by Tim Heston, Senior Editor, The FABRICATOR®

Last month the Fabricators & Manufacturers Association lost one of its most active and influential members: industry consultant Dick Kallage. I remember when I met Dick Kallage. It was FABTECH®. I had walked in during the middle of a seminar, and I saw his PowerPoint slide showing a simple line, with “money out” on one end (spending on materials and labor) and “money in” (customer payment) on the other. Want to improve? Shorten the time between the two, without spending a lot of money doing it.

It was so simple and yet so critical. Kallage’s broad insights rang with no-nonsense clarity. And he knew company leaders couldn’t achieve that goal sitting behind a desk. The truth, he said, is where the work happens, on the shop floor.

Sadly on Feb. 18, Dick passed away of cancer. He was 72.  His family is planning to establish an endowment fund in Dick’s memory and Nuts, Bolts, & Thingamajigs foundation is collecting donations to award a scholarship in Dick’s honor for the Fall 2016 semester. To contribute, click here to make a donation for an NBT scholarship 

For almost a dozen years Dick has contributed so much to FMA as well as to the content of The FABRICATOR magazine. He was a true advocate of the small and medium-sized businesses that are the heart of the metal fabrication industry. He was a guiding force on FMA’s Management Advisory Council since its inception in 2007. His Practical Lean seminars at FABTECH®, LeanFab, The FABRICATOR’s Leadership Summit, and at other association events were among FMA’s highest rated and best attended.

“Dick was tough on the outside, but a Teddy Bear on the inside. He was a Marine. He was a dog lover too. And he was an incredible lover of the outdoors and an expert fly fisherman. He really fished most of the famous fly fishing rivers in the United States.” So said Jim Warren, a senior director at FMA who worked closely with Dick for more than a decade.

Fly fishing really fits Dick. I can picture him casting his fly rod while standing in the river’s flow. In the flow—be it in a river, on the shop floor, or anywhere else—is where Dick truly thrived.