Hi, this is Victoria. This episode is the fourth in a series I recorded at ACC's Responsible Care and Sustainability Conference. Today, you're going to hear from Daryl Roberts, who's the Chief Engineering and Operating Officer. Of DuPont. I think you are really going to love this episode and I know I really loved my conversation with Daryl.
stood out for me and what I think you're going to hear is just how people and value centric Daryl is, and he talks about the importance of people, of values, and engaging appropriately In the community with employees and in the greater world and thinking really about the positive impacts that their products, DuPont's products and other chemical products make in communities and how they can enhance sustainability.
So I think that was one of the things that really, really, really came through for me. Um, the second piece is really this aspect of career perspective. So. Darryl would tell you that joining the chemical industry was natural. It came as part of a family legacy.
Um, but one of the things that's really critical to his career and critical to other people's careers is an openness to continuous learning and reaching, growing your career, taking opportunities and always being open to learning something new and doing something new. So. Lots of great nuggets of wisdom in this episode with Daryl. Um, I think you're really going to enjoy it. So enjoy the episode. Thank you for joining us on today's episode of the chemical show.
Keep listening, keep following, keep sharing, and we will talk with you again soon.
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Hi, this is Victoria Meyer. Welcome back to The Chemical Show. Today, I am speaking with Daryl Roberts, who is the Chief Engineering and Operations Officer for DuPont. We are at ACC's Responsible Care and Sustainability Conference. So our conversation is going to center on that a little bit, as well as maybe a few other questions. Daryl, thanks for joining me.
Well, thanks. It's great to be here with you today.
Yeah, excited to meet you and to spend time with you. Let's talk about your career. What got you into the chemical industry and to where you are now?
Well, no question that, uh, that comes from my upbringing. My, my father was a production operator at Eastman Kodak, uh, back in the day when, uh, people actually took pictures on a camera and got them developed, you know, to tell people have been around for a certain number of years. What a photo Matt booth is, which many people don't remember any longer. But yeah, I grew up with the father who worked in the industry.
Uh, working shift work, uh, was, uh, uh, really focused on me being, uh, educated, uh, and really use this position to really push me to go to school, uh, that led me into chemical engineering. I spent a little bit of time in the service as a chemical officer.
So my expertise from the military and from an upbringing standpoint really kind of led me to the industry that it just felt like I always should have been a part of, and I've been a part of it working for a number of companies from Eastman Kodak to Arkema to DuPont. But I'm kind of a lifelong, you know, process chemistry, process operations, materials person. It's been a great career and provided me a way to support my family and my kids.
And it's been just been a great experience and I've met as I've kind of grown.
That's really cool. Okay. And by the way, side note, have any of your kids followed you into the chemical industry?
Uh, I've got two that are both in college. The oldest is in marketing. I don't know what she's going to do. The youngest is in the civil engineering program at Purdue. So I didn't get her to chemical engineering, but I got her to civil and I'll have to take that as a victory.
Absolutely. That's a win. That's a win.
Yes.
Great. So we're, we're here and we're talking a lot this week about, um, responsible care. So tell me what responsible care means to you and to DuPont.
Yeah. Part of the reason that, uh, I came to work at DuPont is because it was very aligned with my personal beliefs and values, uh, around, uh, how we operate, how we think about employee safety, how we think about the environments in which we operate and the trust that communities have, uh, with us and trust that we have to earn and keep, uh, by operating in a way that allows them to feel like, uh, they don't mind us being in the community and actually see us as a partner from the education
standpoint, from the support, of everything from what we do, uh, from volunteer standpoint to us providing jobs. All of those things, which are just really important. So, so DuPont. Believes in that.
And when I think about responsible care, it really focuses around that us being able to work in a community that values us that knows that we value them that we value not only our employees and contractor safety but we value their safety and the safety in the environment, uh, which we share with them. And it is something we have to earn Uh, and it's something we have to work at every day.
Yeah, that's cool. And in fact, as you say that, it makes me reflect my first experience with DuPont as a company, um, and interacting with some DuPont staff. Safety is what I would say, right? Like this real awareness of the necessary safety of the workplace, of product handling, et cetera. So that's, so it's, you know, part of the DNA.
Yeah. I think that's true. If you go back through the history of the company, you know. Uh, DuPont started off with a pretty, uh, big explosion five or 10 years after operation, uh, when we were just making gunpowder. And from that came a focus on safety going forward from the DuPont family. And it stayed with the brand through all of these years and some of the original OSHA. Uh, kind of processes and policies came from, uh, DuPont, uh, systems that, that were developed through, uh, the 1900s.
So it's, it's just in the DNA of the company, uh, and it's something that, that is unwavering.
That's really cool. When we think about sustainability, cause that's the other flip side of this, right? Responsible care is kind of the, the interaction, but sustainability is another interaction that we have. What are employees and customers? And how is DuPont navigating those priorities?
Yeah, so, so first DuPont thinks about sustainability in really three pillars. The first one is innovate and 80 percent of our product offerings, uh, drive towards something that will help with sustainability and solve global problems. The second is protect, which really kind of aligns perfectly with responsible care.
Uh, and the third is empower, which is what we do around empowering communities, empowering our employees, driving from a diversity standpoint, uh, in the things that we do and the things that we value. So that's kind of how we're structured, you know, our employees. Expect us to treat people right.
And like I said, to be part of the communities in which we operate because that's where they live, uh, our employees, especially, you know, those that have started in the last 5 to 10 years, they don't want to work for a company that doesn't really value sustainability, uh, especially because some have a negative connotation to the chemical industry. But that's without knowing us and knowing what we do and who we are.
Uh, so it's really important that when we go to speak to students that are potential hires, that we can speak about our values and we can speak about sustainability, the things that we're doing to reduce our greenhouse gas footprint, the things that we're doing to provide safe water for people around the world, the things that we're doing, uh, to drive, uh, uh, EVs. with some of our products.
So the things that we do are very well engaged with sustainability So we've got to be able to talk about it. So for our employees and our communities It's really central to what we do and our portfolio really is focused on sustainable solutions and almost across the board.
So it's really helpful to be able to not only talk about what we do from an individual standpoint, but to talk about how what we're innovating the things that we're thinking about are really aligned with the things that they value.
Do you have some examples that you could share?
Sure. If you look at, uh, a EV today in the things that you're doing to, to lightweight vehicles, Uh, and to reduce the, the greenhouse footprint of, of our automobiles. Uh, we make materials, uh, that are auto adhesives, which go into electric batteries. Uh, we make materials, Capton is a, example that go into the winds and motors. Uh, so we've got a number of products which go into EV. So we're, we're very much on that uh, in the spectrum there.
We do a lot of things around the semiconductor chips that you need to be able to power all of these devices today. We focus very much on that. Those are some great examples where a big company when it comes to water filtration. Uh, from a municipal standpoint and putting in, uh, things that allow you to, uh, to have clean water around the world. So those are some, I think some really great examples of our portfolio.
Yeah. Things that people don't necessarily think about when they think about chemicals and do you want that, uh, are really affecting everyday life and making it better?
Absolutely. Yeah. And you know, the other example I would give you is around, uh, we have a portfolio that are around really kind of our shelter. So insulation for houses, the Tyvek wrap that everybody knows when you drive by and you see it going up on houses. Uh, but we really can consider that part of it as well. If you think about the need for safe living around the world.
So you talked a little bit earlier today, um, about operations and how your, how DuPont is harnessing data and AI to, um, drive sustainability and operations. Can you talk about that a little bit more?
Yeah. I mean, boy, I think you're going to get left behind if that's not what you're focused on today. Right? Right. So, so we really feel like the use and harness of data. is really key for us to continue to operate safe and to get safer as we go forward. Uh, and how do we take data that before would have been too hard to collect and use it in a way which lets us not just Uh, to, uh, solve issues after they happen, but to be predictive.
So we're, we're doing, I think, a really good job at our intelligent predictive maintenance system to take data on, you know, pumps that may not be operating right.
They're overheating, they're cavitating, uh, and to have signals that we now send up into the cloud and let third parties look at not only our data, but data from other companies, uh, and put that data together and be able to call us now and say, Hey, We're looking at thousands of these across the world and we can tell you this thing's about to fail. And we know that when we're operating in non standard conditions, that's when processes go bad.
That's when environmental deviances, uh, deviances happen, uh, that's when people get hurt. So anything that we can do to understand when equipment's not running right, uh, and, and stop it and correct it before it fails is a, is a big piece of operating safe, safety within our community.
So it's something we think a lot about, and now, and then the next step is how do we, we use AI and add AI even further into that by taking those, you know, uh, everything from a procedure and now transmitting it into 17 different languages using AI very quickly and effectively, uh, to now taking that procedure and letting operators have the ability to be able to ask questions and to be able for AI to look at our procedures, to look at our past incidences, uh, To look at outside data, like
incidents that have happened at other companies and really give an operator some view of what might be wrong and use that to try to correct. That's just, that's so powerful and something we couldn't have done five or 10 years ago, but those types of things are on the forefront of the way we think about the future.
Yeah, absolutely. And it's amazing. I think about, you know, early in my career working in manufacturing, we did a lot of logs. The operator logs were on paper. Right. Right. Right. And so it was only as good as could you flip back any pages to see what else was happening. So, uh, the use of data is just really accelerating those opportunities. Yeah.
And now the operators, uh, have that data. They can go back and take a look. They can look at the best. The best run we ever had and what the temperatures and pressure should be and compare it. And if something doesn't look right, the system is telling them immediately. It's also sending a alert to a engineer at home and saying, Hey, I think you should call and check in because I see something in the process data that doesn't look normal and your operators might need your support.
So being able to connect data to people is really important and those are the things I think will really be helpful going.
That's really great. And when you think about that, how does this affect your future workforce in terms of skills and what you're looking for, for the future employees of DuPont?
Sure. I think, I mean, there's two parts of that one, you know, I don't want people to be scared about the use of data because we're going to need employees, uh, and we're going to need a lot of them. And we're gonna need them to be trained well, and we're gonna put time into making sure we train people right. AI will help us train and help us get better. It will be a good assist to our operators of the future. But but we're gonna need them. So, first of all, like, I'll start there.
You know, if you think about the skills that you need, it really kind of goes to the conversation we just had. You've got to be able to work with data. You can't be scared of data. Uh, so we're going to help teach you those things, but coming in with the comfort with using computers, looking at data, and being comfortable that we're going to, we're going to train you uh, to understand the trends and what they mean, but you should feel empowered to take action.
So if you see something that we don't feel is safe, we want people that can stand up and say, I'm not doing this, there's something here that's not right, and we're going to take a step back until we figure out what it is. So, we're looking for people that are, that are strong in their conviction that know what our core values are, uh, that are going to lead by those, uh, but can use data and are comfortable really leading because we expect all of our employees to be leaders.
It doesn't matter who works for you to be a leader. Leaders are people who make decisions, right? Absolutely. So we expect everyone to have those types of traits. Those are the people we're really looking for.
That's great. So, so Daryl, you've obviously had a great career in the industry. You've. Reach some very senior levels and then areas of opportunities of influence and leadership. What do you, you know, what's the leadership lessons that you've learned along the way? And then that's part one. And then part two is what advice would you give to somebody who wants to replicate your career?
Yeah, well, that's an interesting question. You know, there's, there's been so many learnings because there's been so many failures, right? Uh, and that's how you learn. So I would tell people to take chances.
Uh, you know, it's important that when people give you opportunities to stretch yourself and work in an area that you haven't worked in in the past, that you take the time to do so, because I think that's where the learning happens when you're working, you know, in a field or an area that's not comfortable for you. So I'm a chemical engineer that also took opportunities to work in E. H. S. And got some experience of that and took the time to work in supply chain and learn what it means.
You know where the product goes when you're shipping it. And that's helped me as I've grown because it's allowed me to have a very diverse view of what operations mean. So So for me, that's important. That's those have been some of the lessons for me. So that goes along with what I would tell people is find a way to continue your education. It doesn't have to be formal, there's all types of ways.
It can be taking a class online, it can be signing up for a training program that the company offers. It can be getting on and finding something on YouTube about something that you just wanted to learn more about. And it can be anything from how you lead people to how a centrifugal pump works right? And I've always been interested in those things and learning and having that kind of lifelong learning mindset, I think is really important.
I think when you have that mindset, people notice and they tend to give you opportunities to do more because they know that you're, uh, you're really thinking about, about what's next and how you develop yourself and how you develop others around you. So, um, Those would be some of the things I think about.
Awesome. Thank you. Well, Darrell, thank you for joining us today. This has been a really great conversation.
Well, great. Thank you. Appreciate the time.
Absolutely.
Thank you for joining us on today's episode of the chemical show. Keep listening, keep following, keep sharing, and we will talk with you again soon.
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