Striving to be the Best | Earl Good | RETECH

A competitive person by nature, Earl Good, Managing Director, Retech , has had a strong desire to do well in the things he is involved with. He wants Retech to be viewed as the 1st choice supplier of the vacuum metallurgical equipment and constantly works towards delivering improved financial results year over year. “In today’s global economy, you cannot sit still because your competitors constantly push to get better. If you want to maintain a leadership position, you must continue to look toward the future,” says Earl. “Therefore, I am always looking at things such as: how we can execute better; how we can improve our furnace products; what new products make sense for our portfolio; what new technology can we develop; do we have the right mix of people; what can we do to better support our customer’s needs.”

To enhance the company, Earl has been implementing the important leadership lessons in Retech. The few pointers he imparts and advises all budding entrepreneurs to implement in their work ethics include:

1. Treat others, regardless of their position or level within the company, as you would like to be treated.

2. Don’t be afraid to make a decision. Gather all the facts you can and decide based on those facts as quickly as you can. The worst thing you can do is not make any decision and allow a situation to drag out. Sometimes, your decision might be the wrong one, but you will be right more often than you are wrong.

3. Share all information with your superiors, whether it is good or bad.

4. Too many people try to hide the bad things from their bosses, and then incorrect decisions are often made due to the partial information.

5. Surround yourself with good people and let them do their jobs. If you have the right people, you can count on them to perform well in their roles. Try to provide the help and support they need to do a good job. Many leaders try to micromanage many of the tasks they give their employees, and most people do not want that type of constant oversight.

6. Look to reward those performing well or doing a good job to continue to push toward the company’s goals.

Armed with such an outlook, Earl has been taking the company to new heights. When a customer approaches Retech about melting some material in one of their R&D furnaces, the company might do several smaller melts of the material for the customer to do testing and development work on it with their customers.

Assuming the material they produced meets their needs, the company might do more melting for them or start discussing a larger production furnace. Sometimes the customer will ask Retech to melt slightly different material compositions before moving to a production furnace. “There are important considerations with our furnaces that have to be considered – things such as desired capacity, melt rate, retention time in the furnace, desired output, etc. Retech’s furnaces are all custom, so they typically take between 8 – 18 months to deliver,” explains Earl. “There is then the furnace installation and start-up period for the furnace.

Additionally, there is an art to melting, which takes a little time to develop. A customer doesn’t usually turn a furnace on and start melting perfect material on the first try.” The Retech Research & Development team is experienced and dedicated to working with our customers in providing equipment development and advancement required for market growth. Materials and applications go hand-in-hand with system advancement; thereby ensuring customer equipment delivers the capability, capacity and consistency required by their specific business model. Retech can help organizations develop the equipment and produce the finished material for them as a trusted part of their supply chain utilizing their in-house equipment. Retech does not compete with the customers; rather their goal is to solve unique niche problems for unique companies.

There is a history of achievements with Retech that have to be highlighted. Retech generally developed all of the different types of vacuum melting furnaces used in the industry. Earl thinks this occurred because Retech had good people; they worked with their customers to meet their needs and developed customized solutions. Keeping these achievements in mind, Earl’s focus has been on updating and improving many different areas over the past five years. Perhaps the two most significant initial changes he made were adding some new talent to the team and taking steps to make sure their project execution was strong.

It is pertinent to mention that Retech has changed most of its support software, which has provided a nice benefit. Their focus now is more on product improvement and the development of new products. The company is completing the development of some products that will allow Retech to compete in the powder market segment. “Additionally, I have pushed our product directors and R&D team to take advantage of outside talent at universities and some of our key suppliers. This change in focus has allowed us to develop some nice partnerships, which has opened the door to some new technology. The past five years have been challenging at times, but we are seeing improvements within Retech each year,” elucidates Earl.

One of the most exciting events for Retech over the last two years has been the move into their new Buffalo office and shop space. “We are in a beautiful space that has been completely refurbished, and will hopefully provide a home to Retech for many years. The shop space will allow Retech to provide manufacturing and assembly capabilities for our customers in North America,” states the steadfast leader. “This is significant given the global events that have taken place over the last two years, which include the pandemic, major shipping and port delays, increased material costs, rising fuel costs, and now the war between Russia and Ukraine. We are seeing a number of customers asking us to provide our furnaces entirely out of North American supply if possible. I expect our new space to give some big dividends for Retech.”