When Rachith Thipperi started working for Pioneer Service in January 2018 as an intern, he didn’t have much knowledge about manufacturing. But his enthusiasm and knowledge he gained from completing a Master’s degree in engineering quickly showed company personnel they had chosen the right person for the position.

Only a month into his internship, Rachith was offered a full-time position as process engineer. After working with multiple teams, he excelled in his role, developing a dashboard tool that provided much-needed transparency and clarity to the quoting process. Use of this new dashboard drastically reduced quote-turnaround time and error frequency at his company.

Rachith’s commitment to excellence, leadership and continuous improvement is proven by his everyday actions. For example, he learned the company’s enterprise resource planning system “on the fly” and according to his nominator, Aneesa Muthana, president of Pioneer Service, he has a talent for catching problematic dimensional issues common to client prints, as his eye for detail reaches almost “superhero proportions.” His efforts have boosted his team’s efficiency and reduced errors.

But almost more important than doing, Rachith takes time to ask the right questions to understand the reasoning behind a current method, listen to his team members and almost always find ways to improve.

His positivity shines when he makes a mistake, Ms. Muthana says. Rachith is not afraid to admit when he makes a mistake, and he’s quick to outline how to prevent it from happening again, not just for him, but for anyone else on the team. As Rachith says, “Failure is just another way to learn and grow.”

Continuous improvement is important to Rachith, and his insights extend to processes beyond production; he has bright ideas for the purchasing, customer service and sales departments as well.

“His attitude helps everyone around him see the light at the end of the tunnel and keeps the team members smiling at their accomplishments,” Ms. Muthana says.

“Rachith has a bright future in manufacturing, and we believe we’ve only seen the beginning of what he will accomplish. Our only complaint is that we’ve been so far unsuccessful in our efforts to clone him.”

To read about all the 2019 Emerging Leaders, visit “Meet Production Machining’s 2019 Emerging Leaders.”

To nominate an Emerging Leader for our 2020 awards, visit our nomination page.