Miller Industries large wrecker supervisor Matt Watson, right, talks with employee Keith True as he prepares to install a wiring harness in a wrecker being built at the Ooltewah manufacturing plant. Watson participated in a leadership training program with an instructor from Chattanooga State Technical Community College.Chattanooga tow truck maker Miller Industries was taking on a big U.S. government order earlier this year on a tight schedule.
The company needed flexibility in its business and had to reshuffle tasks to pull off the work of supplying 260 armored recovery units for American troops in Afghanistan.
“They performed stellar,” said Sias Reyneke, Miller’s vice president of operations of the company’s 375-person staff.
Reyneke gives credit to leadership skills Miller is developing in its ranks with the help of Chattanooga State Community College.
As the economy comes back after the Great Recession, Chattanooga State is seeing more companies again focus on training, said Ginger Duggan, a business development specialist for the college.