All Features
Dirk Dusharme @ Quality Digest
For most of us, food safety is a topic that, at best, only lurks at the edges of our brains. It rarely becomes something we really think about until we open up our refrigerator and try to figure out what’s growing in the back corner of the bottom shelf, or until we hear stories about people being…
The QA Pharm
People often ask me how best to prepare for a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) inspection when you know that you have problems. My first response is that they have already taken the first step: acknowledging that there are problems. Believe me; that is a huge first step. Just like Alcoholics…
Bruce Hamilton
A couple years ago, I was consulting in a large rolling mill to help reduce late deliveries to its customers. After walking the floor for the first time with an enthusiastic 20-something engineer (let’s call him Mark), I asked for help with observation at a particular point in the factory where…
100 Customer Service Tips by Larry Williams
There are times when we make decisions at work that are more personal in nature. To us, they may seem harmless because they are not intended to interfere with our day-to-day activities on the job. Although sometimes done with the best of intentions, these decisions can also hamper our efforts to…
Quality Digest
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eginning last week with “This Year in Quality, Part One,” the editors of Quality Digest Daily took a look at its stories and news articles throughout 2010 and collected what we thought were the most remarkable in the world of quality. From precision measurement to 3-D scanning, from Six Sigma…
The Un-Comfort Zone With Robert Wilson
The other day on the radio I heard these lyrics from the song, “If You Only Knew,” by Shinedown, “It’s 4:03 and I can’t sleep… I toss and turn like the sea.” I thought, “Yeah, why is it always 4 a.m. that I wake up when I’m worried about something?” The singer of this top 10 pop rock song was…
Taran March @ Quality Digest
Pharmaceutical manufacturer Johnson & Johnson, which for decades has enjoyed a trusted reputation for soothing babies and overcoming head colds, is currently facing criminal investigation by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The company’s McNeil Consumer Healthcare unit closed a…
Mike Richman
Yes, it happened again. According to a recent Associated Press story, drinking glasses produced in China, featuring comic and superhero characters, have been discovered to contain extremely high levels of lead. Excessive amounts of cadmium were revealed in the glasses as well.
This has been a…
Digital pen technology is an efficient data management solution that offers better operational visibility, enabling manufacturers to react quickly to the production process and respond to issues via immediate data access. Hyla Soft’s FactoryScribe is a lightweight web application built around…
Nikon Metrology Inc.
(Nikon Metrology: Brighton, MI) -- Process Sciences Inc. (PSI), a process engineering resource center, runs X-ray inspections to trace connectivity issues in electronic circuitry that otherwise remain hidden to the eye. Using intuitive, real-time X-ray imaging, PSI collaborates with original…
Mike Martyn
For Starbucks, the world’s leading retailer, roaster, and brand of speciality coffee, 2008 was a tough year. Amid a struggling economy and increased competition from cheaper rivals, the company’s net income during the first three months of the year fell 28 percent compared to the same period in…
100 Customer Service Tips by Larry Williams
If you’re like most people, you probably plan out a good portion of your day-to-day activities. Even in our off time, we generally make plans to go on vacation, to the movies, and out to dinner; it’s not often that we simply “wing it.” So why would you do so at work? Like the late actor Dennis…
A new year always brings new hope, new plans, and new perspectives. While looking ahead is the most direct route to progress, looking back is essential to understanding the present. After all, the past creates the consequences that will shape the future.
With this in mind, the editors of…
Akhilesh Gulati
A friend recently returned from a visit to China; his company had been acquired by a Chinese organization and he had gone there as part of the mutual due diligence. Not only did he come back impressed by their lower manufacturing costs but also with their technological advancements. While we in…
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icromachining and micromolding are fabrication technologies used for developing devices and components at the micro-to-macro scale. To provide quality control at this scale, manufacturers must be able to inspect various surface measurements, including roughness, area, and dimension. Surface…
Donald J. Wheeler
In my July column, “Where Do Manufacturing Specifications Come From?” we found that the intraclass correlation coefficient is the natural measure of relative utility. This measure is theoretically sound and easy to explain. This column will look at how to use the intraclass correlation to…
100 Customer Service Tips by Larry Williams
Mother always said, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” This is great advice for a number of work-related conditions that can have a serious effect on your reputation and employment. When faced with the opportunity to speak or stay silent, consider the following…
Minitab LLC
ResMed is a global manufacturer of medical devices. The company’s products help people with sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) and other respiratory disorders. Characterized by the interruption of normal breathing patterns during sleep, an estimated 18 million people in the United States suffer from…
On Sept. 4, 2010, an earthquake that registered 7.1 on the Richter scale rocked Christchurch, New Zealand. It lasted 40 seconds but felt more like 40 minutes. This was the worst experience l’ve ever been through, but I managed to stay in bed (yes, I hid under the covers).
I live in the city’s…
Michael R. Frecks
Managing point data sets is already a concern for clients. Now the surveying industry promotes its efficiency at the cost of best practices with a million-point-per-second milestone. Check out the article, “Optech Breaks 1m/sec Barrier,” in the Oct. 5, 2010, issue of SparView. I liken this…
Jon Miller
The Toyota Production System (TPS) house diagram is often drawn with a triangular roof, a rectangular foundation, and two rectangular columns between the foundation and roof. The space between the columns is filled with one’s choice of the systems, tools, and principles to suit the lean enterprise…
David Smithstein
I recently read an article on the Quality Digest website titled, “Deming, Systems Thinking, and the Future,” by Tripp Babbitt, who specializes in systems thinking. His article starts with, “W. Edwards Deming did a great disservice. He left a prescription for what the United States should do to…
Barbara A. Cleary
Signs in factories or on the back of long-range trucking rigs sometimes proclaim “X days since our last accident” or “No on-the-job injuries since 1964.” Extending the stretch between such accidents may be motivated by this announcement alone, but there are better ways to diminish or prevent…
Dirk Dusharme @ Quality Digest
Recently, Industry Week (IW) announced the 10 inductees to its 2010 Manufacturing Hall of Fame, a “lineup of industrial superstars whose collective careers have had an immeasurable impact and influence on U.S. manufacturing.”
Included in the list of IW’s manufacturing “dream team,” alongside…
Bill Kalmar
Lately, the airwaves have been bristling with news of increased airport security screenings. What used to be a relatively easy process to board a plane has become an ordeal that every day brings forth a cacophony of complaints from passengers and even pilots. The new check-in rules, wherein…
