Sponsored article by QAD Redzone
By John Ponte, Senior Director of Demand Generation at QAD Redzone
Find out how frontline women in food manufacturing drive innovation through connected worker technology adoption, problem solving, and collaborative leadership.
International Women’s Month is an opportunity to recognize the remarkable impact women are making across all sectors. An often overlooked industry is food manufacturing, where women make up about 30% of the workforce. Women have made extraordinary improvements in plant efficiency, safety, and sustainability through their leadership skills, practical problem-solving, and enthusiastic adoption of new technologies.
Three women in particular exemplify this spirit of innovation on the production floor: Mireya Jimenez of Pioneer Frozen Foods, Shannon Bone of Companion Baking, and Mallory Chavez of Post-Consumer Brands. Their stories demonstrate how frontline leadership can transform operations and create ripple effects of improvement throughout an organization.
Mireya Jimenez: Building bridges through technology
At Pioneer Frozen Foods, a C.H. Guenther & Sons (CHG) manufacturing plant in Dallas, Production Line Leader Mireya Jimenez has spent 14 years turning everyday challenges into opportunities for improvement. After helping open the plant eight years ago, Mireya has become indispensable to operations, particularly in her role championing digital transformation.
When Pioneer implemented QAD Redzone’s #1 connected workforce solution, many employees resisted the change. Mireya, however, immediately recognized its potential and became the engagement leader on the platform. “We launched operations and Mireya just dove right in,” explains Russell Massinburg, Production Manager. “She led the charge. Every week, we track and review our engagement with the team, and Mireya is consistently in the top three.”
Mireya’s bilingual abilities in English and Spanish have proven invaluable. Mireya has been recruited to visit three other CHG sites to help implement the same technology, where her ability to connect with hesitant employees has been transformative. “It was a huge benefit to have her speak both English and Spanish,” notes a CHG Corporate Quality team member.
The results speak for themselves: Pioneer achieved a 7% increase in overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) within 90 days of implementing new technology, reduced safety recordables from nine to just one in a year, and improved their complaint rate to 0.071 against a target of 0.143. It’s no surprise Mireya was named Pioneer’s 2023 Employee of the Year.
Shannon Bone: Leading safety and sustainability initiatives
At Companion Baking in St. Louis, Shannon Bone has transformed operations through her strategic approach to safety and sustainability. When her supervisor, Operations Manager Suman Shekar, asked for input on reducing workplace accidents, Shannon immediately suggested creating a Safety Committee and dove into researching how to structure and run it effectively.
Given free rein on implementation, Shannon recruited volunteers and established a six-person committee that met monthly to discuss safety topics and conduct facility walkthroughs. Using Redzone to document findings, the committee started storing safety checklists and photos for future reference.
Six months after establishing the Safety Committee, Shannon took on another challenge: leading the “Waste Watchers” Committee to reduce environmental impact and support the company’s goal of zero landfill waste by 2024. Under her leadership, the committee uncovered an opportunity to apply for $75,000 in grant funding for waste reduction equipment, including specialized pans that lowered parchment paper usage by 14,000 units in just three weeks. Companion Baking reduced waste sent to landfills by an impressive 92%.
Her leadership has contributed to significant financial results, including a 61% decrease in safety costs over three years as well as a reduction in both the frequency and severity of accidents. More importantly, she’s fostered a workplace where employees feel valued and empowered. “I would sign up [for the committee] again because of Shannon,” shares Shekar. “She’s a good leader. She’s very passionate about what she does, and she’s very dedicated. That motivates me.”
Mallory Chavez: Inspiring change during transition
When J.M. Smucker was acquired by Post-Consumer Brands (PCB) in 2023, the transition introduced significant operational changes — new shifts, new employees, and brand new digital tools. During this potentially overwhelming period, Mallory Chavez emerged as a catalyst for positive change.
As an early adopter of the company’s new connected worker platform, Redzone, Mallory worked tirelessly, including putting in extra shifts, to help teams adapt to the new system. When the plant switched to continuous operations and had to hire an entirely new shift, she used this new technology to train and facilitate communication between shifts that never overlapped — 50% of the workforce never saw each other in person.
“She’s one of the people who always helps us train new people,” notes Catherine Kellogg, CI Engineer. “She picked up [our digital tool] and used it not only to help her own trainee but to help all of these new people who were working a new job on a new shift. It’s been amazing to see.”
Her focus on proper downtime tracking and problem documentation drove tangible results. When an air hose got stuck in the cooler incline belt, Mallory photographed the failure point, loaded it into Redzone, devised a solution, and had the issue resolved within a week. This practical problem-solving approach, combined with her training efforts, helped PCB achieve an 8% productivity uplift within 90 days. “We’re seeing true leadership from Mallory accepting and providing the bravery that it takes to create a movement that’s positive for the plant,” says Haber.
The common thread: transformative leadership
While Mireya, Shannon, and Mallory work in different companies and face unique challenges, several common threads connect their approaches:
- They embrace new technology as a catalyst for improvement, seeing digital tools as enablers of communication, efficiency, and accountability.
- They prioritize teaching and mentoring others, recognizing that true success comes from elevating the entire team.
- They focus on practical solutions to everyday problems, understanding that small, consistent improvements lead to significant results over time.
- They build bridges across departments and shifts, breaking down silos that typically limit operational efficiency.
As we celebrate International Women’s Month, these stories remind us that the future of food manufacturing depends not just on advanced technology but on the people who champion its adoption and use it to solve real-world problems — one small improvement at a time.
