HAGEN History
While working for a top consulting firm in the United Kingdom, Ian Thompson recognized that a majority of his manufacturing clients were not aiming for their true potential. Instead, clients were defining their true potential based on assumed constraints in their manufacturing systems. Seeing the significant opportunity in breaking these constraints, Ian founded HAGEN & Company in 1990.
After six months and fifty unsuccessful sales calls, Ian met with the Engineering Manager of the largest food plant in Europe. His summary: “I don’t believe a word of what you’re saying. But if it’s true, it’s no skin off my nose. We have an old canning line that we desperately need more volume from. I’ll give you a month to show us what you can do. And, as you said, no results, no fee”.
Five weeks later Ian presented the results to the Engineering Manager, the UK Production Director and the President of Supply Chain for Europe. Output on the line had increased by 30% with zero capital cost. The Production Director signed Ian up for the next 12 months, and the Supply Chain President arranged introductions for him to the European CEOs of Coca-Cola and Mars. With his first successful project, Ian was determined to expand HAGEN further.
Discovering that even the smartest minds at his company were not achieving expected results lead Ian to look deeper into the method of solving problems. Ian and his team defined and refined the company's problem solving method, Control Factor Analysis ® (CFA), of which continues to be a cornerstone of HAGEN's business. Following the development of CFA, the HAGEN team introduced the world's first automatic financial opportunity reporting system for manufacturing companies, True Opportunity ®. The software ranks every opportunity by the true financial value of each issue in real time, which allows the entire plant staff, from the operator to the CEO, to know the most important financial priorities.
With an effective problem-solving method and dollar-driven reporting system in place, HAGEN & Co has learned and continues to learn how to help people understand the dollar value of every problem in their business and how to fix every single one of them to root cause. HAGEN & Co is grateful for the people and organizations integral to our development and excited to assist in the development of others.
After six months and fifty unsuccessful sales calls, Ian met with the Engineering Manager of the largest food plant in Europe. His summary: “I don’t believe a word of what you’re saying. But if it’s true, it’s no skin off my nose. We have an old canning line that we desperately need more volume from. I’ll give you a month to show us what you can do. And, as you said, no results, no fee”.
Five weeks later Ian presented the results to the Engineering Manager, the UK Production Director and the President of Supply Chain for Europe. Output on the line had increased by 30% with zero capital cost. The Production Director signed Ian up for the next 12 months, and the Supply Chain President arranged introductions for him to the European CEOs of Coca-Cola and Mars. With his first successful project, Ian was determined to expand HAGEN further.
Discovering that even the smartest minds at his company were not achieving expected results lead Ian to look deeper into the method of solving problems. Ian and his team defined and refined the company's problem solving method, Control Factor Analysis ® (CFA), of which continues to be a cornerstone of HAGEN's business. Following the development of CFA, the HAGEN team introduced the world's first automatic financial opportunity reporting system for manufacturing companies, True Opportunity ®. The software ranks every opportunity by the true financial value of each issue in real time, which allows the entire plant staff, from the operator to the CEO, to know the most important financial priorities.
With an effective problem-solving method and dollar-driven reporting system in place, HAGEN & Co has learned and continues to learn how to help people understand the dollar value of every problem in their business and how to fix every single one of them to root cause. HAGEN & Co is grateful for the people and organizations integral to our development and excited to assist in the development of others.