Lean Six Sigma has improved manufacturing operations and processes for years now. Now the effect of the methodology is extending to supply chain and operations to help eliminate waste and reduce variation.

Effective equipment testing is essential for manufacturers of industrial equipment and end-users. Without testing, defects and damage can shorten the life span of equipment, cause unplanned downtime, and reduce the quality of finished goods.

PDCA—plan, do, check, act (or adjust)—is one of those acronymic concepts that regularly finds its way into lean discussions.

Failure of a machine in a factory can shut it down. Lost production can cost millions of dollars per day. Component failures can devastate factories, power plants, and battlefield equipment.

The premise for the NIST MEP Digital Supply-Chain Network project is familiar to MEP centers—many small and medium-sized manufacturers (SMMs) are often not ready for Industry 4.0 and don’t know how to implement it.

No matter who you are or what you do, you create systems and live in the systems of others every day. But for some reason, we’re never actually taught lean systems thinking. We think it is natural, that we just sort of “get it.”

Suddenly, supply chains are in the spotlight.

I was talking recently with a friend who runs an academic program at a major U.S. university. She was telling me about solving a problem in her department and how the solution was obvious so she just did it.

This time of year the abundant ads for junk removal and cheap storage units remind us that it’s time for spring cleaning, an annual pastime that has perhaps been bolstered by the need to unlock extra space in the home during the pandemic.

In lean there is mura, the waste of unevenness.