All Features
Matthew Barsalou
A recent Business Insider article discussed Marie Kondo’s wildly popular book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up (Ten Speed Press, 2014). The book is intended for decluttering homes, but the same principles can be applied in the workplace.
For example, we’re told to place all of our books in…
Quality Transformation With David Schwinn
I recently had a dream in which Adrian Bass, a colleague and friend for whom I have much admiration, asked me why I still care about quality management after all these years.
You can substitute Six Sigma for quality management because, in my mind, they are both part of a larger belief system that…
Shuo Wang
As a buyer of manufactured goods in China, how many suppliers do you use for production? Have you ever considered your supplier development strategy? Or, maybe you don’t really have a strategy for developing suppliers. If you’re accustomed to utilizing multiple suppliers, satisfied by the benefits…
Annette Franz
In the world of customer experience, what’s the difference between outside-in and inside-out?
Inside-out thinking means your focus is on processes, systems, tools, and products that are designed and implemented based on internal thinking and intuition. The customer’s needs, jobs, and perspectives…
Mike Figliuolo
Great leaders get the best out of their teams by providing 12 core leadership “services.” The best leaders provide these services in an efficient and effective way.
Every leader wants to give their team all the help they need—help that can come in many forms. How do leaders help their team…
Bob Emiliani
In his book, Toyota Production System (Productivity Press, 1988), the original in Japanese was Toyota Production Method (Diamond Inc., 1978), Taiichi Ohno said:
“The tool used to operate the system is kanban, an idea I got from American supermarkets…. A supermarket is where a customer can get (1…
Ryan E. Day
If you don’t think the Internet of Things (IoT) matters, you’re wrong. If you don’t think the IoT is a big deal—a really big deal—you’re really wrong. Emerging technology that revolutionizes how information is shared and used disrupts many a well-entrenched business paradigm. Don’t think so? Ask…
The inspection and characterization of machine parts is still subject to research. Although optical means of measurement are very promising in respect to speed and precision, they are still not capable of measuring difficult-to-reach inner geometries. In this article, we will demonstrate our …
Jess Scheer
I have a secret: I have the worst sense of direction of anyone I’ve ever known.
I used to hide this personal failing because I feared it would undermine my professional standing. As a process consultant, I’m supposed to be the guy that shows you how to most efficiently get from Point A to Point B…
Fred Schenkelberg
Just, please, plot the data if you have gathered some time-to-failure data, or you have the breakdown dates for a piece of equipment. Any data really. It could be your review of your car maintenance records and notes and dates of repairs. You may have some data from field returns. You have a group…
Michael Causey
A new Government Accounting Office (GAO) report, designed to shed light on what effect the medical device tax will have on the industry in the future, might have done a better job of taking us under the industry’s financial hood.
The GAO, the nonpartisan counting-house arm of the federal…
Jason Furness
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very manager, business owner, or executive has had to deal with projects that fail to deliver. Our days are filled with activities that are the consequences of poorly conceived, poorly executed, and poorly tested projects—most noticeably during a new product launch.
The days leading up to a…
Bruce Hamilton
Summer is here and that means a family vacation to the beach, the boardwalk, and the Hamilton’s favorite pizza place. We all agree that Manco’s pizza is the best anywhere, but we differ on the reason why.
My brother, Geoff, thinks it’s the cheese—aged white cheddar in place of mozzarella. My son…
Arun Hariharan
Peter Drucker once said, "The most important, and indeed the truly unique, contribution of management in the 20th century was the fifty-fold increase in the productivity of the manual worker in manufacturing. The most important contribution management needs to make in the 21st century is similarly…
William A. Levinson
Risk-based thinking, or “actions to address risks and opportunities,” is among the most significant additions to ISO 9001:2015. This provision encompasses what we currently call preventive action, or proactive actions that prevent poor quality before it happens.
Corrective action for poor quality…
Eston Martz
Statisticians say the darnedest things. At least, that’s how it can seem if you’re not well-versed in statistics.
When I began studying statistics, I approached it as a language. I quickly noticed that, compared to other disciplines, statistics has some unique problems with terminology. These are…
Annette Franz
Do you think that the speed of innovation is too fast for your customers? Or just right? Do you know how your customers feel about the pace?
I was reading about the 2015 Edelman Trust Barometer the other day and saw this finding: “More than half of the global informed public believe that the pace…
Gorur N. Sridhar
Quality and Six Sigma are often considered as links in a chain. For example, when quality is poor, many times the immediate response is, “Let’s improve it using Six Sigma.” But does Six Sigma, or any other program for that matter, really improve quality? Or, are they simply mirrors to let us know…
Joel Smith
Just 100 years ago, very few statistical tools were available and the field was largely unknown. Since then, there has been an explosion in available tools, as well as ever-increasing awareness and use of statistics.
Although most readers of this column are looking to pick up new tools or improve…
Mark Rosenthal
In his TEDx talk, Josh Kaufman, author of The First 20 Hours (Portfolio, 2013), outlines his theory of learning a new skill. One of his key points is the prevailing belief that you have to spend 10,000 hours practicing a skill to become good at it.
This equates to more than five years of practice…
John Flaig
I have discussed the economics of project management numerous times in presentations all over the country, and based on the response to my message, I have to conclude that many people just don’t get it.
Let me again sound the wake-up call with a quote from V. S. Liebhold, co-author of the article…
Jack Dunigan
Jason is a principal officer in a city office of a large consulting firm. The regional vice president recently met with him to offer a position as a district manager. For two hours or so the regional guy talked about the district, its strengths, its few weaknesses, and offered Jason the job. It…
Randall D’Amico
Story update 8/6/2015: Paragraph 14 of this article stated "many organizations are ill-equipped to develop an effective risk management assessment process," implying, to some, that a risk management system is required, which as stated in paragraph 8 of this article, it is not (nor was that the…
Ryan E. Day
“The experiments we’re undertaking today will lead to an all-new model of transportation and mobility within the next 10 years and beyond.” —Mark Fields, president and CEO, Ford Motor Co.
Mark Fields delivered those somewhat prophetic words at the official grand opening of Ford’s Research and…
TE Connectivity
Connectors and lead wires provide the electrical connection between the coils of an LVDT position sensor and signal conditioning electronics. Choosing between a connector and lead wires, when specifying an LVDT or other sensor, often depends on the application and its environment.
Below are some…
