Congratulations to the Foremost Farms Second Quarter 2024 Circle of Excellence Winners!
Foremost Farms Circle of Excellence Winners have been selected from nominations made by their coworkers and leaders to recognize their great work and demonstrating Foremost Farms’ Four Core Values: One Team, Force for Good, Work with Integrity, Take Care of Our World. Learn more about them!*
One Team
Vong Lor – Appleton, Supervisor, Quality Control
Nominated by: Michelle Wiltzius
Vong Lor has extensive experience working with a specific, complex process in our Appleton and volunteered travel to our Lancaster plant to support them as they developed and implemented the same process. While Vong was in Lancaster, he also supported the Quality team and helped them gain expertise in the process. Vong went above and beyond to share his knowledge with the Lancaster team, and he set them up for success through his efforts.
Take Care of Our World
Ben Smith, Aaron Kleeman – Transportation Team
Nominated by: Kaitlyn Harbort
Ben Smith and Aaron Kleeman created dashboards through collaboration with finished goods and milk hauling partners to provide increased visibility into Foremost Farms’ hauling miles, loads and pounds to establish better primary data to conduct GHG inventory calculations and better holistic hauling data for decision making. Ben and Aaron’s effort engaged our hauling partners in joining industry-supported partnerships that improve measurement and reporting, efficiency and environmental impacts. It also helped our hauling partners consider their role in sustainability and proactively preparing for adaptive capacity in a world that is decarbonizing. This self-driven effort shows Ben and Aaron are committed to Take Care of Our World and that their team has a critical role to play in helping our cooperative.
Work With Integrity
Joe Stanek – Headquarters, Analyst II, Process & IT Integration
Nominated by: Joan Schenk, Kyle Kussmaul, Jill Logterman, Lora Zimmerman
Joe Stanek helped the Commercial Team to develop a Pricing Request Form to utilize our customer database, improve accuracy of submissions and create visibility and ease of traceability. Joe guided us through the development process, asked the right questions to allow us to expand on our initial ideas for the form, followed up with us on a regular basis and looked for ways to improve the form to make it easier to complete. We launched the new form, and the transition could not have gone any smoother. Joe was quick to resolve a few small problems that occurred with the new form (as is expected on any new process) and kept the transition moving without interruption. The Commercial Team has embraced the new form, accuracy of submissions has improved greatly and Customer Care Coordinators have an easier time locating information they need to serve customers.
Force For Good
Jeff Brost – Marshfield, Maintenance
Nominated by: Patty Thurs
Jeff Brost is doing what it takes to succeed in business practices that protect our environment by using his knowledge and experience to make major improvements on the wastewater usage at the Marshfield facility. Jeff implemented his ideas with budget, safety, sustainability and efficiency in mind. Jeff has been instrumental in leading, coaching and mentoring the maintenance team and has designed a plan that allows better calibration of polymer usage. He has taken the lead on wastewater improvements and helped formulize a schedule to balance the flow to the pre-treatment plant. By making simple and cost-effective changes, he has helped balance the flow of wastewater to our onsite pre-treatment facility throughout a 24-hour period and reduced waste and costs affecting the bottom line to improve efficiency in our business.
*Excerpts of original nominations, edited for length and content. Foremost Farms employees may read full nominations on Main Street, the cooperative’s employee intranet.