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learning is the day you become a less effec- tive leader. "I've always had this philosophy to emu- late or follow or learn from people that I would consider mentors," he said, "and there's a lot of people in business and outside of business that I've looked at as people that I wanted to shape myself around their charac- ter and ethics and their morality and their approach to life in general. "One of those that crosses both business Dan Ariens When notified that he was selected among the "Most Influential People in the Green Industry" in 2011, Dan Ariens, presi- dent and CEO of the Ariens Company in Brillion, Wis., said that he was "surprised" and "flattered." "There are a lot of very important and influential people in the OPE industry and have been for a long time," said Ariens, the great-grandson of Henry Ariens, who founded the Ariens Company in 1933. "If I were voting, I think I would've picked some others." Given all that Dan has accomplished in the OPE industry and the Wisconsin business community, leading to numerous productiv- ity and leadership awards, the honor should certainly come as no surprise. In addition to enjoying tremendous suc- cess with the Ariens Company, Dan has served as chairman of the Outdoor Power Equipment Institute (OPEI) and twice as chairman of OPEI's Green Industry and Equipment Expo Committee. He has re- ceived two gubernatorial appointments from two different Wisconsin governors represent- ing two different parties, including his pres- ent appointment as the vice chair of the Wisconsin Economic Development Corpo- ration. He has served on several boards of di- rectors for educational entities, for-profit companies and non-profit economic devel- opment groups in the state, including the New North (an 18-county regional eco- nomic development board) and Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce. Plus, he is one of only seven members on the Executive Committee of the Green Bay Packers' board of directors. Despite all of his success, Dan still consid- ers himself "just a guy from Brillion," who is always looking to learn from other leaders because he believes that the day you stop — this business — and life would be my father (Mike Ariens). He's certainly been a very important influence on me from a long time back." From an early age, Dan recalls learning several valuable lessons from his father and developing a passion for the family business while hanging out at the plant with his fa- ther, his grandfather Steve, or the guys in the R&D lab. During high school, Dan spent his summers working in the plant, building snowblowers to save money for college tuition because his father made him foot half the bill. Dan earned a degree in business and finance from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minn., in 1981. Shortly thereafter, Dan wanted to join the family business on a full-time basis, but had to put those plans on hold because his fa- ther had a "rule of thumb" for his children that they had to work somewhere else for at least two years. In 1983, Dan finally landed his first full-time job with the Ariens Company in the marketing department at then-recent-acquisition Gravely in Winston-Salem, N.C. He worked his way up through the ranks before his father stepped down as president and CEO and named Dan his successor and fourth- generation owner. "He's a very strong moral authority in terms of what's right and what's wrong," Dan said of his father. "He was always a great teacher of 'No, we're not going to do that. That's just not the way we do things.' I think the lessons that I learned from others were more about having my father as a guidepost." Based on the lessons learned from his fa- ther, and shortly after succeeding him, Dan quickly established his own company ex- pectations by creating a set of five "Core Values": 1) Be honest; 2) Be fair; 3) Keep our commitments; 4) Respect the individ- ual; and 5) Encourage intellectual curiosity. "We talk about those multiple times a day," Dan said. "I mean that's just not something we just stick on the wall. That's a conversa- tion we have every day, around every decision." Those Core Values were put to the test almost immediately after Dan left Jasper, Ind., where he had been running Stens (ac- quired in 1995), and returned to Brillion to succeed his father. From 1998 to 2000, Dan admitted the company was a "train wreck," due to several factors, such as overproduc- tion, excessive inventory, lack of innovation, quality control issues and two-step distribu- tion. Realizing something had to change, Dan spearheaded a movement to follow Toyota's lead in the automotive industry by becoming an OPE industry pioneer in the implementation of "lean management." "I would define (lean management) as 'the journey of continuous improvement,'" said Dan, "And the subset of that is, in con- tinuous improvement, you assume and you internalize the fact that you've never achieved perfection and that you're always on a journey toward perfection. Because, as my friend (legendary Packers coach) Vince Lombardi said, 'Somewhere you'll find ex- cellence in the pursuit of perfection.' To me, that's lean." Ariens Company not only survived the turn of the century, but made a remarkable comeback, acquiring other companies and entering new markets in recent years. In 2004, shortly after the release of Jeffrey Liker's best-selling book titled "The Toyota Way: 14 Management Principles from the World's Greatest Manufacturer," Dan and his management team refined the com- pany's lean management message by devel- oping their own 15 management principles. Also in 2004, they established a 20-year vision, which includes having the best and brightest employees producing the world's highest-quality product and carry- ing out the company's vision statement of being passionate about astounding their customers. Dan, who with his wife of 27 years, Julie, has five children between the ages of 15 and 25, was asked how he would like to remembered when he retires and what the future of the company holds for subsequent generations. He laughed and said, "I'm pretty young. You know I think just as kind of the way I hope people think of me now. I'm 'just a guy from Brillion' that likes to come in (to work) and loves this business. I think at the end of the day, if we achieve our 20-year vision, I'd like to be able to look back at that with my peers here and say, 'We did alright. We created a lot of jobs. We built a nice company here, and it's on a platform that's sustainable, and it's time to turn it over to the next generation.'" OUTDOOR POWER EQUIPMENT JANUARY 2012 — Steve Noe 13 M.I.P.