Visual Management. What is it? Why use it? Examples. Do’s and Don’t’s. To address these, we first hear from two experts giving their take on visual management. Then we’ll get information on why visual management boards fail and finish with a look at what a professional visual management company has to say. Craig Otto, Production Support [...]
Lean and Six Sigma projects all have potential risks that may derail or impact the project in other ways: scope, time, and/or cost. Project risk management provides approaches and tools to mitigate such risks. Project risk management is a rich and sometimes complex subject. However, there are simpler tools that are idea for small to [...]
Continuous Improvement at Caterpillar includes Six Sigma, Lean, and the Caterpillar Production System (CPS). We will cover all three using various sources. Six Sigma: They initiated their Six Sigma Program in 2001. Caterpillar had a long road in front of it, but the initial rollout of 6 Sigma used more than 300,000 hours of training [...]
Predictive Maintenance is used to assess the state of operating equipment, materials, or other items in order to determine when maintenance is necessary. Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, and Statistical Methods are helpful in making the predictions in order to prevent more costly breakdowns later. Ryan Chan, CEO at Upkeep Maintenance Management, discusses Predictive Maintenance. “Predictive [...]
How do you visualize the flow in a process before and after improvements? The Spaghetti Diagram to the rescue! The concept is basic, but the Spaghetti Diagram is quite useful. What is a Spaghetti Diagram? It is a line diagram superimposed on the process layout in order to map the flow in the steps of [...]
What is a quality circle? What are its advantages and disadvantages? Early starts in Japan and the US. Developments in India and in Healthcare in Europe. Quality Circle: A group of workers who do the same or similar work, meeting regularly to identify, analyze and solve work-related problems. Participation is voluntary, takes place during work [...]
You may have heard of A/B Testing and Multivariable Testing (Experimental Design) in terms of website optimization to maximize conversions among other goals. What are these testing regimens? When should you use them? A/B testing is just that — testing one configured webpage (A) against another (B) and analyzing which is best. Multivariate testing (MVT) [...]
If you are in Quality, Lean, or Six Sigma, you will write procedures. How can you check that your documents are written at a maximum grade level to ensure that everyone can comprehend them as intended? The answer is readability statistics. What are readability statistics? They are formulas that rate your documents and give a [...]
When you acquire data for analysis, it is highly unlikely that it will be in a form ready to analyze. Experienced data analysts and statisticians know that data preparation or data cleaning is the most time-consuming part of data analysis but incredibly important, otherwise any conclusions drawn from your analysis will be suspect. We’ll explore [...]
What is standard or standardized work? What is its role in Lean? Is it difficult to implement? What are some examples? We will use several sources to address these topics in order. What is standard or standardized work and its role in Lean? Standard work defined: A precise description of each work activity, specifying cycle [...]
