organizational hierarchy.

At the same time, the reverse is equally and, perhaps, even more likely, true. It’s often harder to do the right thing when it comes to food safety; there are extra steps involved to ensure the environment and tools used are clean, to check and double check the quality of the product and to communicate any concerns that may be encountered along the way. It’s easy to look at someone who takes shortcuts—particularly someone at a higher level than you—and decide that’s an accepted behavior. This can lead to devastating results quickly in a food processing or manufacturing facility where everything from the profit margins to the ability to employ workers to the legal standing of the company hinges on quality assurance.

That said, it’s important that those at the leadership level prioritize foster-ing a positive food safety culture by leading by example. Additionally, it’s vital to regularly glean a quick read of the room to stay on top of culture shifts. The following are some questions you can use to guide that check-in and identify potential red flags long before those worst-case scenarios have a chance to play out.

Would you describe the company’s food safety expectations to be one-size-fits-all notions or, rather, clearly defined rules tailored to different teams and job roles?

If you would put your company in the first category, it’s important you take some time to consider the procedures and guidelines put in place in your facility. Whereas you want company-wide buy-in for overarching food safety priorities, the job role will look very different for, say, someone on the packaging line versus the janitorial team. Within those teams, there should be a shared vernacular and routine specifically related to the job role they need to carry out. It’s unfair and perhaps a bit risky to assume that employees will know how to best carry out their job if “best” is never properly defined for them in training procedures.

Is there clear and consistent messaging that stems from leadership about a commitment to food safety?

The actions and words of those at the highest level of an organizational hierarchy set expectations for the entire company. It’s not only important that they communicate the importance of food safety to the company, but that they return to that conversation often. It’s a good idea to reiterate the significance of food safety considerations in vision and mission statement documents but to also bring it up during staff meetings, company-wide emails and annual reports. Food safety trainings should be held regularly as the more of-ten you highlight these expectations, the more they are thought about across the company. That consideration is what ultimately leads to action.

Do members of leadership take on an active role during food safety training sessions?

Again, we cannot stress enough the importance of those at the top setting the tone for a positive food safety culture by not only talking the talk but also walking the walk. Employees will take note if those higher up in the company who take time out of their day to partake in food safety training. It sends the message that this is indeed important to the company and therefore should be important to the employees.

Are food safety expectations communicated to employees via multiple communication outlets?

Just as a teacher in grade school aims to consider the unique learning styles of students, you should be mindful of the ways in which you are communicating with your team. Some people retain information best through auditory exposure, some are more visual learners and, for some, recall is best after hands-on activities. Consider the ways in which your currently communicate food safety expectations to employees and take note of any additional approaches you might need to take to best reach all employees.

Along those same lines, you should be mindful of additional considerations that might be necessary depending on the makeup of your staff. We recommend working closely with human resources to identify whether or not you should incorporate multi-lingual training procedures and how to best accommodate any employees with disabilities.

Does your company have an obvious method in place for raising concerns about food safety?

The mistake a lot of facilities make is focusing too much on what it looks like for things to go as planned and to overlook procedures for when things don’t go according to plan. If you asked any member of your team, they should be able to tell you the preferred method for reporting any concerns related to food safety. We recommend polling a few employees across different job roles to see if that is the case. If not, it’s vital you establish a protocol and clearly communicate that protocol to all employees. The easier the protocol, the more likely employees are to remember it and to follow through when necessary.

Deirdre Schlunegger, Stop Foodborne Illness
Food Safety Culture Club

The C-Suite: Showing up for Food Safety

By Deirdre Schlunegger
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Deirdre Schlunegger, Stop Foodborne Illness

It’s plain and simple: Having safe food, strong food safety programs, and ample resources allocated to them, are only possible (and sustainable) when company leadership make customers and consumers a priority.

Hence, a company’s food safety leadership, their departments and support will have experienced and knowledgeable staff, and access to new technology, best practices and collaboration opportunities. A long-view perspective means a better chance of meeting the bottom line—money saved, illness and possible lawsuits avoided, all while ensuring food integrity.

When you witness a company’s food safety leaders at important conferences, you can see their commitment to make food safety their top priority. But, when a CEO shows up to speak, listen and learn along with their food safety leadership, it is confirmation that they understand and care, or are there to learn. At national and international meetings, when they’re side by side with their senior staff, one can be confident that a strong food safety culture is a priority in their company.

Recalls and outbreaks will still happen,, but it’s been my perspective that food safety representatives who are absent at the food safety table may lack a commitment to a sustainable company-wide food safety culture and are subject to reoccurring and frequent recalls.

I applaud those C-Suite executives who show up, and are committed to hard work, research and collaboration, and sharing insight into their best practices! The list of great examples, of these kinds of companies and leaders, is growing.

Please join me in recognizing their ever-growing contribution to not only the safety of food, but consumers.

Hand

Ranking of Top CEOs of 2018 Includes Major Food and Retail Companies

By Food Safety Tech Staff
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Hand

This week Glassdoor released its Top CEOs for 2018 list via its annual Employees’ Choice Awards. Among those who made the list are several CEOs from food and retail companies.

“You already know that having a great CEO is critical for business, but you may not realize how much of an impact it can have on your talent acquisition efforts.” – Glassdoor

The CEOs who made the list are from large companies with more than 1000 employees.

99. Preston Atkinson, Whataburger
83. Craig Jelinek, Costco Wholesale
50. Dan T. Cathy, Chick-fil-A
9. Colleen Wegman, Wegmans Food Markets
7. Charles C. Butt, H E B
4. Lynsi Snyder, In-N-Out Burger

Joy Dell'Aringa, bioMerieux
FST Soapbox

The Value of Industry Engagement in Professional Organizations

By Joy Dell’Aringa
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Joy Dell'Aringa, bioMerieux

We moved to Chicago five years ago. A massive city, and an epicenter of the food industry. I was at once excited and overwhelmed—afloat in a great lake of network overload. Removed from my comfort zone, I searched for ways to meet people and integrate into this new community. Upon suggestion of a trusted friend and experienced networker, I decided to try my hand at volunteering at an event hosted by the Chicago Section of the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT). That singular decision launched one of the most fulfilling journeys in both my professional and personal life. Now, five years later, I have made countless meaningful and personal connections, developed long-term relationships, and made an impact in my professional community. What started out as a way to navigate the complex circuitry of the Chicago food landscape has turned into a personal voyage for industry advocacy, leadership and contribution.

I am not alone. I have the pleasure to work and serve with colleagues around the globe that have experienced similar fulfillment by engaging with various professional organizations. Similarly, the companies that we work for reap the benefits of our involvement. Here, we will explore the value of industry engagement through the lens of the individual and the employer.

Employee Value: Top 5 Reasons to Engage

1. Professional Development – Safe Ways to Stretch Into New Roles & Skill Sets

When Pam Coleman, vice president of research services at Merieux Nutrisciences and incoming president-elect for IFT first started volunteering early in her career as a bench chemist, she found opportunities to lead groups and committees. “I developed new skills in a really safe way. As a volunteer, you can try new things, test the waters, and get relatively diverse experiences to see what you enjoy, what you don’t, and where you want to develop and explore.” The wide range of opportunities in industry organizations can offer a glimpse into future career development, or offer a learning experience that rounds out your professional repertoire. For example, joining a finance committee can stretch you outside of your comfort zone, but prepare you with skills and perspectives for future management roles. Participating on a fundraising committee can sharpen your influencing and organizational skills. Leading a technical group can offer opportunities to deep dive into a technology or discipline that can spark a passion to develop expertise in a new area. These cross-functional opportunities may not be readily available in your company, but industry organizations are always looking for professionals to volunteer.

2. Develop Your Network & Identify Mentors

Industry organizations are wrought with peers and potential mentors. Networking at events and symposiums will bring you in contact with people doing the same things as you are, facing the same challenges. You also have the opportunity to interact with the regulatory sector to learn from them. “Early in my career, my former manager built relationships with regulatory technical leaders at the USDA through industry organization involvement, and it was a great advantage for us when we ran into analytical challenges in the lab—she was able to personally call them and get suggestions and insights. They developed a rapport. This was a big lesson for me as a young volunteer. Your network can be an analytical asset.” Mentor opportunities abound as well. I have personally found that the more I engage with my organizations, the more trust I built within my network, the more mentorship opportunities naturally develop. I’ve honed valuable professional and life skills through these relationships: Conflict resolution, contract negotiations, and 501(c)3 organization creation to name just a few of the arduous tasks my organizational mentors have helped and supported me with. Building relationships across technical disciplines also holds advantage. As a microbiologist, it is fascinating to work with product developers and learn where our challenges and opportunities intersect. Not only can you network with technical peers, but also industry partners, vendors, suppliers and competitors to bring a well rounded perspective to see the industry through a truly holistic lens.

3. Gain Industry Insights

What’s new in your industry? What emerging trends are on the horizon? Engaging within industry organizations can bring keen insights well before they are published in our industry magazines and keynote presentations. Educational learning opportunities through technical committees, short courses, and symposiums can bring key advantages to giving you and your company a jump on implementing new technologies and trends. Understanding regulatory changes, implications, and perhaps most important, insights on how regulators will interpret and enact changes can also be gleaned from organization engagement. You can also gain exposure and experience with new business models such as zero-based budgeting and account-based marketing, which can lead to additional opportunities and advantage for you and your company.

4. Create Your Personal Brand

Who are you in the Industry? What do you want to be known for? Through industry engagement you can develop your personal brand and carry that image into your career. Do you strive to be a facilitator and connector? Run for a leadership position. Do you want to be known as a technical leader and subject matter expert? Lead a technical committee or task force. Do you want to be seen as a reliable contributor? Offer to develop content for a technical newsletter, or volunteer for a marketing committee. Not sure what you want your personal brand to look like? Try multiple roles and opportunities to see what inspires and fulfills you, and then pursue that with gusto. “When I look back and think, ‘How did I go from a bench chemist to this?'”, reflects Coleman, “I am certain I wouldn’t be where I am in my career today if it weren’t for my experiences and opportunities in organizations like IFT.”

5. Personal Fulfillment – Increased Health & Happiness

Industry advocacy and engagement can bring an immense sense of personal fulfillment, especially when you are able to make a contribution and an impact to the organization. Not only that, it can make you feel better, too: A 2010 United healthcare/VolunteerMatch (UHVM) study found that volunteering has a positive influence on physical and emotional health. One of the common objections to engaged volunteering is time, or lack of it. However, the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School recently found that those who volunteer not only feel more accomplished, but they also found they could do even more, as “giving your time to others can make you feel more ‘time affluent’ and less time-constrained”. In the words of my trusted networker friend that set me off on my volunteering journey five years ago: “The more you do, the more you can do.”

Quick TIPS:

  • Be Clear on Your Time: No matter how many or few hours you can devote, be upfront with the organization about how much time you can commit and what your goals are.
  • Think Local: Don’t forget your regional sections and chapters. Your organization(s) of choice also may have specialty groups and divisions that match your expertise or an area you may want to explore.
  • Get Out of the Booth: For those of us accustomed to working the trade show floor, challenge yourself to one meeting a year where you are there to learn. Get out of the booth. Absorb technical insights and trends. Bring back your learnings to your team and help connect the dots.

Employer Value: Top 5 Reasons to Support Engagement

1. Gain Company Influence & Visibility

Paid sponsorship opportunities are always available (and appreciated) but are often limited to financial contribution, and the benefit of company logo and online web banner opportunities. Real value is in visibility of your brand through your people. Supporting your employees to lead and engage puts your brands’ voice in a position of influence and contribution. Imagine if your company could influence industry guidance on topics that matter most to your brand? Encouraging your employees to lead in trade and technical organizations puts them in a position to do just that.

2. Customer & Industry Insights

Engagement in industry organizations also brings ‘boot- on-the-ground’ insights on the voice and needs of your customers. This is where you will find what the real emerging needs and challenges are in our B2B world. Dave Goins, COO of Q Laboratories and a leading proponent of employee contribution to technical organizations agrees. “A key benefit Q Laboratories enjoys [of our scientists involvement]I s they get to ‘complete the picture’ when it comes to the importance to our clients on the testing we do for them, and the reasons why we approach our analytical business the way we do.” Instead of only relying on analytics, market trend reports, and legacy industry assumptions—encouraging your people to get out from behind their desks, or off the bench, and engaging with the customers and market directly will not only provide insight on their present needs, but can also give a peek into the proverbial crystal ball of needs to come and give your company a competitive edge.

3. Leadership Creation & Development

“Our employees gain valuable confirmation at these meetings” reflects Goins, “and as a result of their engagement and contributions we see careers, development and advancement accelerate for these individuals within Q Laboratories.” Putting forth employees to engage in industry organizations in leadership roles can help them develop from good to great. Not only does this provide leadership cultivation, but also opportunities to develop technical competencies at a more rapid pace with shared resources. Employees can hone soft skills too, such as emotional intelligence, conflict resolution, negotiation and collaborative skills that they will bring back to work.

4. Learn from the Industry & Contribute to Problem Solving

Industry engagement, especially from a technical perspective, allows your company and your people to collaborate and learn from others successes and mistakes. “Our people have the added benefit of having the opportunity to share experience and ideas with other highly qualified individuals who often face the same challenges our teams face every day,” says Goins. Your team can build on those insights to ensure your company’s continued success. Engagement also provides opportunity for your company to present itself as a market leader in setting policy and launching innovative solutions. With the right idea, the right platform, and the right audience, your company could be poised to be the champion and realize the success of the next “blockchain-like” revolution.

5. Your Competitors are Doing It

It goes without saying that we are all looking for that competitive edge, the premium exposure, and the increased market share for our brand and solutions. As industry organizations are recruiting members, volunteers and leaders, they are seeking engaged individuals who want to contribute and champion the organizations mission and vision. If it isn’t your people filling those roles, it will be your competition’s people. Your competitors will learn and connect in deep, meaningful ways and build relationships with your current and prospective customers. Research also shows that companies that encourage volunteering enjoy increased employee loyalty and increased employee retention. Bottom line: Supporting Industry organizations through employee engagement is good for your people, and good for business.

Quick TIPS:

  • Invest & Incentivize Engagement: Pay for memberships and meetings, and reward employee leadership and participation on committees, working groups and elected positions.
  • Formalize a Program: Partner with key industry organizations to create an ambassador program within your company to share happenings and opportunities. In the end, you will have a powerful group of engaged employees in various organizations making an impact and championing your brand.
  • Think Outside of the Lab: While encouraging technical employees to engage, also consider the less obvious team members to get involved: Sales, marketing, human resources, finance and executive-level teams. Often, industry organizations suffer from monoculture challenges and can use expertise from other professional backgrounds to improve. As a result, your team will gain exponential insights, influence and opportunities.
Vicky Waskiewicz
FST Soapbox

Food Safety Issues Don’t Occur In The QA Manager’s Office

By Vicky Waskiewicz
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Vicky Waskiewicz

Just like many jobs, a quality assurance manager starts out with high hopes of creating a real difference in their day-to-day work. But that vision quickly gets blocked by stacks of paperwork and other to-dos taking top priority. Soon, QA managers find themselves far from the floor and far from where the real work is happening, usually stuck behind a desk in an office.

While this may have become standard practice, that doesn’t mean that there’s nothing you can do to change this reality. And, the sooner you are able to do so the better, because we all know that the job of a QA manager, especially when it comes to food safety, is important, both to the company and to the public.

Why Food Safety Should Be At The Top Of A QA Manager’s Priority List

The roles and responsibilities of a QA manager are vast, which is why it’s so easy to get caught-up in tasks that keep you holed up in your office. But of all the duties you have, the one that shouldn’t get overlooked is food safety. Because food is consumed, and has the potential to endanger consumers if it’s not produced properly, it is capable of destroying a company’s reputation and their margins, not to mention people’s lives.

As a QA manager, you know this, but you might not be doing everything in your power to make sure the food your company is producing is safe.

How To Improve Food Safety

While you can do a lot from your office, you can’t know what’s happening on the floor without actually spending time there. You have to work closely with your employees to make sure they understand the importance of food safety and therefore the importance of their job.

Here are five ways you can begin to improve the level of food safety in your company.

  1. Work directly with the production floor. Make it a priority to get out of your office regularly to observe the practices that are being used. The more you talk directly with employees about food safety, the more they will understand why it’s important and the safety precautions they can take to ensure they are creating food that is safe.
  2. Demonstrate the importance of food safety. Consider setting up a meeting or talk that gives real life examples of people who have gotten sick or hurt from food that is produced with improper practices. Demonstrating the importance of things, like proper sanitation, can make individuals on the floor aware of the repercussions if they don’t follow the safety guidelines.
  3. Get employees involved in food safety. Spend time educating your employees on measures they can take to assure that the food they are producing is safe. Letting them hold each other accountable is a powerful way to make sure there are eyes on the floor even when you’re not there.
  4. Lead by example. When management walks out onto the production floor, all eyes are on them. Be sure that senior management is aware of the rules, handwashing, hair restraints, etc. and that they follow them every time they enter the production area. Teach employees to kindly remind them if they see them bypass one of the good manufacturing practices.
  5. Regularly change signage throughout the facility. The same old signage over time becomes part of the landscape and eventually the worker is blind to it. Take the time to change the signs, using different sizes, bold colors and positive messaging.

Becoming A Food Safety Hero

QA managers play crucial roles in companies, but without putting food safety at the top of their list, they’re overlooking one of their most important jobs. By learning about steps you can take to improve food safety, like the five mentioned above, you can become a food safety hero, protecting your company and its consumers.

Deirdre Schlunegger, CEO of STOP Foodborne Illness
Food Safety Culture Club

Changes in Culture

By Deirdre Schlunegger
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Deirdre Schlunegger, CEO of STOP Foodborne Illness

The vast majority of foodborne illnesses in the United States results from either a management system failure or human error. This supports our belief that all foodborne illnesses are preventable. With the introduction of FSMA, prevention has become a significant focus in the battle to eliminate foodborne illness.

STOP Foodborne Illness is collaborating with Intrinsic Leadership, LLC to offer a Food Safety Leadership program. The primary objective of this program is to equip leaders with the knowledge, skills and abilities to develop and sustain a culture of prevention relative to food safety.

Successful prevention requires more than just the introduction of new knowledge and skills for workers. Success requires the consistent and ongoing application of those skills.

We know that training can provide knowledge and skill. However, the most significant predictor of long-term success is the extent to which frontline managers actively support behavioral changes within the employee base. Experience shows that transforming an organization to produce superior results is much more than training programs, process improvement or new technology. While each of these elements are important, sustainable improvement occurs when we are able to shift the way people think about the business in a way that drives them to consistently act different then they did in the past. The role of leadership is to:

  • Frame the business opportunity in a way that inspires employees to seek a better outcome
  • Relentlessly pursue management system improvement
  • Represent, support and encourage a culture that aligns with improvement opportunities

Stories are powerful reminders and provide the “why” behind food safety.  Below are two such stories.

Raw Milk – E. coli 0157:H7

It is the stories that create the urgency behind the importance of food safety.  Christopher’s story is heart breaking—yet, he was one of the lucky ones, as he recovered from his illness.

Cheese – Listeria

Allison survived as well but had a rough entry into the world, as she was diagnosed with Listeriosis shortly after birth.

 

Brian Bedard, GMA, Food Safety Consortium

Food Safety Culture Series: Where the Leaders Are

By Maria Fontanazza
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Brian Bedard, GMA, Food Safety Consortium

Most industries face issues with breaking down silos and promoting cross-functional collaboration. For the next class of leaders to be well equipped to promote and practice a strong food safety culture, more work needs to be done on alignment within organizations and across industry. In part II of Food Safety Tech’s series on food safety culture, Brian Bedard, executive director of the GMA Science and Education Foundation and Lone Jespersen weigh in on leadership.

Food Safety Tech: Food Safety Culture requires strong professional leaders. How can industry work together to develop the leadership that is needed?

The GMA Science Forum takes place April 18–21, 2016 in Washington, DC | LEARN MORELone Jespersen: We start by acknowledging that we have an abundance of strong leaders in the food industry. We don’t need to build from the ground up or something new. We need to look at what makes [these leaders] strong. Why are some leaders more successful than others? Identify the companies that have strong food safety leaders that are not within food safety—those that come from finance, HR, procurement, and the CEO—and formally acknowledge their technical and leadership competencies.

I’m aware of three organizations that are actively looking at what constitutes a food safety professional and its competencies—IFPTI (International Food Protection Training Institute) in the United States, Safe Food Canada, and the International Union of Food Science and Technology. Alignment between the work conducted by each of these organizations is important to shorten the time between development and business impact. It’s really important to get this alignment. The more we keep working in small subgroups while not comparing notes and agreeing on those competencies, the more we’re going to see the cost of developing leaders going up. And we’ll have fewer strong leaders, because it will be hard for individuals to move on in their career if it is not clear what it means to be a competent, strong food safety leader.

There’s a very large group of food safety leaders, the ‘Malcolms-in-the-Middle’ who are excellent leaders and are one or two steps down from the head of food safety in an organization. Sometimes we forget that we have strong leaders at this level, and they have a much stronger handle on food safety culture because they’re the ones who have to make sure programs work for frontline associates, supervisors, and managers. Letting that level become more visible to what their competencies are or should be and making sure that they contribute and are heard in the conversations [is important].

Brian Bedard: We need to collaborate and get some alignment around what we think leaders need. Unfortunately, this is creating a competitive space among service providers and training entities that can work with leaders.

There are a couple of fundamental principles that need to be addressed:

  • The leaders at the top need to recognize and drive it down through their entire system so that everyone is responsible in terms of their annual work and development plans, including metrics and the deliverables in their annual evaluations
  • The ‘Malcolms-in-the-Middle’ who, in most cases, manage the budget. It’s critical to get them on board to ensure that, when making investments, they’re spending money on driving food safety culture throughout an organization
  • Several specific opportunities now exist to promote food safety culture leadership, including the Food Safety Leadership Workshop being offered by the GMA Science and Education Foundation at the upcoming GMA Science Forum (April 18, Washington, DC).
Timothy Ahn, LRQA
FST Soapbox

The Real Cost of Not Having an Effective Food Safety Management System

By Timothy Ahn
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Timothy Ahn, LRQA

If you watch the evening news or read the local newspaper, the chances are pretty good that you will read or see something about a food safety concern or incident.

Consumers and Foodborne Illness
An estimated 1 in 6 Americans fall victim to a foodborne illness annually.

While the American food supply is among the safest in the world, the Federal government estimates that there are about 48 million cases of foodborne illness annually—the equivalent of sickening 1 in 6 Americans each year, according to Foodsafety.gov. And each year these illnesses result in an estimated 128,000 hospitalizations and 3,000 deaths. Five types of organisms—Salmonella, Toxoplasma, Listeria, norovirus, and Campylobacter—account for 88% of the deaths for which the cause is known.

We watched from the sidelines when major retailers faced public scrutiny over their practices on safeguarding consumer credit card information when their websites were hacked. Today, consumer and regulatory interest in food safety are the new focus areas for the news media, especially in light of the Blue Bell Creameries Listeria and the Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) Salmonella outbreaks. Unlike consumer credit information, serious missteps in our industry can kill people, and in the case of PCA, can put you permanently out of business.

In 2008, peanut butter paste manufactured by PCA killed nine people and sickened 714 others, some critically, across 46 states and was one of the largest food recalls in American history, according to the CDC. Although still under appeal, PCA CEO Stewart Parnell was convicted and sentenced to a 28-year prison term for his role in knowingly shipping out salmonella-contaminated peanut butter. Parnell received one of the toughest punishments in U.S. history in a foodborne illness case.

In the Blue Bell case, a total of 10 people with Listeriosis related to this outbreak were reported from four states, with three deaths reported from Kansas, according to the CDC. Blue Bell pulled their products from store shelves on April 20, 2015. On May 7, the FDA released findings from inspections at the Blue Bell production facilities in Brenham, Texas, Broken Arrow, Oklahoma and Sylacauga, Alabama. The FDA reports highlighted serious problems across multiple sites.

Both cases shine a spotlight on what can happen if you don’t have an effective food safety management system (FSMS). So what makes up a good FSMS, and is it enough to keep you out of trouble? An effective FSMS is built on three elements: Good Manufacturing Practices (GMPs), Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points (HACCP) and a management system. Food safety issues are avoidable, and good processes and a strong culture within an organization make them more unlikely to occur.

Does your leadership recognize the importance of your FSMS?
Does your leadership recognize the importance of your FSMS? An effective FSMS should be established before a product incident or recall occurs.

Implementing a FSMS does not happen in a few months; it may take up to two years to establish one. No doubt, foundational activities need to be in place for factory operations. In addition to focusing on foundational elements such as making sure equipment is cleaned properly and procedures for allergens are implemented, the leadership team needs to make it clear that it is never acceptable under any circumstances to take shortcuts that could jeopardize food safety. This policy needs to be indoctrinated throughout the organization and thus does not happen overnight.

Underlying an effective FSMS are strong HACCP and GMPs, but food safety should always be the top priority for management and its employees, not share price, earnings or profit margin. Although financial performance is important, food safety must take precedence in the organization, and leadership at all levels needs to send that message loud and clear to all employees. In today’s environment, HACCP is pretty much mandatory from a regulatory standpoint and is an essential part of a FSMS. But the missing piece in many organizations is the support from the top—this is where culture becomes embedded in the organization.

The FSMS culture is the collective behavior from the organization around shared values and beliefs. The organization will follow the actions of leaders, not necessarily what they say—we all know actions speak louder than words. A good food safety culture is one where best practices are openly discussed, defined and rewarded. Food safety culture has become a buzz word and there needs to be a focus on making it come to life through a structured FSMS.

At this year’s Food Safety Consortium conference, Tim Ahn will discuss advancing food safety training and harmonization (November 19). LEARN MOREFood safety training is important not only for first line supervisors and operators, but also for senior managers and leadership, because they define the objectives and policies of the FSMS. What does it mean to conduct an effective management review? What does it mean to do an internal audit? What’s a good corrective action process? Training often misses the mark, because organizations fail to embed it correctly.

For FSMS to thrive, management must commit to the FSMS being a required way of doing things throughout the entire organization. A FSMS is most effective when it benchmarked against a proven standard and verified by an independent third party. Certification against a proven standard will reduce risk within your business.

Select your independent third-party verifier carefully. Do they have the resources and time, and do they know what they are doing? Do they add value to your organization? This is important since once you get certified, your journey starts and it doesn’t end. The value comes in two areas: Identifying risks and developing the appropriate control measures, and ensuring that the process drive continuous improvement in your organization. FSMS is focused on how continuous improvement applies to the management of risk and business operations.

The most effective way to establish an FSMS is to have leadership that recognizes its importance. The worst way is to have a recall or an incident, which draws attention to the fact that there is a problem and something needs to happen. In the case of Blue Bell, they probably understood the importance of food safety and thought they were taking the right actions. However, their management system led them to problems. FSMS must be independently verified against world-class standards to ensure effective performance.

Auditing and FSMS
A thorough auditor won’t look the other way and will find the problems. Call it as you see it–don’t be too soft when getting an assessment.

Companies can develop blind spots where they cannot see their own bad practices, and they become institutionalized over time. Fortunately, experienced independent third-party assessors can shine a spotlight on those bad practices. That is the true value in bringing in outsiders to look at your operations and culture to uncover those blind spots.

At PCA, their poor culture and actions to the problem sealed their fate. In some ways, this criminal case presented a wake-up call to boardrooms across America and highlights how badly leadership mismanaged matters. This case came to light in the context of the public complaining to the regulators that they were not doing enough following several highly visible food poisoning cases. A FSMS would have prevented these problems because the structure would not allow such bad decisions to be made and would have been verified by an independent third party that would test and check everything. A reputable third-party verifier would not miss poor GMP/ HACCP processes.

A good assessor can help a company understand what is really important and what is not so important when it comes to findings (i.e., context). We don’t waste a client’s time with insignificant issues and that is where the experience and judgment of the auditor becomes critical. Last year I met with a client and said, “you need to be checking for Salmonella in your environment—how do you know it is not there?” I pushed them into checking because I understood the changing regulatory environment. I came back a year later, and they had confirmed that regulators were interested in their Salmonella monitoring program during a recent inspection. As an auditor, you have to be confident enough to provide advice and context to the client in a way that is understood and accepted, and that helps to build trust.

With FSMA, the government can now take specific actions against companies. If I am plant manager or CEO, how do I know for sure that I am in compliance with the requirements? How do I know that I don’t have any of these potential issues? The only way to know for sure is to have the FSMS assessed. Just like a bank or publicly traded company hires financial auditors to assure everything is done correctly, companies need to audit their FSMS to ensure compliance. Get a process audit and ensure they drill down deep into the organization—that is where we find issues and gaps. A thorough auditor will find your problems instead of looking the other way. It is important to call it the way you see it and not be too “soft” when getting an assessment.

If I am the CEO, I want to know where those problems exist. Independent third party assurance is the best way to find out how compliant you are with regulations. No CEO wants to deal with the inevitable lawsuits and lost business impacts. At least with an effective FSMS, you can show a level of due diligence when the regulators show up at your doorstep and the culture is such that you want to address any problems.

We have entered an important time for the food industry with FSMA implementation and other food safety regulatory requirements in the United States. These new rules place an emphasis on management accountability, risk assessment and control of supply chains. The bar for due diligence has been raised and it up to all us to show that we have done everything possible, and the best way is with an effective FSMS.

Timothy Ahn, LRQA

Beyond the Fluff: Leadership Must Demonstrate Food Safety Culture Through Actions

By Maria Fontanazza
1 Comment
Timothy Ahn, LRQA

As the popular phrase goes, if you’re going to talk the talk, then you need to walk the walk. This expression really does ring true when discussing an effective food safety culture within an organization. Timothy Ahn, senior technical manager of food safety at LRQA sheds some light on the importance of management commitment as a foundation for success in implementing a food safety culture and how employee training fits into the picture.

Food Safety Tech: In your column on Food Safety Tech, “Tackling the ‘Why’ of Food Safety”, you touch on the point that food safety culture needs to start at the top. What are the issues in management today that prevents a food safety culture from flourishing within organizations?

Timothy Ahn: First, it’s important to define food safety culture. It can mean a lot of different things to people. The culture is the collective behavior from the organization around shared values and beliefs. From that perspective, it’s extremely important the leadership understands its beliefs and values. The collective behaviors of the leaders become really important, because we’re also talking about how the leadership sets management commitment and drives what’s important in the organization. The organization will follow whatever the leaders do and not necessarily what they say. That’s the issue—having the ability to get commitment from leadership that is demonstrated through their actions, which then transfers into rewards, objectives and consequences. What are the issues that are preventing the culture from embedding itself? Actions aren’t aligned with their words. You have a senior leadership group that will say one thing, but then their actions are different.

In addition, when cascading priorities are very different, food safety doesn’t get the right messages. It’s about growth, market share, profits—all of those financial measures are extremely important, because they have consequences and are also rewarded. Meanwhile, depending on the organization, the objectives around food safety culture may or may not be talked about, defined, or even rewarded. It’s really about making sure that the organization has cascading priorities.

FST: When taking a holistic approach to employee training, what are some of the challenges that companies can expect to encounter?

Ahn: I put food safety into three different buckets that build on top of each other.

  1. At the bottom is the foundation. It’s around good manufacturing practices and all the foundational activities that need to be in place for factory operations. How often you clean your equipment? What do you do around allergens? Can you trace your materials from one end to the other? Do you have a pest control program?
  2. Our food safety system: This includes things around HACCP: Do you have a HACCP plan in place? Do you understand what your hazards are? Have you defined your control measures?
  3. The last bucket is around the management system that drives food safety. Have you defined your objectives? Do you have a policy? Do you conduct a management review? Do you have an internal audit?

The issue with training is many operations only focus on the foundation. You need to have people who know how to clean equipment; you have to make sure that the pest control is done; you need to have good allergen management. Those are all pretty well done. Now you’re starting to get more traction in the second bucket, which is around HACCP, because with FSMA, HACCP is no longer an option; you need to be able to do it.

But the missing piece in many organizations is at the top—the management systems. This is important, because when you talk about culture, that’s where it gets embedded within an organization—through implementation of the management system.

If you look at this holistically, you need to train across all of those areas, not just in the foundation. You can differentiate yourself from organizations that have effective food safety management systems (not just food safety systems) because they’re training across all those buckets.

The other part of training is management systems. Who do you train? Besides targeting first line employees and operators, you also need to train senior managers because these managers, along with leadership, need to better define the objectives and policies. What does it mean to conduct an effective management review? What does it mean to do an internal audit? What’s a good corrective action process? The training often falls apart because organizations haven’t embedded that very well.

FST: Do you see differences between implementing these practices in small versus large organizations?

Ahn: There are differences, but it’s not necessarily a function of the size of the company. It’s more around how they’ve approached developing and organizing their management system and in particular, their food safety management system.

FST: In reality, how long does it take a typical company to create an effective food safety culture?

Ahn: There are two parts to that question.

My belief is that if you want to implement a food safety culture, you need to create a food safety management system, otherwise it is just all words and talk. It’s what you do, not what you say. The way to do that is to embed a food safety management system within your organization.

The two questions are: How do you get to initiate it? And, how long does it take to execute once you decide to initiate?

To address the first question: How do you initiate it?

There are a couple of ways that it can happen. There’s nothing like a crisis to get the fire under somebody’s feet, whether it’s a recall or an incident, it will draw attention to the fact that there’s a problem and something needs to happen. But, that’s reactive and detrimental.

The other way to initiate is that if you have enlightened leadership—an owner or group of owners who understand where they want to go, where they need to go, what needs to be avoided and understands the importance of the organization’s culture in getting to the right place, etc.

Secondly, once you start this process, how long does it take to get this type of system running?

Based on my experience in implementing food safety management systems like FSSC 22000, it takes anywhere from 18 months to 2 years to get it established, and then probably another 18 months or so to actually fully implement. So it’s not something that happens in a couple of months. It takes some time to really get it implemented and embedded, because these are foundational elements you  must put into place. There’s a lot of momentum involved, and it has to move throughout the organization.

The term food safety culture has gotten a lot of attention—it’s a buzzword. But what does it really mean and how do you make it come to life? That’s really where people need to start looking. You make it come to life through implementation of structured food safety management systems—ones that are verified, and independently verified. Put substance and real work around your food safety culture instead of using a lot of fluffy words to describe it.