Hello everyone, I hope you had an awesome weekend and are off to a great start this week! This weekend I had the opportunity to take part in the the first annual Caterpillar Young Professionals-Bradley Engineering/Business Case Competition (what a mouthful!). What this ridiculously long-named event entails is ten teams of five people: three Caterpillar employees, one Bradley engineering student, and one Bradley business student. The purpose of the competition was to not only encourage continued education for CAT employees and networking for Bradley students, but to actually come up with a creative and sustainable solution to an issue CAT is facing (unfortunately I am legally bound to secrecy on the specifics).
To prepare for the competition, all teams met once a week for four weeks. We spent two hours together and discussed the process of Six Sigma (Six Sigma is simply a process that many companies use to improve processes and minimize defects) and what would be expected of us come competition day. Then, the big day came. We were handed the case on Friday at 8am and were expected to send in our solution by 6:59am on Saturday. My group spent almost 22 hours in the same room working on our presentation; there was copious amounts of coffee and takeout consumed. Around 5:30am we decided to call it quits so we could shower and get spiffy. We then met up at the CAT administration building at 7am and awaited the beginning of the presentations which were to be judged by panels of various Caterpillar specialists.
In total, my team was up for 32 hours straight; we were literally sleeping with our eyes open. I don’t know about you, but that’s the longest I have ever stayed awake, and trust me, I was getting slightly cranky! I regret to say that we did not win, but I learned more about CAT, Six Sigma, and teamwork than I ever thought possible. If any engineering or business students from BU are reading this, I highly recommend you try to be a part of this soon- to- be annual opportunity. It was hard work, and it was tiring work, but in the end I think it was one of the most beneficial opportunities I have ever had the pleasure to take part in. If you have any questions, just shoot me a comment!
Thanks for reading! Stay warm and stay safe this Halloween season!
Jenny Walker
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