In
Mary Messuti
Profile
When Mary Messuti came to WVU, she was originally a pre-med student. Biology lab turned her off so she started looking for another major. She always liked math and physics, so she considered engineering. But she also wanted something to do with business. She found out about Industrial Engineering from some friends in engineering.
When she graduated, she went to work in consulting which she loved. She had no thoughts of leaving a consulting career path until one of her clients kept insisting that she come to work for them. She bargained for full profit/loss (P/L) responsibility of the $18 million dollar company. She was 26 years old.
That began a series of turnaround assignments where Mary was brought in to help resurrect businesses. Her next assignment was an $87 million dollar company.
Over her career, Mary has worked for a diverse set of companies. One of the more interesting experiences was with Piper Aircraft in Brunei. She had responsibility for setting up a division of Piper Aircraft serving countries from the Middle East, throughout Asia, Japan, Korea, Australia, and New Zealand.
Mary has encountered a number of gender issues so she insists on setting the tone for the culture where she works. “I don’t want to have to worry about people accepting me based upon my gender,” she says. She has also encountered situations where companies don’t want to pay her what the male executives who she is replacing were making.
Mary is especially proud of setting up the Christian Business Women’s Connection a non-profit organization that helps women executives maintain the principles of their faith in a business environment. She uses biblical principles to make business decisions. To Mary, the way people are treated is of paramount importance.
To Mary the blue collar values of West Virginia are what she looks for in putting together the management teams for the businesses she works with.
Bio
Mary Messuti is a results driven manufacturing chief executive with a proven record of success in global markets. She has fifteen+ years of P&L leadership in both union and non-union businesses. She is an accomplished turnaround leader, skilled at creative strategic problem-solving with laser focus on growing business sales and earnings. She has a track record of leveraging market positions and disciplined expense management. She has expertise in implementation of Lean/Six Sigma in job shop and repetitive manufacturing environments. She works collaboratively with Board and financial partners – private equity experience.
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE:
Gallo Displays, Inc., President and CEO
Piper Aircraft Inc., Managing Director Asia
Piper Aircraft Inc., Director Manufacturing Engineering
Ingersoll-Rand, General Manager Pneumatic Tools
Ingersoll-Rand, Director of Finance for Corporate Shared Services
Ingersoll-Rand, Director of Strategic Sourcing for Metals/Machining
Burns Aerospace, Vice President Manufacturing Operations
Andersen Consulting/Accenture, Lean Manufacturing Consultant
KEY CAREER ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
Senior turnaround executive with 15+ years of P&L experience and development of process controls to maximize utilization of assets, working capital, and cash management in highly leveraged environments.
Developed and executed business and operations strategic plans resulting in 33%
increase in sales, and 38% cost reduction due to right-sizing labor as well as implementation of lean manufacturing techniques.
Restructured sales and marketing functions to better address the relevant competitive advantages in the marketplace resulting in a sustainable process that increased the sales proposal pipeline as well as increasing sales closure rates.
Negotiated 27+ Union Collective Bargaining Unit Agreements with various major unions in the NYC, NC, and Boston areas. Unions included Teamsters Union, Carpenters Union, and various others.
EDUCATION:
M.S., Operations Management, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York
B.S., Industrial Engineering, West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia
