All Features
Corey Brown
While on-the-job training is practical for certain applications, manufacturers rely on it too heavily as a method for onboarding and training employees.
Companies looking to train a new workforce should be aware that on-the-job training can: • Hurt productivity • Increase safety risks • Impact…
Nico Thomas
Earlier this year, the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA), a part of the U.S. Department of Commerce, celebrated its 50th anniversary. The recognition is much deserved for an agency that has worked hard to strengthen minority-owned businesses. Through a network of centers and partners not…
Davis Balestracci
During the late 1970s, quality began to evolve from its historically Neanderthal, passive inspection approach to its current Cro-Magnon state, where its more proactive, project-based approach is bolted on to the operational status quo. Joseph Juran was a pioneer in such efforts. Various subsequent…
Clifton B. Parker
An underlying theme emerged from the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence’s fall conference: Artificial intelligence (AI) must be truly beneficial for humanity and not undermine people in a cold calculus of efficiency.
Titled “AI Ethics, Policy, and Governance,” the event…
Ryan E. Day
Headquartered in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Plasan North America (PNA) manufactures metal, composite, and ceramic-composite components for defense and commercial applications. PNA brings decades of process experience to bear in creating the world’s most advanced armor, metal components, and…
Thomas R. Cutler
Quality control and inventory control are equally important to the ongoing success of all manufacturing businesses. Both form the basis of an efficient organization that operates at high productivity levels, minimizes waste, and delivers quality products to meet or exceed consumers’ expectations.…
Pawel Korzynski
Dell is doing it. MasterCard, too. Even universities, not exactly bastions of social media influence, are embracing it. Employee advocacy in social media is gaining currency as an effective way to promote an organization by the very people who work in it. Rather than creating ads or hiring social…
The QA Pharm
Weekly CGMP Quiz 1: Part 210 & 211 Subpart A General Provisions. Use with your team for training credit!
This is the first of eleven quizzes on CGMPs that will appear weekly on QA Pharm. Try it yourself, and use it as a discussion tool for your staff groups. Also, each quiz will have one…
Jennifer Chu
In today’s factories and warehouses, it’s not uncommon to see robots whizzing about, shuttling items or tools from one station to another. For the most part, robots navigate pretty easily across open layouts. But they have a much harder time winding through narrow spaces to carry out tasks such as…
Jim Benson
Editor’s note: This is episode two in the Respect for People series. Click here for episode one.
When we build any working system, we need to understand and appreciate how people naturally exchange information. They withhold some things, say some other things. Some of this is fear, some is…
Julie Winkle Giulioni
If you’re like many leaders, you are knee-deep in preparing strategies and tactics to drive success in the new fiscal year. And that prompted me, in the first part or this two-part series, to pose the question: “What if leaders brought the same thoughtfulness, rigor, and discipline that we apply to…
Larry Emond
No matter where you’re located, you might think that Schneider Electric is a native company. It’s an easy assumption to make. The €25.7-billion energy, automation, and software solutions company is officially headquartered in France, but its strategy is to localize to the markets it’s in—and it’s…
Brian Charles
It’s often difficult to pinpoint the exact moment when things change, but it usually happens faster than one imagines. Old technology gets replaced by new innovations; first by early adopters, and then, suddenly, by everyone. A century ago silent movies reigned, then talkies, and now 3D and virtual…
Ken Voytek
Productivity matters. It matters a lot. Yet it often seems that folks talk about productivity but don’t do anything about it. At least, it feels that way to me when I go outside of the MEP National Network, where we’re always focused on enhancing manufacturing productivity. And you could say that…
Naphtali Hoff
Let’s assume that you want to delegate a task that’s been sitting on your desk since forever. You know what needs to get done and have (finally) found (and trained) the right person to do it. Let’s call this person Sally.
You sit down with Sally to plan the process. The two of you review…
Jody Muelaner
Measurement is often seen as nonvalue-added work. However, if we properly account for the expected costs involved in passing defects on to customers, then the increased value of the product can be clearly shown. This approach makes it possible to make rational, data-based decisions about when to…
Boris Liedtke
In May 2019, a California jury found Monsanto’s weed killer, Roundup, to be a “substantial factor” in the cancer suffered by a couple and ordered the U.S. agrochemical company to pay them $2 billion in damages. This was the third and largest verdict against Monsanto, now owned by German…
Jack Dunigan
What good is it?
Often the mantra of the obsessively practical or the hopelessly cynical, a “what good is it?” response typically indicates disgust, disappointment, or disdain, maybe all three. Obsessively practical leaders seem to become, well, obsessed with efficiency. Every act, every task,…
Lola Butcher, Knowable Magazine
Any patient scheduled for surgery hopes, and maybe assumes, that his surgeon will do a high-quality job. Surgeons know better. Nearly three decades of research have made clear that some hospitals and surgeons have significantly better outcomes than others.
Exactly how to measure the quality of a…
Taran March @ Quality Digest
So it seems the contentious wall along our southern border, variously known as the Trump wall or the Mexico-United States barrier, isn’t meeting requirements. Walls keep people in; walls keep people out. They serve as backdrops for graffiti. But aside from fulfilling the last item, this wall might…
Richard Ruiz
According to the Deloitte Automotive Quality 2020 report, auto manufacturers spend an average of 116 days annually on quality management system (QMS) compliance.
Layered process audits (LPAs), which can number more than a thousand audits per year, can take up many of those hours for companies that…
Ryan E. Day
Headquartered in Houston, Texas, Dimensional Engineering was born on the back of a dream, a major contract from an aircraft manufacturer, and a process developed specifically to fulfill that project. Dimensional Engineering has steadily grown to become a full-service team of consulting and field…
Bruce Hamilton
After being recognized in 1990 by the Shingo Prize, my plant became an overnight hot spot for benchmarking. Hardly a week went by when there was not a visit from a distinguished visitor, Fortune 500 company, professional organization, or college class. Initially, we accepted the visits because of…
Janelle Farkas
According to the International Institute for Analytics, businesses that use data will gain $430 billion in productivity benefits over competitors who aren’t using data by 2020. As an industrial engineer for the Northeastern Pennsylvania Industrial Resource Center, part of the MEP National Network,…
Theodoros Evgeniou
It seems that every week, AI technology has learned to do something humans do, but faster and better. From detecting cancers and eye conditions to predicting floods; or analyzing the language, tone, and facial expressions of candidates during recruitment processes, AI is now at the stage where it…
