Frederick Portal

Frederick Portal, Adjunct Professor of Operations Management at Sacred Heart University Luxembourg since 2006, studied Engineering Production & Economics at Birmingham University, graduating with double honors. He then studied Manufacturing Management at IMD Switzerland and received an MBA from the Open Business School in the United Kingdom. Frederick is a Chartered Engineer, a Lean Sensei and a Six Sigma Black Belt.

Initially working near London, he first experienced the power of lean as the driving force in a turnaround to transform an ailing manufacturing business into a profitable concern ever since the global leader. Next he moved to Switzerland in Operations Management for Ralston Energy Systems (Energizer Batteries), then as Chef de Fabrication (Operations Director) at SAPAL, the world’s leading confectionery equipment company, also in Switzerland, before moving to Delphi Luxembourg. There his career spanned from Strategic Planning, Manufacturing Engineering, Production Management and finally to the deployment of lean sigma across European and South American operations and Technical Centers for Delphi. He pioneered lean deployment in transnational processes, such as Product Development, Procurement, Customer Service, and Financial Reporting. He now works as an Operations Consultant to businesses where his three decades of experience applying lean principles helps them towards Business Excellence in quality, delivery, cost and speed to market.

This same passion for lean is the central theme of Frederick’s teaching and students are challenged and accompanied on a journey to learn to apply lean sigma and other improvement methodologies to their own business situations to achieve radical improvements.