Joseph J. Caylor
ABC Company Work Instruction
Purpose: To determine root cause for external nonconformance (customer complaints), internal nonconformance (rework, sort, subcontractor), and quality audit...
Abe Eshkenazi
With increasing productivity and focus on efficiency, good manufacturing jobs can still be found in the United States, but they are becoming more complex, and the people who succeed in the field need...
Bill Kalmar
I think most of us would agree that there are a handful of attributes that separate average companies from those that should be held up as role models. Some of those traits would be: a strong and...
Mike Micklewright
Question: When the first-grade boy asked to use the washroom, the teacher said that he must first say his ABCs aloud. The little boy obediently did so, but he skipped the “P” and the “Y.” The teacher...
Michael Casey
Allegra Print and Imaging of Portage, Michigan, was founded in 1988 and has been growing by at least 6 percent annually over the past five years, despite a weak local economy. Allegra Portage is a...
Mike Micklewright
Question: When the first-grade boy asked to use the washroom, the teacher said that he must first say his ABCs aloud. The little boy obediently did so, but he skipped the “P” and the “Y.” The teacher...
I recently gave a speech on products made in China to ASQ’s customer service division in Raleigh, North Carolina. The critical takeaways were that global uncertainties and risks were fundamentally...
Mike Thelen
What’s an extremely difficult part of lean? Sustained improvement. Kaizen is best known and most often described as continual, incremental improvement. Kaikaku is perhaps best described as...
Mike Thelen
What’s an extremely difficult part of lean? Sustained improvement. Kaizen is best known and most often described as continual, incremental improvement. Kaikaku is perhaps best described as...
Bill Kalmar
It seems that not a day goes by that some politician, government official, or CEO of a major company has to retract a misspoken remark or admit that a previous message was either exaggerated or wasn’...
Douglas C. Fair
Never say “never”? I guess I overlooked that memo. In case you missed it, the last two columns were written about what you should never do with control limits. These three nevers, if avoided, will...
David A. Marshall
Not long ago many manufacturing companies considered accidents and the resulting costs part of the expense of doing business. Today’s companies are creating better safety programs that benefit the...
Mike Thelen
Mark Graban, consultant and host of www.leanblog.org , and a good lean friend, once posted a web log topic on “lean or lame” (a phrase he coined). That topic drew a variety of comments from his...
Mike Thelen
Mark Graban, consultant and host of www.leanblog.org , and a good lean friend, once posted a web log topic on “lean or lame” (a phrase he coined). That topic drew a variety of comments from his...
Greg Hutchins
This is the first of a new QualityInsider column that will discuss new practices, processes, tools, and lessons learned in what I think is the future of quality—risk management. I’ll feature...
Mike Staver
It’s an election year in the United States, and if there ever was a need for clarity in communication, it’s now. Yet no matter how specific the question or how many times it’s asked, the candidates...
Bill Kalmar
Starbucks’ announcement that it would close for three hours on February 26 to retrain about 135,000 in-store employees sent shudders through the thousands of coffee fanatics in the nation. Would java...
America needs you to get your act together. This isn’t just about jobs, although many people are getting hurt because of your mismanagement of three of the most important name brands in America. You’...
Mike Micklewright
Question:What do you call it when a quality manager is caught cheating on a quality exam?
Answer:Benchmarking
Several months ago, I taught a three-day internal-audit class to about 15 people. On the...
