All Features
ASQ
(ASQ: Milwaukee) -- The ASQ Inspection Division has announced the recipients of the 2020 H. James Harrington Scholarship.
This fund scholarship was created to help ASQ division members, their family or friends defray the costs associated with college expenses. Scholarship funds are dispersed to…
Amber Dance, Knowable Magazine
This story was originally published by Knowable Magazine.
As Covid-19 cases fill the hospitals, among the sickest and most likely to die are those whose bodies react in a signature, catastrophic way. Immune cells flood and attack the lungs they should be protecting. Blood vessels leak; the blood…
Jay Arthur—The KnowWare Man
Story update 5/6/2020: The charts and some data have been updated to reflect the data available on the date this article was published.
During the Covid-19 stay-at-home order in Colorado, I've become increasingly frustrated by Covid-19 charts. Most of what I see are cumulative column charts, which…
Michael Dehoyos
The amount of risk that one is exposed to when running a business is vast. Some risks may result in severe legal or financial trouble or cause the business to shut down. Mitigating these risks is a major aspect of successfully running a business.
Every aspect of a business has certain risk factors…
H. James Harrington
(Harrington Management Systems: Los Gatos, CA) -- H. James Harrington and William S. Ruggles have released their book Project Management for Performance Improvement Teams.
“We believe this book can be very valuable to you and your organization,” say the authors. “One of the highest failure rates…
Julius DeSilva
ISO 9001 certifications have seen a decline during the past two years, per data from ISO. Some say the standard has gotten too complicated with the introduction of organizational context, risk-based thinking, and the removal of mandatory documented procedures. Even a few of QMII’s clients have…
Bruce Hamilton
Most lean folks use 5 Whys daily to problem solve, but relatively few are familiar with a clever problem-solving device developed 30 years ago by Deming Prize winner Ryuji Fukuda, called the why-not diagram.
Because objection is a natural human response to new ideas, Fukuda created the why-not…
Kathleen Wybourn
Business continuity is a relatively simple idea. Plan ahead so you can keep your business successful during times of difficulty. Key management transitions, loss of a major customer, the impact of a lawsuit, perhaps a fire or an earthquake. But what if that “difficulty” is a global public health…
Donald J. Wheeler, Al Pfadt
Each day we receive data that seek to quantify the Covid-19 pandemic. These daily values tell us how things have changed from yesterday, and give us the current totals, but they are difficult to understand simply because they are only a small piece of the puzzle. And like pieces of a puzzle, data…
Del Williams
We are all familiar with flash memory storage devices, the inexpensive “thumb” drives that you stick into your laptop to store and transfer data. However, there are much more rugged industrial flash drives that perform mission-critical storage functions built into systems that you rely on almost…
Quality Digest
Marketing is all about having a clear vision. To many, that means understanding what you want to see happen, and how you plan to accomplish it.
As important as that is, however, a different and much more imperative vision must come first: the vision of your potential customers and their perception…
Stanislav Shekshnia
Corporate boards across Europe are reacting to the coronavirus pandemic in three ways. For some, it’s business as usual. “Crisis is the business of the CEO; the board does not need to adjust its workings,” the chair of one such board told me. Other boards are going in the opposite direction,…
Jennifer Chu
The brain is one of our most vulnerable organs, as soft as the softest tofu. Brain implants, on the other hand, are typically made from metal and other rigid materials that, over time, can cause inflammation and the buildup of scar tissue.
MIT engineers are working on developing soft, flexible…
Olympus
(Olympus: Waltham, MA) -- With similar functionality as a standard videoscope insertion tube, the IPLEX NX working channel scope is a useful backup while offering the versatility to detect and remove foreign object debris (FOD).
A versatile tool for foreign object debris (FOD) and visual…
Naphtali Hoff
Since rolling out my “four-step” productivity plan, I have seen the need to include an added step that focuses on leadership. After all, if we are going to get more from our people, we need to use our leadership position to motivate others, create a healthy work environment, and engage others in…
The Hechinger Report
Students generally learn about moles, atoms, compounds, and the intricacies of the periodic table in college, but Daniel Fried is convinced kids can learn complex biochemistry topics as early as elementary school.
Fried is an assistant professor of chemistry at Saint Peter’s University in New…
Stephanie Parker, Knowable Magazine
This story was originally published by Knowable Magazine.
An anthropologist looks at the myriad ways we link food to place—and whether it really could make a difference.
“Local food” is a term loaded with virtue for many people. Some with environmental concerns lean toward local because food…
ERP Solutions
(ERP Solutions: Chanhassen, MN) -- ERP Solutions Inc., a world leader in advanced quality management solutions (QMS) for Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations, announces v. 3.0 of its QMS solution, Total Quality Control Management (TQCM). The new release incorporates additional functionality and…
ETQ LLC
(ETQ: Boston) -- ETQ, a leading provider of quality management solutions, released findings from a first-of-its-kind research study–“The State of Quality Management: 2020.” According to the survey, companies are investing more in quality as a strategic business growth initiative that brings a…
William A. Levinson
The phrase “flatten the curve” means to slow the transmission of the coronavirus (Covid-19) in order to spread the total number of cases out over a longer period of time. This will avoid overwhelming the healthcare system.1 The model is accurate as presented throughout the internet, but it also…
David Dubois, Joanna Teoh
From AI-enabled chatbots to ads based on individuals’ search or social media activities, digital data offer novel ways to connect with customers. These connections can develop into intimate customer relationships that boost satisfaction, engagement, and ultimately, loyalty. Consider Netflix’s…
Knowledge at Wharton
When the Mosaic browser, with its consumer-friendly interface, was released to the world in 1993, most had no idea how radically this first foray into the internet era would transform our lives, both personally and professionally. As humans, we are generally poor at detecting and acting on early…
The Un-Comfort Zone With Robert Wilson
I was shocked to see that I had to walk through a maze of stacked pallets in order to enter the store. Then I saw a man spraying the shopping carts with some chemical, and I felt a chill run down my spine. Once I got inside, I noticed that almost everyone was wearing surgical masks and rubber…
Mike Figliuolo
Projects go off the rails all the time. Some statistics I’ve seen say only one in eight projects can truly be declared a success. Why are we so horrible at executing projects, especially when we have all these “tried and true” project management methodologies?
There are seven deadly killers of…
Bill Kalmar
Have you noticed that coupons have become a major part of our lives? There are always coupons for restaurants or stores in most of the newspapers these days. And it seems that every day, we receive an email about a deal at a local store, but it requires a coupon.
Last month was my birthday month,…
