Maersk Line is the largest container shipping company in the world. At any given time, its 500 vessels transport approximately 3 percent of the world's gross national product (GNP). In 2007, I walked into Maersk as a lean Six Sigma consultant looking for business and walked out with a job.

I saw an opportunity of a lifetime: an organization that had the wisdom and patience to take a long-term perspective about process improvement. What attracted me was that Maersk considers it critical that its process excellence (PEX) efforts enable the corporate strategy, which among other things manages revenues upwards of 28 billion and steers about 25,000 employees and seafarers based in more than 125 countries.

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