Treat Standards as Servants, Not MastersMake them work for you, and they won’t be costly, time-consuming annoyances
Tue, 02/14/2012 - 11:23
Compliance is an unfortunate word in connection with standards because it suggests something arduous, unpleasant, costly, and annoying that one must do to “get the certificate.”
It’s true that organizations must meet certain requirements to… Don’t Confuse Brand Names with Quality Quality professionals can help retailers learn how to use high-wage U.S. labor effectively
Fri, 01/13/2012 - 13:20
I recently returned a pair of $28 (suggested retail price) Chinese-made gloves I bought for $7.97 the day after Christmas, which is when I do all my Christmas shopping. The reason I returned the gloves was because a seam had begun to come apart less… Are Control Charts Suitable for Health Care Applications? Adverse events require closed-loop corrective action to prevent recurrence
Mon, 12/12/2011 - 10:54
Hospital-acquired infections, ventilator-acquired pneumonia, patient falls, and similar events are (hopefully) rare enough to promote discussion of control charts for rare events. A Google search will, for example, turn up the application of u… Don’t Ship or Stock Air‘Good stowin’s good stowin’ all the same...’
Mon, 11/21/2011 - 16:09
The elimination of waste (muda) from all manufacturing and logistics activities is an obvious concept. Less obvious is the fact that waste often hides in plain view. “Unfortunately, real waste lurks in forms that do not look like waste,” says… JetBlue: A Bad Workman Always Blames His ToolsLeave the unfriendly skies to the greedy industry
Mon, 11/07/2011 - 12:00
The recent incident in which JetBlue stranded Flight 504’s passengers on a runway for seven hours reinforces the need for all but recreational travelers to adopt remote conferencing technology as rapidly as possible. It is past time to eliminate… Henry Ford’s Lean Performance IndicatorsMaximum results from minimum metrics
Fri, 10/07/2011 - 10:59
Frederick the Great stated that a general who tries to defend everything defends nothing. The same principle applies to business performance metrics: He who tries to measure everything measures nothing because it is impossible to focus… Is Greenhouse Gas Mitigation Socially Responsible?Do the right thing for the right reason
Fri, 09/09/2011 - 14:51
There is a lot of controversy about whether energy-intensive businesses should make extraordinary efforts to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide. Energy conservation measures such as Leadership in Energy and… Time for Virtual Professional ConferencingTake the <em>muda</em> out of information sharing
Wed, 08/10/2011 - 12:16
Professional societies can and should break the costly paradigm that a conference requires the physical presence of all attendees. A conference with a virtual attendance option can increase participation enormously while demonstrating how… Medical Tragedy Can Be Easily Prevented by Error ProofingFord’s “Can’t Rather Than Don’t” principle is applicable to any industry
Tue, 07/19/2011 - 11:11
Dr. Gary Brandeland’s article, “The Day Joy Died,” which appeared in the Oct. 20, 2006, edition of Modern Medicine, underscores the primitive nature of quality thinking—and more specifically, safety thinking—in hospitals. Although I’m not going to… Beware of Document Conflicts in Your QMSFord’s “can’t rather than don’t” should apply to work instructions
Mon, 06/20/2011 - 06:00
In “Why Companies Fail Quality Audits” (Manufacturing Engineering, May 1996), Robert M. Bakker cites control of documents as one of the three major sources of QS-9000—now ISO/TS 16949—nonconformances, and there is indeed plenty that can go wrong,…
