Episode Details

Contact Mark Whitten

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-whitten-61790119/

Lisa Ryan: Hey, it's Lisa Ryan. Welcome to the Manufacturers' Network Podcast. Our guest today is Mark Whitten. Mark is the President and CEO of Spartanburg Steel Products. Spartanburg specializes in designing, developing, and manufacturing high-quality complex metal stamping and welded assemblies, serving the automotive, heavy truck, power, lawn and garden, construction, utility, and off-road vehicle manufacturing industries.

A passionate leader with 25 years of manufacturing experience leadership and strategic direction, Mark has achieved business success and transformation through engagement and collaboration. Mark, welcome to the show.

Mark Whitten: Thank you for having me, Lisa. I'm glad to be here.

Lisa Ryan: Mark, please share with us your background and what led you to do what you're doing right now with Spartanburg.

Mark Whitten: Sure. I'm Canadian. I worked in Canada for many years before I came to Atlanta. I went to Mexico first. I started my career with General Motors Academy, a Suzuki joint venture GM plant. I did several different roles there. This was after Freightliner. Then I ended up Magna or National, a tier-one automotive supplier. I worked for Magna was seven years, and then I had the opportunity to go to Mexico as an assistant plant manager. So I moved my wife and children, and we went to Mexico. We were there for six years before returning to Canada again as a general manager for Magna. Then we came to the US in 2015. I did a short stint as a plant manager in the Cleveland area. Then I was recruited to Martin read, another Canadian automotive supplier for their Kentucky plant in Shelbyville.

A few years later, I had a director of OPS role. I had the four plants under me at the time. I then had an opportunity to come to Spartanburg Steel Products as President CEO in March of 2020. It was while Covid landed - literally within weeks as I got here. We started the protocols for Covid.

Lisa Ryan: Wow, isn't it funny that from now until the end of time, those of us in the know will know that anytime somebody says March of 2020, we will all go ooooh.

Mark Whitten: yeah.

Lisa Ryan: Absolutely. When you joined Spartanburg, what was the culture like? What were some of the things that you noticed and started to change?

Mark Whitten: Well, Spartanburg is a privately held company family-owned business. They've owned the business for 40 plus years. It's a good company with good people. I think that, over time, the performance had eroded. The culture is affected when you have those situations where the company's not making money. You've got customer issues and quality issues. The culture also takes an impact there that people feel at leadership levels.

My task coming in here was to grow the business back to what it once was, as a prominent BMW supplier. We're 12 miles from plant 10 Spartanburg, which is building all the X-model BMWs. We had a couple of things we needed to do to build a relationship back with customers. First, we needed to focus on the company's culture and make sure we were doing the right things to engage people. I always talk about how hearts and minds ultimately drive performance. Business results, good quality, profitability, and these things are crucial.

The last two years have been a journey of doing exactly what we've coined at SSP 2.0 -Spartanburg Steel Products 2.0. And the 2.0 is, I wanted to honor 1.0. We're a company that's been around 40 years and a BMW supplier. We've had success. I didn't want to take anything away from the people that have been here for 25 plus years; I wanted to honor 1.0 as the foundation. But we ultimately focused on 2.0, which has to be the future.