All Features
Jon Finerty
In today’s highly competitive business environment, a trusted supply chain that functions seamlessly is essential. Even small errors can affect the entire supply chain, resulting in lost revenue, unsatisfied customers, and irreparable damage to your brand.
Now more than ever, companies need the…
Stephanie Ojeda
Effective complaint handling is fundamental to life-sciences quality management, with implications for operations, product design, risk management, and more.
It’s also critical to ISO 9001, FDA Quality System Regulation (QSR), and EU Medical Device Regulation (MDR) compliance.
Manufacturers that…
Selena Rezvani
Have you ever had one of those career moments where you felt like you’d made it? A moment of proof that you’d finally earned a spot at the cool or important table?
I remember mine vividly.
I was invited to a leadership awards event to accept an honor alongside many strong businesswomen I admired…
Ken Voytek
It’s time for U.S. manufacturers to focus on productivity or they will lose their long-term advantage. Productivity is fundamentally about increasing output rather than decreasing costs and inputs while output remains static. We faced this challenge during the 1980s and 1990s but didn’t learn much…
Wayne Schaefer
Industrial machine-vision systems use high-resolution cameras, image-processing algorithms, and artificial intelligence to enhance quality control, automate inspections, and optimize production processes with precision and efficiency.
Implementing vision systems spans applications such as 2D…
Mike Figliuolo
Twice in the last week I’ve heard about “idiot bosses.” Being the inquisitive guy I am, I probed for the root cause of such comments. Rather than simply asking what the cause is, I decided to address the symptoms first.
Q: “Tell me more about this idiot boss.”
A: “I’m so fed up with him. He’s…
Mike Figliuolo
It’s a great time of year. Beautiful weather, flowers blooming, and 110 bags of mulch to be spread tell you it’s spring. Now is when we traditionally clean our homes and yards. It’s also a great time to clean up your work and professional life.
Face it: We’re creatures of habit and averse to…
Evan Milberg
The year is 2033: The owner of a planned high-rise in a big city is looking to build prefabricated modules with recyclable, low-carbon materials. Work is expected to begin as soon as possible, so the contractor can’t afford to spend a great deal of time figuring out how much of each material will…
Mike Morini
Following the turmoil of the pandemic, many salaried employees have had the opportunity to work remotely and enjoy newfound flexibility in their day-to-day work lives. For many, the ability to be more in control over where and when they work has been life-changing, enabling them to find better work…
Taran March @ Quality Digest
As part of last year’s Masters Summit, hosted by the quality software specialists at MasterControl, Jeff Dewar, Quality Digest’s publisher, approached a few attendees for some candid comments. Since most people there were quality professionals of one sort or another, he cast a wide net and simply…
William A. Levinson
Time value of money calculations, including net present value analysis, is important when selecting projects and investments. The calculations are part of the body of knowledge for some of ASQ’s certification exams. They also go a long way toward explaining exactly what happened to Silicon Valley…
Etienne Nichols
Medical device companies must have established risk management processes that comply with ISO 14971. It doesn’t matter whether you’re developing medical devices in the U.S., EU, Canada, or elsewhere. Every international regulatory agency you’ve ever heard of accepts ISO 14971.
ISO 14971 is a good…
Anders Rasmussen
Enterprise resource planning (ERP), product life cycle management (PLM), and customer relationship management (CRM) systems were transformative when they were first developed. They made it possible for businesses to establish centralized data repositories for customer, product, or financial…
Kate Zabriskie
‘They reduce our bonus if our calls go longer than three minutes. I’m not going to lie; I start talking faster at the 90-second mark.”
“She asked me to suggest ideas, so I did. I now have a whole bunch of extra work to do. It’s the last time I’m opening my mouth. I didn’t realize offering an idea…
Chengyi Lin
Although the days of fully remote work may be over, many employees have expressed a desire for flexible work arrangements. But with Covid-19 no longer a global health emergency, more organizations could demand that people return to the office—setting the scene for an inevitable tug-of-war.
Some…
Jake Mazulewicz
Wildland firefighters. Air traffic controllers. Flight deck crews of aircraft carriers. Operators of nuclear power plants and the national bulk electric grid. These are among the safest and most reliable work teams in the world. And they don’t try to eliminate all errors and surprises.
Decades of…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
