Top 20 Media & Industry Influencers of 2020, Part 1



Top 20 Media and Industry InfluencersNow that we have officially rung in the new year, we can breathe a sigh of relief that 2020 is over. (Phew!) This has been a year of loss, lessons, and growth. However, like so many other essential workers worldwide, industry found a way to rise to the occasion. This community continued to meet the needs of a chaotic world and, in many ways, keep life moving forward.

Where would we be without the industrial and media influencers who kept us in the know about our rapidly evolving industries during the upended year? These are the individuals who used their social media and traditional media followings to ensure that we were updated on what was happening in their areas of expertise. They also let us know what was going on within the manufacturing industry as a whole.

Below, you’ll find Part 1 of a roundup of our 20 favorite industrial and media influencers from the year 2020 that you should continue to follow in 2021 . Did we leave anyone out? Let us know at lorid@sepco.com. You can check out Part 2 as well.


1. Joe Anderson, CMRP, CRL

Top 20 Industry and Media Influencers of 2020 Joe Anderson reliability xJoe is a partner and the Chief Operating Officer (COO) at ReliabilityX. As a plant-turnaround expert that helps companies become profitable and open capacity constraints, he helps companies reach their full potential through improvement gains and lowering costs, giving them competitive advantage on their journey to excellence. He teaches people how to make a sustainable impact on their business through education, training, and maintenance and operational effectiveness.

Joe is also an active columnist in Plant Services and contributes the Captain Unreliability column each month. As a Certified Maintenance & Reliability Professional (CMRP), Certified Reliability Leader (CRL), CARO, MLT2, MLA1, LSSGB, IAM-55k, CRL Black Belt, Joe is a reliability and maintenance expert, and we were happy he took the time to share his knowledge with us.

You can find Joe on LinkedIn, Twitter, and on the Practical Reliability Podcast.

2. Dr. Klaus Blache

Klaus is the Director and Research Professor at the Tickle College of Engineering and the Reliability and Maintainability Center for the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. Previously, he worked more than 35 years at General Motors (assignments such as the manager of Corporate Maintenance and Reliability, Manufacturing Engineering Director and Corporate Industrial Engineering Manager). Klaus is a past two-year Chairman of Society of Maintenance and Reliability Professionals (SMRP). After 30 years of competitive process benchmarking and reliability and maintenance/Lean Manufacturing implementations, his current focus is to help companies change cultural mindsets and scale up ROI based improvements.

The RMC is a university-industry association dedicated to improving industrial productivity, efficiency, safety, quality and profitability through advanced reliability and maintenance practices, technologies and management principles. It exists to advance reliability and maintenance education and practices within the academic and industrial sector. In his role, Klaus works toward creating opportunities for member companies, students, faculty, and industry to achieve exceptional value through a comprehensive program of education (professional development and academic), reliability and maintenance assessments, industry/company specific projects, and information sharing. In addition, he writes a monthly column for for Efficient Plant.

You can find Klaus on LinkedIn.

3. David Brewer, SEPCO

David is regional manager, Atlantic Region, for SEPCO. Before this role, he served four years in the U.S. Navy and received three Letters of Commendation. He began his career in the fluid sealing industry in January 1995 with other seal manufacturers until he joined the SEPCO team. He has served many industries including pulp and paper, chemical processing, food and beverage, power generation, textile, and waste treatment. He graduated from Lees McRae College.

David also serves on the Processing Editorial Advisory Board, was featured in several Industry Briefs videos, writes for trade publications, and frequently presents at industry events.

You can find David on LinkedIn.

4. Chandra Brown

Chandra is the CEO of MxD, one of 14 institutes that are known collectively as Manufacturing USA. In her role, she uses more than 25 years of experience in manufacturing to help American manufacturers seize the potential offered by new and emerging digital technologies. Chandra, an IWIM 2019 honoree, oversees all technology investment, partner relationships and project execution for the more than $90 million dollar portfolio of advanced manufacturing technology, cybersecurity and workforce development research, development, and demonstration. According to an article in Smart Industry, MxD was awarded funding this fall to help boost U.S. manufacturing’s COVID response.

You can find Chandra on LinkedIn and on Twitter.

5. Kevin Clark, CMRP

Kevin is the vice president of Industrial Strategy at Accruent, a Fortive company and provider of intelligent solutions for the built environment—spanning real estate, integrated technology systems, and the physical and digital assets they connect. Kevin has more than 25 years of experience in operations leadership focusing on engineering, asset management, IT, supply, manufacturing automation, and safety systems.

As a long-standing member of the Society of Maintenance & Reliability Professionals (SMRP), Kevin has held various positions at state and national levels and has been a CMRP since 2004. He frequently presents at industry prevents, writes for trade publications, and is a member of the Pumps & Systems Editorial Advisory Board.

You can find Kevin on LinkedIn and Twitter.

6. Suzane Greeman, ASQ-CMQ/OE, CAMA, CAMP, CMRP

Suzane is the President and Principal Asset Management Advisor of Greeman Asset Management Solutions Inc., a firm that provides expert asset management advisory, consulting and educational services to organizations with large portfolios of physical assets. She is the author of “Risk-based Asset Criticality Assessment (R-b ACA©) Handbook.”

With more than 22 years of experience, Suzane is an accomplished asset management leader and has worked across several asset management disciplines to implement asset management strategies for cement manufacturing, power generation, wastewater treatment, and airport assets. Her areas of expertise include developing asset information management strategies and systems, developing and deploying asset management systems, developing asset management business processes, and organizational capacity-building.

You can find Suzanne on LinkedIn and on her firm’s blog.

7. Ramesh Gulati, BSME, MSIE, EMBA

Top 20 Industry and Media Influencers of 2020Ramesh is the Asset Management & Reliability Specialist for Jacobs Asset Management Group. With more than 50 years of diversified experience in people, product, and process development and improvement as it relates to consumer goods, process/service, and the heavy metal industry.

Ramesh has a broad background in operations analysis and process improvements including kaizen, re-engineering, performance measurement/metrics, plant reliability and maintenance process improvement tools/techniques (e.g., CMMS, CBM/PdM, TPM, RCM), implementation of asset management systems (e.g., ISO-certified), energy management, and people development.

He’s the author of several books, including the award-winning Maintenance & Reliability Best Practices.

You can find Ramesh on LinkedIn.

8. Shon Isenhour, CMRP, CAMA

Top 20 Industry and Media Influencers of 2020 Shon IsenhourShon is a founding partner of Eruditio LLC, located aboard the USS Yorktown in Charleston Harbor. It is an education and training provider with a focus on project-based applied learning .

Shon is an engineering graduate of North Carolina State University and has become an expert in the implementation of holistic reliability solutions using tools such as Total Productive Maintenance (TPM), Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM), and Root Cause Analysis (RCA) as well as Six Sigma and Lean to drive significant bottom line results. He specializes in Adult Education, Business Process Management, Strategic Planning, Organizational Change Management, Leadership, Asset Management, and Reliability Engineering. Shon is a Certified Maintenance and Reliability Professional (CMRP), and has been certified by Prosci and Colorado State University as a Change Management Professional. He is a well-respected presenter at many industry events, when we have them.

You can find Shon on Twitter, LinkedIn, and on the leading industry blogs that he manages — www.ReliabilityNow.com.

9. Jennifer King

Top 20 Industry and Media Influencers of 2020 Jennifer kingJennifer is the editor of Pumps & Systems magazine. In this role, she assigns, writes, edits, and manages business-to-business content for the monthly print publication, as well as all online content including newsletters, social media content, webinars, podcasts, online articles, and more. Before COVID-19, you might have seen her at a number of industry trade shows all over the country.

Jennifer is also a published author and writes the blog Jennifer’s Stellar Life.

You can find Jennifer on LinkedIn, Twitter, and via PumpsandSystems.com.

10. James Kovacevic, MMP, CMRP, CAMA 

Top 20 Industry and Media Influencers of 2020 James KovacevicJames is the Principal Instructor at Eruditio LLC, author of the HP Reliability Blog, host of the Rooted in Reliability Podcast, and educator in the field of maintenance, reliability, and asset management. He is also a member of the Board of Directors for the Plant Engineering and Maintenance Association of Canada (PEMAC), which is a national not for profit association providing global leadership, education and certification in world class maintenance, reliability and physical asset management practices.

Additionally, James is an Authorized Maintenance Management Professional (MMP) Instructor, permitted to teach PEMAC’s MMP modules 5, 6 and 7, part of a series that leads to the MMP designation.

You can find James on LinkedIn, Twitter, and the HP Reliability Blog.


Part 2 completes our list of Top 20 Industry and Media Influencers of 2020.

About the Author
Anna Claire Howard is a contributing writer, editor, and content marketing specialist for Sealing Equipment Products Co. Inc. (SEPCO) and has been since Spring 2019. Before those two big life changes, she was the content marketing specialist for Fluke Accelix; assistant editor for Grand View Outdoors, publisher of Bowhunting World, Predator Xtreme, Whitetail Journal, Tactical Retailer, and Shooting Sports Retailer; managing editor for Media Solutions, Inc., publisher of Gear Solutions, Wind Systems, and Thermal Processing magazines; assistant editor for MSI; and the editorial intern for B.A.S.S., LLC, publisher of Bassmaster Magazine and Bassmaster.com. In these B2B/B2C roles, Anna Claire developed an appreciation for the industrial sector, as well as the operators and technicians who make up the workforce. You can find her on LinkedIn at bit.ly/ACHowardLI.