Last week, we asked, "What sources have given you the best results when you seek outside expertise?"

Selected answers were:

Consultants with supplier and operating backgrounds. They are entrepreneurs that want to succeed and are not bound by their corporations.

Networking with other papermakers and supplier personnel.

Referrals from personal contacts

Internal Technology group, contacts from [professional organizations], current and former friends and colleagues

Consultants with knowledge & experience in the subject area.

In spite of the words in your topic of this week, were is stated that even within bigger concerns the will to share knowledge is not that big, I can tell that in the Dutch paperindustrie there is the will to share, even with competitors. We have an organisation (knowledge center dutch paper en board industrie) were we share knowledge and information. The Maintenance people share two annual meetings, procestechnologist from different factory's have more meetings together, and there is a big nationwide project about energy reduction in paper and board. So we learn a lot from each other, visit each others mills and even share then a free lunch together ;-) The website (although in dutch) from the knowledge center is http://www.kcpk.nl/ and the organisation of dutch paper manufacturers is VNP ( http://www.vnp-online.nl/ ) and there is also a special organisation for education of people who work in the paper and board industry, VAPA ( http://www.vapa.nl//index.php?page=vapa-englisg ) This is rather special whilst dutch paper industry is very small, we try to help and learn from each other, while inventing the wheel over and over is much too expensive ;-) Best Regards, Gert van Beek

Among vendors, the willingness to help one another eventually develops as time and trust accumulate. We begin to watch each other's backs. That is, the folks with integrity understand that we are all 'in it together.'

Paid for consultancy

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