We help supply chain operations teams design and implement critical projects.
How We Operate
We work with operations teams who have to start up and improve warehouses and distribution centers.
Why? We’ve worked in warehouses. We’ve experienced the problems. And we can help things be better.
New site implementations and projects are risky. We know all sorts of things can go wrong, from permitting problems, to WMS System bugs, to staffing issues, to plain mechanical failures. We’ve been through PLC cabinets on the sorter literally bursting into flames at 2AM. That’s not the type of thing you want to deal with during Peak.
Missed functionality, schedules, budgets, or just having “issues” like that at startup is costly and stressful. And those problems only get more costly and troublesome to fix as time goes on.
Nobody wants those problems. But somehow they keep popping up on projects.
And guess what?
We’ve developed a way to avoid them.
Most teams need someone with the expertise and experience to bring the project together.
That’s what we do. We’ve done the leg work and know where the issues are and how to avoid them. We tailor project-tested methodologies and experience to your organization’s needs.
Most importantly, we know how to work with you to do it.
With our industry background, experience with large projects and complex stakeholder environments, and pulling in the right experts at the right times, we help teams reduce risk and deliver a smooth startup experience.
Principles
- Do the right thing. Build trust with competence, integrity, and empathy. Our clients, our company, and our partners all deserve respect, humanity, and our best efforts.
- Start with the basics. We reason from first principles and master fundamentals.
- Zoom in, zoom out. Details matter—a lot—but we don’t lose sight of the big picture and context.
- Learn often, share often. We embrace learning, applying knowledge, and helping others succeed. We work to improve and refresh our approaches with deep expertise and multi-disciplinary lenses.
- Have a point of view. No one person has the whole picture or all the right answers. But everyone has a part: bring and voice yours and listen deeply to others.
- Make it repeatable. We build by writing down our processes, successes, and failures.
- Get to the finish line. We finish what we start. “Done” is better than “perfect on paper”.
- Deliver results. Everybody benefits when we do a great job.
- Build a great team. Bring the right people on, make them the best you can.
- We help Operations Teams operate.
Team
Paul Lukehart is the principal of PL Programs. He has managed warehouse operations in a variety of industries. Paul has managed implementations for sites ranging from 40,000 sf to 1.1M sf, greenfields and brownfields, from forklifts to robotics. He worked for Target, Amazon, and XPO Logistics, and he has consulted for other well-known companies. He is an Army veteran with a B.S. in Civil Engineering from West Point and MBA from the Harvard Business School.
Paul is the author of Practical Floor Supervision and Practical Performance Management.
Eric Ashbaugh is PL Programs’s Director of Engineering. He has extensive industrial engineering and cost accounting experience in manufacturing, retail, and 3PL environments.
He has led engineering support services from initial solution design to final operational handover. This included solutions for over 30 industry-leading companies with varied product profiles and requirements. He is an expert in traditional design and current automation solutions.
Eric has initiated, developed and mentored engineering teams to drive throughput and efficiency improvements, operational capacity increases, and ongoing expansion capabilities. Eric earned his Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering from North Carolina State University.
Nick has over 25 years of experience in Supply Chain associated with medium-to-Fortune 500 organizations with a focus in facility start-ups and implementations. His industry experience includes sporting manufacturing, multi-channel retail, ecom, and 3PL’s.
In these roles he has driven multiple system implementations (WMS), site start-ups (greens space to go live and stabilization), expansions and continuous improvement working collectively with internal and external partners.
Nick has led multiple diverse teams managing “Big-Box” and automated sites driving quality, SLA’s, and fiscal accountability. He earned his Bachelor of Science from BGSU.
Adam Murphy is a Supply Chain Consultant for PL Programs. He joined PL Programs after working with Pepsico/Frito Lay North America and Amazon in Operations. He has also worked with Apple in technical support.
Adam has hands-on experience leading high volume distribution facilities, formerly managing in the largest Frito-Lay distribution center in the southeast. His key contributions include initiating process improvement changes to increase productivity and efficiency metrics.
Adam is PMP-certified and a graduate of the University of Florida with B.A. in Business Administration.
PL Programs, LLC is a VA-certified Veteran-Owned Small Business.
