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To borrow a phrase that was borrowed by Pope Benedict XVI for his (in)famous 2006 Regensburg lecture, “There is no compulsion in lean.” OK, the pontiff didn’t really use the word “lean” (rather, it was “religion”), but the underlying sentiment is much the same.
How so?
Well, you can’t force…
Barry was excited about the journey he was to embark on. He had just contracted a professional organization in his industry that would help his company implement lean practices. These professionals understood Barry’s challenges: “Making it” isn’t easy in U.S. manufacturing, especially with…
(Mahr Federal: Providence, RI) -- Mahr Federal has added a MarConnect Integrated Wireless data transmission system to its family of MarCator Digital Indicators at prices that compete with typical wired systems. Low-power data transmission technology has allowed the transmitter to be built into the…
I recently picked up the summer 2012 edition of the American Society for Quality's (ASQ) Quality Management Forum, which focused on creativity and innovation. Tracy Owens started off the discussion with his article, “Don’t Ask Him, He’s Not Creative.”
It was a thoughtful piece about creativity,…
I never proposed to my wife. No bended knee, romantic dinner, or moonlit stroll on the beach. Although we’d known each other for quite awhile, we hadn’t been dating very long. We weren’t even in the same state at the time.
As we spoke on the phone, she expressed some uncertainty about explaining…
(5SToday) -- 5SToday.com has announced the addition of the 5S Education Center to its website. The Education Center is a comprehensive collection of information about 5S, Lean Manufacturing, and product information, and covers a wide range of topics, from “What is 5S?” to “Total Quality Management…
There you are. It’s Monday morning. You’ve arrived early, ready to start your week. Coffee is brewing in the staff kitchen. You’re caught up on your emails. Things are looking good. That is, until Bob, your client’s auditor, calls at 9 a.m. to tell you he’s coming for an audit on Wednesday.
If you…
(Exact Metrology: Cincinnati) -- Exact Metrology Inc., a provider of full-service measurement solutions, is hosting an open house on Oct. 25, 2012, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at its facility near Milwaukee.
Located at 20515 Industry Ave in Brookfield, Wisconsin, this facility, which opened in July…
After 30 years with a bank and 10 years as director of a state quality award program, I retired from the work force in 2003 and have never looked back. As I approach being a septuagenarian next year in March, I look back on my work history with fondness, satisfaction, accomplishment, excitement,…
Customer satisfaction at the national level is exactly where it stood at the start of 2012, and as far back as two years ago, according to a report released by the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI). During the second quarter of 2012, aggregate customer satisfaction stayed flat at 75.9 on…
G
E Transportation has unveiled the prototype for its next Evolution Series locomotive, which will decrease constituent emissions by more than 70 percent and save railroad customers more than $1.5 billion in infrastructure and operational costs.
GE expects that the locomotive will be the first in…
In this episode, Sheriff Andy Taylor uses cars and parking spaces to explain process capability to Deputy Barney Fife.
Sheriff Taylor: What's wrong, Barney? Barney: Someone spilled alphabet soup all over my capability output! Wait till I catch the practical joker who did this! They'll be sorry!!…
Which is better, a standing workstation or a seated workstation? This is a common question, yet there is no simple answer. Sitting vs. standing while working has been the focus of several recent media reports due to published data suggesting that prolonged standing burns more calories than sitting…
I wrote what follows with ISO 9001 and its derivatives in mind because these are the standards I’m most familiar with. Yet even before writing, I realized, at least from my experience, that the following points can be shared by most management system consultancy projects. Especially when the…
Whereas “big data” will make organizations smarter, open data will be far more consequential for increasing revenue and business value, according to Gartner Inc.
“Big data is a topic of growing interest for many business and IT leaders, and there is little doubt that it creates business value by…
(FARO: Lake Mary, FL) -- FARO Technologies Inc. and Carl Zeiss Industrial Metrology LLC announced today they will share adjacent exhibit space and demonstrate a network of shared metrology solutions at the International Manufacturing Technology Show (IMTS) in Chicago, Sept. 10-15, 2012. This marks…
A s you may be aware, causality is critical in strategy execution. Without causality, it is nearly impossible to measure the impact of various strategic initiatives of a company’s overall goals; therefore, it would be difficult to tell if you were headed in the right direction, a situation similar…
I went canoeing last week with my 13-year-old son, Ben, on the boundary lakes between Minnesota and Ontario. Away from phones, radios, and any other means to communicate with the outside world, we focused on the strenuous, but relaxing, journey across lakes and portages.
We’d prepared earlier in…
ISO 14001 originated in the 1990s, and ISO 50001 is even newer. The basic and easily understandable concepts behind them have, however, been around for more than 100 years.
Harrington Emerson’s paper, “Efficiency as a Basis for Operation and Wages” (The Engineering Magazine, 1909) uses examples…
(Sunnen Products: St. Louis, MO) -- Sunnen Products will rev up your inner gearhead at IMTS by exhibiting the world’s smallest, fully functional production V8 engine at booth N-7400, where machines similar to those used to make the Conley V8 will be displayed.
Booth highlights include: • Gary…
Anyone who has tried to build a piece of furniture from scratch knows the frustration of painstakingly cutting pieces of wood, only to discover that they won't fit together because the cutting was not quite accurate enough.
That's exactly what happened to Alec Rivers, a Ph.D. student in MIT’s…
I’m a quality engineer, so it probably goes without saying that I like gathering and analyzing data. Minitab and I spend a significant amount of time together. Some might say our relationship is unhealthy—perhaps even codependent.
But Minitab and I have been together for almost 20 years. That’s a…
Passionate Pauline is driving down the boulevard in the early morning, whistling to the tune “Oh Happy Day” with a big smile on her face, ready to take on the day with a vengeance and excited to tackle any challenges that may come her way. In the next lane over, Sullen Sue is sulking, and somehow…
(AMT: McClean, VA) -- June U.S. manufacturing technology orders totaled $462.95 million, according to The Association for Manufacturing Technology (AMT). This total, as reported by companies participating in the U.S. Manufacturing Technology Orders (USMTO) program, was down 0.6 percent from May and…
The most important pieces of information we must manage are product requirements, yet it seems to be something that lacks a standard practice or much discussion of best practice. Improve how your organization maintains requirements records.
In my experience, the most important element of successful…
