All Features
Stotz Gaging Co.
It’s a fact that air gauges are typically not in use approximately 90 percent (or more) of the time they’re in your shop or QC department. Because these gauges function by using clean and dry compressed air in a highly controlled flow, this relatively expensive commodity can cost your operation…
Phillip Singerman
Here we are in 2015, all one year older and one year smarter… well, hopefully. Before we forget all those ambitious New Year’s resolutions (which we’ll renegotiate in February), let’s take one final look at the key trends that kept U.S. manufacturing in the news in 2014.
Technology
Technological…
Greg Fox
At the end of part one, aspiring statisticians Woodrow “Woody” Stem and August “Russell” Leaf, creators of the famed Stem-and-Leaf plot, were in bad shape. They had beaten each other statsless after an argument about the challenge given to them by their mentor, Dr. Histeaux Graham. That challenge…
jeffdewar
Evolutionary biologist Stephen J. Gould is best known for his history of punctuated equilibrium, a revision to Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution. Punctuated equilibrium holds that new species evolve suddenly over brief periods of time, followed by longer periods during which there is no genetic…
Thomas R. Cutler
In November 2014, Quality Digest Daily published the first in a series about companywide lean cultures and how a lean journey affects people and companies. Jonesboro, Arkansas-based Hytrol Conveyors, a designer and manufacturer of advanced conveyor systems, allowed an in-depth examination of why…
Alan Nicol
In part one of this two-part column, we discussed the uses and occasional misapplications of the rolling action item list (RAIL). Now, let’s discuss some good practices and optional features that can help us make better use of this tool and become more efficient. The first and most important…
Steve Banker
What resolutions are you making in the New Year to improve your supply chain? Here are a few of mine.
To remember that supply chains should be built backward from the customer
One way to do this is to use a perfect order metric as a key way of measuring the supply chain organization. The question…
Alan Nicol
Let’s talk about the rolling action item list (RAIL). It’s an essential tool for many organizations and project leaders. Unfortunately, it is a highly dysfunctional tool for many.
Let’s look at some mistakes that undermine the RAIL’s utility and some good practices that make it more useful. Get…
Kevin Meyer
My November 2014 post, which I titled “Gratitude, for Gratitude,” generated a large number of responses. Interestingly, most were private, commenting on both the nature of gratitude but especially on my daily routine. I had detailed my regular set of activities in the morning, including meditation…
Arun Hariharan
Last month a New Delhi taxi driver allegedly committed a sexual assault on a woman rider. Reacting to the public outcry that followed, the Delhi government decided to ban Uber, the taxi company that contracted the taxi driver.
This startling news reminds me of some companies’ reactions to quality…
The Un-Comfort Zone With Robert Wilson
Tom’s board spun out from under his feet as he attempted to surf the large wave. As he plunged backward into the roiling surf, he was frustrated once again by the lack of stability from his traditional Hawaiian-style surfboard.
A few days later as he was walking along the beach, he came across a…
Donald J. Wheeler
Whenever the original data pile up against a barrier or a boundary value, the histogram tends to be skewed and non-normal in shape. In 1967 Irving W. Burr computed the appropriate bias correction factors for non-normal probability models. These bias correction factors allow us to evaluate the…
Mike Richman
Those of us in the media get into our careers for various reasons and in many different ways, but one thing that we all have in common is our love of a good story. Finding the narrative, discovering the angle, figuring out why we (and you) should care—these are the things that keep us coming back…
Dawn Bailey
According to a recent IndustryWeek article, the 2015 edition of ISO 9001, the standard on quality management systems, is nearing completion.
The new version of IOS 9001 will have three areas of focus:
1. The process approach will be strongly emphasized; that is, the quality management system has…
Tripp Babbitt
In my last column I wrote about the seven perspectives that pollute customers and culture. These perspectives rule the design of our organizations. They are inherent to our work cultures and thinking. They put us on autopilot as we toil in our everyday work. The first step to change that is to…
Jesse Lyn Stoner
Why are so few companies values-driven? Even when they start down that path, why do they wind up dead-ended?
A 2012 study shows “employees want their organizations to display honesty and integrity in business activities,” and “when leaders behave consistently with the core values, they earn…
Peter Sanderson
Walls—structures, usually solid, that define and sometimes protect an area—have been built since the beginning of time. The Aurelian Walls were built between 270 and 273 in Rome during the reign of the Roman Emperor Aurelian. The 12.5-mile-long wall was intended to defend the city from barbarian…
Quality Transformation With David Schwinn
My wife, Carole, and I recently participated in the 16th Annual ILA (International Leadership Association) Global Conference. The theme was conscious leadership. At the conference, Meg Wheatley was given a Lifetime Achievement Award. That puts her in the company of Peter Drucker, Warren Bennis,…
Bill Kalmar
Listening to classic Christmas music on a radio station that labeled the songs as “holiday traditions” certainly brought back memories of holiday traditions from the past. Some of them, in fact, are so traditional they’re in danger of being lost in the mists of time. As such, here is my top 10…
Melinda Plaisier, Michael Landa
We were ready to head out to observe the inspection of a Miami seafood warehouse, but another team of investigators asked that we first look at evidence from their last job. They showed us a video of a huge quantity of rice contaminated with live insects.
Their work, they knew, would prevent…
Dawn Bailey
During the 1980s, Joseph Juran, one of the Baldrige Program’s first overseers, coined the term “Big Q” to serve as a quality “umbrella”: “Little q” would encompass goods and those processes directly related to the manufacture of goods, while “Big Q” would encompass all of an organization’s…
Greg Goodwin
Everyone is talking about technology advancements. References to the cloud, mobile, big data, the Internet of things (IoT)—used as central talking points or tangential nuggets that bounce in and out of conversation—are nearly ubiquitous across manufacturing industries. Most professionals seem to…
Meredith Griffith
During the last year or so I've heard a lot of people asking, "How can I calculate B10 life in Minitab?" Despite my being a statistician and an industrial engineer (mind you, one who's never actually been in the field) and having taken a reliability engineering course, I'd never heard of B10 life…
Mike Simpson
What comes to mind when you hear the word “innovation?” Quick—grab a pen and paper and jot down the first five things that you think about. Many decades ago, I thought of things such as technology, inventions, and the future when someone talked about innovation. The flying cars and robots you’d…
Gary Phillips
All manufacturing companies that get audited require some or all of their calibration certificates to specify the calibration uncertainty. At a minimum, some manufacturers only need certified uncertainty for gauges that are reference standards used to calibrate other gauges. Those companies…
