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In last week’s Quality Digest Live: LEGO, do spacesuits make your butt look fat, and when reality smacks you in the face.
“What to Do When Reality Smacks You in the Face”
Three self-leadership techniques to use when reality smacks you in the face.
“The LEGO Group reaches 100% renewable energy…
My eye was caught recently by a gossipy article concerning NASA’s suit situation. Spacesuits, that is, not the standard-issue coat and trousers worn by many earthbound employees at the agency. It seems its Office of Inspector General (OIG) issued a thumbs down following a spacesuit audit, warning…
You may have heard that it takes 21 days to form a new habit. Well, it turns out that’s just a myth. Researchers found that, on average, it takes people more than two months before a new behavior becomes automatic. So what does that have to do with your office ergonomics process? A lot, especially…
Do Less Better is the name of my book (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). Do less better is also a culture and a strategy of organizations and their leaders. Do-less-better practitioners are fanatical about focus and simplification; herein lies the secret of their success. Yet, do less better isn’t…
In his February 2017 Quality Digest column, “Don’t We Need Good Measurements?” Donald J. Wheeler recommends that a measurement system contributing up to 80 percent of the overall variation (on the variance scale) is good enough to detect persistent mean shifts when using a process behavior (…
In his February 2017 Quality Digest column, “Don’t We Need Good Measurements?” Donald J. Wheeler recommends that a measurement system contributing up to 80 percent of the overall variation (on the variance scale) is good enough to detect persistent mean shifts when using a process behavior (…
While Hank Matousek Sr. was perfectly content in his position as quality control manager at a bearing company during the late 1960s and early 1970s, he had no idea that his employer’s growing financial woes and a pending layoff would become his surprise catalysts to found Grind All Inc. Not…
Create an innovation advantage for your organization by letting go of industrial-age principles, embracing imagination, and experimenting even if you might fail, said Polly LaBarre, co-founder and director of Management Lab (MLab) and co-founder of MIX (Management Innovation eXchange). LaBarre,…
(MIT Sloan Executive Education: Cambridge, MA) -- The use of internet of things (IoT) technologies in manufacturing—known as the industrial internet of things (IIoT)—has been heralded as a way to improve operational efficiency by correcting inefficiencies and identifying problems sooner.…
The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) seeks stakeholder feedback to gather information for an International Organization for Standardization (ISO) survey, focused on service standards and management system standards. As the U.S. member to ISO, ANSI requests information from U.S.…
The CEO rejected my proposal by explaining, “Susan, your problem is you keep creating nine-ton elephants for two-ton cages.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. This man was putting the kibosh on a cutting-edge product based on his limited perspective and lack of imagination. What did he know…
In parts one and two of “Gauging Gage,” we looked at the numbers of parts, operators, and replicates used in a gage repeatability and reproducibility (GR&R) study and how accurately we could estimate %Contribution based on the choice for each. In doing so, I hoped to provide you with valuable…
A common pitfall in quality management system (QMS) process automation occurs with a poorly planned process automation strategy. Too often, the temptation is to automate all quality processes at once and streamline the entire eQMS process in one giant undertaking. However, real-world experience…
(Georgia Tech News Center: Atlanta) -- A team of researchers from Georgia Institute of Technology and two other institutions has developed a new 3D printing method to create objects that can permanently transform into a range of different shapes in response to heat.
The team, which included…
The episode of QDL from this past Fri., May 19, 2017, offered a wonderful example of Dirk geeking out about NIST and innovation in metrology, not to mention a great interview and a delicious take on the power of chefs as leaders.
“Move Over, Superman” Lots of people talk about infrastructure…
During times of excessive work and crisis, something has to give. Sometimes brutal prioritization is the only way to make it through challenging times with your sanity intact.
It happens to all of us. The universe, in its infinite wisdom, determines this month, of all months, is the month to test…
People have touted the potential of big data and computation in medicine for what feels like decades, promising more effective and personalized treatments, new research discoveries, and smarter clinical predictions. But only recently have these technologies made it to the clinic, where they can…
Passenger satisfaction is up compared to a year ago, but airlines remain in the bottom third of industries tracked by the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI). As the largest airlines lower their ticket prices to compete with discount carriers, the industry gains 4.2 percent to 75 on a 100-…
Technology is amazing. It’s amazing that I own a smartphone with more power than a 10-year-old laptop. It’s amazing that we have self-driving cars or smart appliances that tell you when you need to go shopping, ideas considered science fiction 20 years ago. It’s even amazing that you are reading…
It’s usually a prescient sign that it’s not going to be a great meeting when two women walk into your office and one is trembling while the other is on the verge of tears.
Such was the scene early in my career when I was an HR manager for a large organization. Both women were there to see me…
There is an enemy in your company, and it’s invisible. You can’t see it because it literally is not there. Yet its impact is massive on every level of the enterprise, from boardroom to marketing to operations to the field staff. And the only way we have even the smallest chance of destroying it is…
Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have produced and precisely measured a spectrum of X-rays using a new, state-of-the-art machine. The instrument they used to measure the X-rays took 20 years to develop, and will help scientists working at the agency make…
A researcher from the University of Cambridge recently worked on the Bonavista Peninsula to get a better understanding of what’s left of some of the oldest organisms in the history of life on earth.
Paleontologist Emily Mitchell used portable 3D metrology equipment from FARO and Manchester…
Recent interest in portable coordinate measuring systems (CMS) has attracted the attention of industrial users and the technical community at large. Articulated arm coordinate measuring machines (CMMs) and optically tracked CMM (OTCMM) systems have emerged from being “nice-to-have” to “must-have”…
Recent interest in portable coordinate measuring systems (CMS) has attracted the attention of industrial users and the technical community at large. Articulated arm coordinate measuring machines (CMMs) and optically tracked CMM (OTCMM) systems have emerged from being “nice-to-have” to “must-have”…