The Mindsets That Drive Better Solutions
In December, I wrote about the Measure Phase of DMAIC, emphasizing the importance of collecting facts and aligning around them so we can collaboratively work on a problem. This month, […]
What’s New for the New Year
Happy New Year! Let’s take a brief pause on our newsletter series covering DMAIC to recognize the year ahead of us. For those of you born in the last century, […]
Just the Facts, Please
How are you doing? It’s a good question to ask at the end of the year. Next month I will fill you in on how Chalmers St. is doing and […]
The Power of a Good Definition
What’s in a project charter? I started in the Motorola Six Sigma Program in 2001. At that time, they did not include DMAIC as part of the training. The focus […]
The Foundational Approach to Asking Better Questions
I was recently asked to talk about Continuous Improvement on a podcast. One of the questions was what approaches are important and I went into a fairly long explanation of […]
A Pragmatic Perspective on Artificial Intelligence
Hey, have you heard about AI!? It’s all the rage, but then maybe it’s just another passing fad… kinda like the Pet Rock. Kidding aside, the thinking computer is here. […]
Digitizing to Control the Process
The nature of knowledge work is that it is very hard to see. Knowledge work takes one form of informational input and translates it into another form of information. Much […]
Maintaining Human Engagement in an Increasingly Digital World
I see a lot of Gemba boards in my work. It is a fun thing in consulting to see so many different companies and variations in how information is gathered, […]
Optimize Human and Machine Interaction and Minimize Machine Downtime
Machine uptime is crucial to the efficiency of all our operations. Machines are intertwined with all areas of our operations. We enter data into them and they process the data […]
When Is Automation The Right Answer?
When is the right time to automate? One of my clients asked us to look at automation for their receiving dock. They were short on labor and saw a machine […]