OUR
TEAM
The power of NEXT LEVEL Partners®, LLC is our people and our experience.
Our leadership team has decades of collective expertise driving superior shareholder value creation. Our Practitioner team is unmatched in real-world experience and success implementing Lean, Toyota Production System and Six Sigma methods enterprise-wide. Read a little about us and find out how we can connect with you to help your organization.
Our Leadership Team
Bill Butler
Founding Principal
Bill is a founding principal of NEXT LEVEL Partners®, LLC. He founded the firm with the vision to leverage his more than 30 years of successful leadership experience into Lean transformation client offerings that take organizations to the next level of business performance. Prior to founding…
Don Dreher
Founding Principal
Don is a founding principal of NEXT LEVEL Partners®, LLC. He founded the firm with the vision to leverage his more than 30 years as an exceptional leader of Lean enterprises and top practitioner of Lean Business System implementations to help clients consistently deliver outstanding…
Dennis Longo
Founding Principal
Dennis is a founding principal of NEXT LEVEL Partners®, LLC. He founded the firm with the vision to leverage his more than 30 years of human capital experience to help clients build winning, high-performance teams that deliver outstanding results. Prior to founding Next Level Partners®,…
Ronica Bowen
Principal
Ronica is an accomplished Lean operations executive with a strong track record of transforming organizations through the implementation of comprehensive Lean Business Systems. As an experienced business leader, Lean Transformation architect, and Lean TPS sensei, she is…
Darlene Kober
Principal
Darlene is a commercial leader with more than 25 years of experience accelerating profitable growth in high-performance, high-expectation organizations. She has developed and executed several advanced Commercial Excellence/Growth Tools as both a…
Andy Lee
Principal
Andy is a recognized pioneer and leader of Lean implementation in a broad range of geographies and industries with deep expertise in the hospitality and entertainment industry. As a former Danaher Business System (“DBS”) Director at Danaher Corporation, Andy had…
Eric Lussier
Principal
Eric is a hands-on student and practitioner of Lean with a passion for building problem-solving cultures built on the pillars of continuous improvement and respect for people. Originally trained by a Japanese sensei as an engineering co-op student, he has over 25 years of experience…
Brian Maready
Principal
Brian brings a unique leadership background in Lean healthcare and manufacturing with over 25 years of expertise in engineering, operations, and marketing. Specializing in supporting complete business transformations, he ensures companies become…
Will Bedingfield
Vice President
Will has more than 20 years of experience implementing Lean principles and strategies in both the service and manufacturing industries. He is a hands-on leader-of-change with an enviable track record of coaching and mentoring teams through transformational Lean journeys…
Skip Gallo
Vice President
Skip is a broadly skilled sales, marketing, and operating executive with more than 30 years serving the industrial marketplace. He is passionate about helping clients achieve breakthrough growth and profit improvement using Lean transformation techniques. Before joining NEXT LEVEL…
Jim Kenyon
Vice President
Jim is a human resource executive with 30 years of experience identifying A-player talent in private equity-backed and Fortune 500 companies. Before joining, NEXT LEVEL Partners®, LLC, Jim founded Better Talent Faster, a human capital and executive search firm. He is also HR…
Eleazar Longoria
Vice President
Eleazar is an operational and Lean transformation leader with over 30 years of manufacturing experience. His deep expertise in Lean Manufacturing, coupled with his extensive background in automotive, industrial, and consumer goods sectors, allows him to help clients…
Our Practitioners
As a consulting firm with over 20 years of experience applying lean principles to business transformation, we have a world-class team of Lean Practitioners:
- Are all Lean “A” Players
- Have 15 - 25+ years of experience
- Most have both domestic and international experience
- On average, have facilitated / led over 450 kaizen events in a high-performance / high-expectation operating environment
- Collectively have hundreds of years of experience in solving real-world problems
- All understand that you live continuous improvement, you don’t implement it
- All understand the importance and alignment with Strategy Deployment
- All are TPS (Toyota Production System) based Lean tools certified
- All have expertise in multiple tools, ensuring your improvement roadmap contains an optimal mix of tools
- Many are also Six Sigma Black Belts with intimate understanding of how Six Sigma & Lean complement each other
- All have also held multi-disciplined roles in their careers, not just professional facilitators
- All understand and can help develop the infrastructure required for self sustainability
Contact Us
Manufacturing Practice Leader
1-877-NLP-Lean (657-5326)
NEXT LEVEL Partners®, LLC
2338 Immokalee Road, Suite 415
Naples, FL 34110