All Features
Aaron Heinrich, MetalForming
In metal stamping, especially in critical automotive applications, sometimes it’s not enough simply to close the control loop. Traditional control algorithms rely on eliminating an error between what is happening—as indicated by feedback from system sensors—and what should happen. High-speed motion…
Dave Gilson
Many people think of negotiation as a fight, but it’s really about collaboration, Margaret Neale explains to me as we begin our walk. “What negotiation is, to me, is joint problem-solving. Let’s find a solution to a problem that we’re facing.”
Right now, the problem Neale and I face is how to get…
Bob Ferrone
Industry stands at a new frontier of how organizations will be structured. With rapid advancements in technology, changing consumer behaviors, and the emergence of new business models, businesses are being forced to adapt and evolve to remain competitive. Businesses are also focusing more on…
Jeanne Quimby
As I sat with my 7-year-old son for more than an hour in front of an abstract painting, I saw what appeared to be black paint thrown onto a white canvas.
My son loves abstract paintings. He was explaining to me how much I was missing by just looking at the paint color. I hadn’t seen the energy…
Donald J. Wheeler
The keys to effective process behavior charts are rational sampling and rational subgrouping. As implied by the word rational, we must use our knowledge of the context to collect and organize data in a way that answers the interesting questions. This column will show the role that sample frequency…
Matt Fieldman
German manufacturing is a powerhouse, fueling 21 percent of the country’s economy and contributing nearly $1.4 trillion in exports. Given these facts, we in the MEP National Network have been studying Germany’s vocational educational training (VET) program, which most of us call apprenticeships, by…
Ophir Ronen
From the health histories of patients to the effectiveness of different healthcare services, hospitals are sitting on a treasure trove of historical data. Unfortunately, most of these data go unused, often because they are so difficult to store or format for actionable use.
Due to inconsistencies…
Jacob Bourne
Producing products quickly, efficiently, and at low cost is a focal point for the manufacturing sector. There are several technologies that companies are using to achieve those goals, including high-performance computing (HPC) and supercomputing. The allure of cheap design and production…
Gleb Tsipursky
Many leaders, driven by memories of pre-pandemic times, believe that forcing employees to return to the office will naturally lead to mentoring and development. For example, consider what Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said in spring 2023 on the On With Kara Swisher podcast after the company demanded…
Nathan Furr
When top Amazon executives were debating in the mid-2000s whether to greenlight Kindle, the now ubiquitous e-reader, sparks flew in the boardroom. Jeff Wilke, CEO of Amazon’s retail business at the time, openly challenged Jeff Bezos in front of the board. Wilke argued the venture would fail because…
Massoud Pedram
Superconductors make highly efficient electronics, but the ultralow temperatures and ultrahigh pressures required to make them work are costly and difficult to implement. Room-temperature superconductors promise to change that.
The recent announcement by researchers at the University of Rochester…
Jennifer V. Miller
Many people think they can’t say no on the job. They tell me, “It’s just not acceptable.” They say it’s because they work in a “can do” culture. Or, they work for a boss who is pure evil. They’re afraid they’ll lose their jobs if they don’t try to do everything humanly possible to bring in one more…
Vanessa Bates Ramirez
Since OpenAI’s release of ChatGPT in November 2022, the buzz around generative AI has been steadily ramping up. Some are excited about its potential to transform the way we work, create, and live, while others are wary of the dangers it poses and the nefarious ways it can be used. We know that…
Tina Behers
If the last few years have taught us anything, it’s how quickly—and drastically—things can change in business. Indeed, organizations have been in an almost constant state of change through the ebbs and flows of the pandemic and its new work models, the fluctuating economy, and labor challenges…
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
On the grounds of the University of Maine’s Advanced Structures and Composites Center sits the nation’s first additively manufactured home made entirely from biobased materials—BioHome3D. The 600 sq ft home, the result of a collaboration between Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and the…
Harish Jose
I’m looking at a topic in statistics. I’ve had a lot of feedback on one of my earlier posts on OC curves and how one can use them to generate a reliability/confidence statement based on sample size (n), and rejects (c). I provided an Excel spreadsheet that calculates the reliability/confidence…
Nellie Wartoft
Diverse teams are an essential asset to any business. According to a Forbes article, “Companies with a diverse workforce are 35 percent more likely to experience greater financial returns than their non-diverse counterparts.” This is because heterogeneous teams can provide greater insight into a…
Martin Cottam
It’s tempting to attribute the increased profile now given to occupational health and safety (OH&S) to the Covid-19 pandemic. But while in many organizations the pandemic shone a spotlight on OH&S management, there are other issues that will keep OH&S at the fore throughout the next…
Alonso Diaz, Maria DiBari
The pandemic has sparked a shift in many business models around the world, especially in the MedTech industry. The old manual labor model has sharply transitioned into businesses leaning on digitization and remote working models to cut costs, innovate, discover new drugs, enhance clinical trials,…
Emily Newton
It’s increasingly common for today’s warehouse managers to pursue robotic material-handling solutions. That approach can boost productivity, reduce injury rates, and enable companies to adjust to changing demands. However, before company decision-makers choose what kind of robots they want, they…
Megan Wallin-Kerth
The ability to observe relationships, patterns, and environment may be deemed a “soft” skill, but there’s plenty of hard data supporting the power of observation in the workplace. After all, observation is the sometimes overlooked first step in the scientific method: Make an observation, and from…
Scott Knoche
A very popular version of the coordinate measuring machine (CMM) is the portable CMM “arm,” not to be confused with the “robotic arm” or simply, robot—as it is called in the factory automation world. Robots are motorized, machine-driven devices that have tube segments connected by articulating…
Sharon McDougall
Although the coronavirus pandemic changed the working lives of employees around the world, closing workplaces and transforming dining tables into professional workstations, it also gave employees a chance to time out and recharge from the hustle and bustle associated with office working.
The…
Tami Trout
It’s time for a digital workforce transformation. Modern manufacturers must juggle evolving expectations for workplace flexibility, pay, career paths, and benefits. They also have to take into account the changes in the ways employees learn and access information. The most obvious example of this…
Mark Hembree
Now that AI is an acronym that doesn’t really need to be spelled out (artificial intelligence, just in case you’ve been off the planet the last couple of years), we are hearing and understanding more about its various applications and capabilities.
I’m not an early adapter, but I do recall midway…
