All Features
Thomas R. Cutler
HR Nicholson Co., “pioneers in the juice industry,” has operated for nearly a century. The company has grown from 45 employees to 75 employees in just the past six years. The family-owned, Baltimore-based manufacturing and distribution company realized that, unlike the first eighty-plus years when…
Christopher Werner
Although conventional homogenization has served the needs of the dairy industry and other industries for more than a century, the producers of pharmaceutical, personal care, chemical and food products are increasingly turning to high-shear fluid processing when highly precise processing is required…
Douglas C. Fair
According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, deaths, injuries and property damage from consumer product incidents cost the nation more than $700 billion annually. There are severe costs to the business involved in the recall, in addition to potential costs of civil and criminal…
Steven Ouellette
I
n Dirk Dusharme’s First Word in the April 2006 issue of Quality Digest, he sneaks into the back of the “Church of the Six Sigma” and cannily reports the goings on. In this column, I will burst in through the doors dressed in motley and try to pry the scales off of your eyes, chanting, “DMAIC…
Craig Cochran
Last year I had the good fortune of doing some consulting with B&C Specialty Products in Hopeulikit, Georgia. B&C does light manufacturing, primarily plastic molding and assembly, and they distribute products produced by companies in the Far East. They have about 150 employees and are by…
Denise Robitaille
"For want of nail a shoe was lost For want of a shoe a horse was lost For want of horse a rider was lost For want of a rider a battle was lost For loss of a battle a kingdom was lost And all because of a horseshoe nail." In researching the origins of this familiar cautionary maxim, I…
Bill Kalmar
In a recent Volkswagen Jetta commercial, a pleasant conversation between two friends is abruptly interrupted by a horrific accident. Fortunately there are no injuries thanks to the air-bag system in the Jetta. Similar experiences are provided by Allstate Insurance warning us to buy a…
Praveen Gupta
Six Sigma has gained a reputation as a data-driven statistical methodology for process improvement. If the statistical methodology by itself were responsible for Six Sigma’s success, then there would be nothing new in Six Sigma. Methodologies based on data-driven statistics have been known for many…
Thomas R. Cutler
At the Shorewood Packaging Midland Avenue facility in Toronto, real-time information helps yield world-class lean manufacturing results. Shorewood Packaging is part of International Paper, which has operations in more than 40 countries and sells its products in more than 120 nations. Shorewood…
A. P. Porter
The quality of my telephone experience has deteriorated over the years. As a teenager, I spent hours on the telephone when being on the phone meant being tethered to a wall. High-tech was a 25-foot cord. If I called a friend, he’d only answer if he were at home. If someone was on the…
Jerry Fireman
Diagnostic Hybrids Inc. manufactures discrete units of mammalian cell cultures and diagnostic reagents—such as antibodies—that are used to grow, isolate and type viruses. The company faced complex information-management challenges because of its many different product offerings, complex…
American Airlines’ CEO Gerard J. Arpey’s letter to the editor (Quality Digest, January 2006) shows exactly why the U.S. airline industry is in trouble: “We carry about a quarter of a million people every day,” writes Arpey. “Inevitably, there will be mistakes that impact our customers…
All too often FMEA (Failure Modes and Effects Analysis), DFMEA (Design, Failure Modes, and Effects Analysis) or FMECA (Failure Mode, Effects, and Criticality Analysis) ends up costing a company hundreds or thousands of dollars to prepare and returns nothing by way of payback, increased…
Craig Cochran
Last year I had the good fortune of doing some consulting with B&C Specialty Products in Hopeulikit, Georgia. B&C does light manufacturing, primarily plastic molding and assembly, and they distribute imported products produced by companies in the Far East. They have about 150…
William R. Gilman
Metrology is the science of measurement. It’s a very broad topic because so much is measured. In manufacturing, the need to verify and validate dimensions of parts is crucial. These dimensional measurements are done at many stages in the manufacturing process with a range of devices, from simple…
Denise Robitaille
A few months ago, I wrote about the importance of understanding your customers’ requirements. We looked at requirements that exceed the traditional scope of product specifications such as labeling, packaging and documentation.This month, we’ll take a look at how we communicate our…
Esteve Garriga
The 2005+ approach is the system established to characterize and winnow the applicants for the 2006 European Award. Formerly instituted as the European Quality Award, this year it will be designated the 2006 EFQM European Award.The 2005+ approach doesn’t represent a change in the reference and…
Praveen Gupta
I talk to a lot of people and most of them are stressed at work and carrying it over to their homes. The question then becomes, “What drives performance—fear or fun?”If someone asks employees what it’s like to work at Google, the most likely answer is that it’s exciting to work in a fun,…
Thomas R. Cutler
Manufacturing products produces waste that ranges from overproduction, waiting time, and transportation costs to overprocessing, excess inventory, unnecessary motion and scrap. By eliminating these wastes, production time and cost of goods sold (COGS) are reduced, and quality is improved. COGS…
According to the Institute of Medicine, there are approximately 100,000 people per year killed in the Unites States because of medical errors. There are 100,000 families in despair because they have lost a loved one too soon. This also means that 100,000 medical professionals are losing…
John Geary
The challenge of responding to the threat of cheap offshore labor isn’t new to North American businesses. Nearly a hundred years ago, Henry Towne wrote about the need for increased efficiency and productivity in a foreword to Frederick Winslow Taylor’s 1911 paper, “Shop Management”:
"We are justly…
Dr T Burns
In 1633, opposition to the common viewpoint could mean death. This was the case with Galileo when he proposed that the Earth revolved around the sun. He was tried for heresy. Of course things are different today. People who question dogma are no longer burnt at the stake. Instead, they’re branded…
David C. Crosby
Zero defects is an idea that was discovered in the early 1960s. It was articulated by Phil Crosby and first implemented at the Martin company in Orlando, Florida. Zero defects enjoyed widespread popularity until the mid 1970s, and almost every major company and their suppliers had a zero-defects…
Craig Cochran
Last year I had the good fortune of doing some consulting with B&C Specialty Products in Hopeulikit, Georgia. B&C does light manufacturing, primarily plastic molding and assembly, and they also distribute imported products produced by companies in the Far East. They have about 150 employees…
Frank Powell
Machine tool and manufacturing system builders have been producing increasingly intelligent equipment for more than 50 years, and today’s computer numeric controlled (CNC) machines and systems are marvels of technology. However, they still need intensive human supervision and…