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Put your hands together. Now move them back and forth to rub them against each other. Feel that heat? That’s from friction. No matter if it’s between siblings or the gears of an engine, we usually think of friction as a bad thing, and often it is. Friction can cause things to heat up, wear down,…
(ISO: Geneva) -- Exposure to ionizing radiation is a potential risk in many situations, and the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has a score of standards that help ensure exposure levels are kept within safe limits. Now, two new standards have been published that focus on the…
“It is a common experience that a problem difficult at night is resolved in the morning after the committee of sleep has worked on it.” —John Steinbeck
In Personal Kanban (Modus Cooperandi Press, 2011), Jim Benson and I discuss how workflow should be optimized for throughput, not capacity. Work…
Most of the time when I’m consulting, the problem that my clients think they have is not the real problem. That makes sense, because if people understood their real problem, they would just fix it. The fact that the problem still exists is a likely indicator that the real issue hasn’t been…
(U.S. Dept of Labor: Washington, D.C.) -- The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration has announced the availability of a total of $4.6 million in funds in the Susan Harwood Training Grant Program.
The grants will fund the creation of in-person, hands-on training…
Today I’d like to talk about kaizen—specifically, the order for kaizen. The term has come to mean “continuous improvement,” but kaizen originally translates from Japanese as “change for better.” To help clarify this useful concept, I’ll present three different views for approaching kaizen: Taiichi…
Resurrecting your career after a long break isn’t easy. Stories of those who went through the transition can teach us how to better navigate a way back to work.
No one wants to have to choose between staying on her career path and tending to urgent personal needs, but that’s the situation faced by…
Resurrecting your career after a long break isn’t easy. Stories of those who went through the transition can teach us how to better navigate a way back to work.
No one wants to have to choose between staying on her career path and tending to urgent personal needs, but that’s the situation faced by…
When a team of researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Physical Measurement Laboratory (PML) first tested a new kind of pressure sensor two years ago, initial results showed it was faster and had higher resolution than the centuries-old mercury-based method for…
(ANSI: Washington, D.C.) -- On April 11, 2016, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) held a China Roundtable meeting in Beijing to discuss the draft revised China Standardization Law, which was recently released for public comment. ANSI members, including Oracle, Underwriters…
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There are many paths for organizations to become good, sustainable, low-footprint citizens of the business world. Production processes can be redesigned to be more efficient, corporate campuses can be located so as to reduce employees’ dependence on fossil fuels, and buildings…
Recently on the Taking Measure blog, we asked Tara Lovestead, a recipient of the 2016 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), a few questions about her life and work. She was recognized for her extensive application of new methods to rapidly and inexpensively detect…
There’s an old saying that “if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” Every project manager knows that she has to create a realistic project budget before the project begins. This step is not optional because when you’re midway through your project and realize you’ve run out of money, you’re in big…
It’s the natural order of economics that when an opportunity becomes available, everything rushes in to fill the vacuum. As the market becomes crowded, various offerings must differentiate themselves from the others to demonstrate value. So it’s almost inevitable that innovation will grow to…
Experimental designs that result in orthogonal data structures allow us to get the most out of both our analysis and our research budget. As a result, designed experiments have been used for everything from basic research to process optimization. These multiple roles make it crucial to understand…
If we used a time machine to transport a pharmaceutical scientist from the 1960s into a current pharmaceutical production plant, it might be surprising to learn that he would already be familiar with most of the processes and production techniques being used. That’s because not much has changed in…
(CRC Press: Boca Raton, FL) — The procedure outlined in the book, Process Implementation Through 5S: Laying the Foundation for Lean, by Drew Willis (Productivity Press, 2016), shows how basic lean principles can be used to implement standardized work and visual controls through plan-do-check-…
An upcoming audit can be one of the more stressful times of the year for a quality team. Whether you are pursuing a new certification or retaining your current one, audit preparation can be a daunting challenge to even the most diligent organization. Although standards such as ISO/IEC 17025, ISO/…
Time was, layoffs were seen as an emergency strategy, the last resort in a downturn or crisis. Today, however, layoffs are a standard tool for doing business. As the economy continues to heal and job indicators improve, a number of firms have announced a fresh wave of layoffs—Nordstrom, Sprint,…
Regression analysis is used in a variety of manufacturing applications. An example of such an application would be to learn the effect of process variables on output quality variables. This allows the process control people to monitor those key variables and keep the output variables at the…
Regression analysis is used in a variety of manufacturing applications. An example of such an application would be to learn the effect of process variables on output quality variables. This allows the process control people to monitor those key variables and keep the output variables at the…
(Hexagon: North Kingstown, RI) -- Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence has unveiled a new model of its versatile GLOBAL coordinate measuring machine (CMM) designed in collaboration with internationally renowned design house Pininfarina. This best-in-class machine is tailored specifically to offer…
Ihave never been accused of being an early adopter of cutting-edge technology. On the other hand, I don’t dance the Luddite jig, either. True to my own type, I hung on to my old M-1A tank, aka a Motorola flip phone, for as long as I could, but was pleased as punch when circumstances led me to…
The last few months have witnessed the unraveling of the remarkable life sciences company Theranos, culminating in the news that federal regulators may ban Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes from the blood-testing industry for at least two years. The company is also facing a federal criminal…
During the past few years I’ve been working hard on cultivating positive habits. New habits can be powerful. But habits can also create barriers that limit our perspective, which can hinder kaizen, creativity, and even our knowledge of ourselves. We’ve all found ourselves in the proverbial “rut”…
