Seeing the Impact of Improved Operations

The first time Rohit Salgaonkar worked in an operations environment, he was an assistant manager at Godrej, one of India's most popular brands that does work in consumer goods, real estate, appliances, agriculture and many other businesses. He was tasked with trying to reduce the number of trans-shipment damages to granite worktops used in the business. Salgaonkar helped redesign the supply chain and reduce the number of damage incidents. In the process, he helped enhance product delivery, reduce the manpower requirement at warehouses and create safer working conditions.

It was this wide-reaching impact of an operations change that satisfied him most.

When he began studying in Northwestern's Master of Engineering Management (MEM) program, Salgaonkar knew he wanted to try and find similar opportunities to improve operations within a company in a way that could hopefully transform the business. He recently finished one of those opportunities as an intern at AbbVie — a research-driven biopharmaceutical company — and took some time to look back on the experience and the role operations can play not just in a company, but also in an individual's daily life.  

What were your roles and responsibilities at AbbVie?

AbbVie strives to come up with new approaches to addressing today’s health issues, from life-threatening illness to chronic conditions. During the summer, I worked as an Operations Excellence Intern in the Commercial Analytics & Operations function. My primary process improvement project required me to analyze the current Cycle Time performance of the Purchasing Process and then recommended strategies to tackle bottlenecks or system redundancies and thus enhance the performance.  

What's one thing about Operations that would surprise someone who has no knowledge about the industry?

I strongly believe the expression that "Operations is a Way of Life". The stigma associated with Operations is that it is related only to manufacturing processes, however, I strongly disagree. The principles of Operations are applicable to so many diverse fields - from operating room scheduling in a surgical hospital to revenue management in airline and hotel room booking. To be honest, you can even consider efficiencies in our personal lives. No matter how much we'd like to think otherwise, our lives are collections of mechanical processes as well. 

What were you hoping to learn from your internship experience?

I wanted to extend my course learnings to real-world problems. The manner in which my Computer Simulation for Risk & Operations Analysis and Operations Excellence courses were structured magnified my passion for enhanced decision-making and establishing high-efficiency systems and processes. In my internship, I hoped to extend the application of techniques such as simulation, optimization, theory of constraints and queuing theory from class projects to real-world problems.

I also wanted to explore the healthcare space. I previously worked on a project to improve the storage of vaccines in rural India, and afterward I was always intrigued by the healthcare space. Before joining AbbVie, I also worked on a project at Northwestern Medicine (Lake Forest Hospital) to analyze and monitor the utilization performance of their Operating Room Suite and recommended strategies to achieve optimum utilization. With AbbVie, I was looking forward to working on challenging projects on a bigger scale and doing my bit toward advancing the standard of living and care. 

Looking back on it, in what ways were you able to get the experience you hoped for?

In our Operation Excellence class, we worked on a project to reduce the cycle time in a vortex flow-meter manufacturing plant by applying the queuing theory discipline of VUT (Variability, Utilization, Time) equation to identify bottlenecks in the process. I was pleasantly surprised when I was able to apply the same model with minor tweaks to my project at AbbVie.  

The learnings and concepts from my courses also helped me interact and communicate very effectively with the data scientists at AbbVie. Although the tools and ways of determining solutions were different, I could effectively understand the fundamentals in the way they would approach a problem, which made for educational dialogue.

Lastly, networking with experts within AbbVie gave me a glimpse of how innovation plays a vital role in allowing various functions within the organization to be agile, developing solutions that are long-term, and above all, delivering high-quality medicine that makes a remarkable impact on people’s lives.

What were the two or three most important lessons you learned from your internship?

Data storytelling is perhaps one of the most underrated skills required for an engineering professional. I remember an old article from Forbes that said, "Your data may hold tremendous amounts of potential value, but not an ounce of value can be created unless insights are uncovered and translated into actions or business outcomes." My team at AbbVie, helped me develop the skill to use relatable analogies and play around with data visualization to coherently communicate the essence to an audience from multiple backgrounds and position levels.

My project at AbbVie also helped me realize that no matter how accurate or abundant your data, it never will show you the complete picture. The culture at AbbVie places high importance on conducting "immersions" with various key stakeholders in order to gather clues, identify key insights and get to the root cause of a problem. During my interactions with various experts, I learned that in order to truly implement effective and long-lasting measures, it is important to focus on both data and the human element. 

How did this internship help you better understand operations and better prepare you for a career in operations?

I believe both my internship experience and the projects I've worked on at Northwestern have helped me gain expertise on the fundamental principles in approaching any operations or process improvement project. Having already worked professionally on operations projects in the manufacturing, surgical hospital and pharmaceutical industries, I feel extremely confident in carrying out many more challenging projects, no matter the industry.

How important do you think this type of internship is to your overall MEM experience?

I think it is one of the most pivotal parts of my overall MEM experience. It has helped me evolve my existing skills and provided an excellent platform to learn more about the nuanced changes I needed to develop to communicate in the language of business. 

Is there anything else you'd like to add?

I am a strong advocate of "Learning by Doing" and "Striving for Excellence and not Success". For any incoming full-time student, my advice would be to immerse yourself in the opportunities provided by Northwestern, devote your time to learn and develop, and create a brand for yourself, which I believe will be the most effective approach to get to your goals.