Hello all – I am inviting you to take a look around and give me feedback on a community forum site I have put together. Right now there is no content – just a structure with categories, etc. These things are hard to get going as there needs to be a critical mass of participation. [...]
Over the decades, I have observed that it is quite common for organizational leaders to try to use the word “opportunity” when talking about a problem. I can understand the desire to do this – we typically think of “problems” as something to do with people. But I find the emphamistic language… problematic. [...]
I have seen this topic come up in forums many times, and seen wide ranging responses. If I were to summarize them all, it would be “ I’ll know it when I see it.” A couple of weeks ago I heard a great quote from a co-worker that puts things into perspective. I’m always ready [...]
To my readers in United States Coast Guard aviation: I know you are a small community and the tragic crash of an MH-60 helicopter off the coast of Washington State this week has affected you all. I want to take a moment to publicly express my sympathies to, not only the immediate families, but the extended family, [...]
I have known Russ Field since working with him on a few projects in a large Seattle (now Chicago) based aerospace company. Recently he posted a very (typically Russ) thorough reply on NWLEAN to a question about value stream accounting. I asked him to take the same basic material, clean it up a little, and [...]
Metrics are a fairly common topic of discussion on the various lean manufacturing forums. One theme that comes up fairly frequently is how to determine “what counts” in this-or-that measurement. For example, a recent post asked about measuring lead times. The way they were measuring lead time only counted the time from when the order [...]
correction: I had typed “October 10″ for the date. That was my mistake. It is October 8th. I will be speaking at the October 8 meeting of the Seattle ASQ on the topic of “The Continuous Improvement Ideal: Principles to Engage Your People.” From the ASQ event page: You may have heard of Toyota’s principle [...]
Toyota to end Calif. joint venture with GM – Yahoo! News. The joint venture was developed to have American workers learn Toyota’s production methods, which were much leaner and more efficient. [emphasis added] Maybe that was GM’s intention – to “fix” the workforce. This fits in with the judgment I developed about GM’s leadership over [...]
Occasionally it is good to think about not only the product we make or service we deliver, but to reflect a bit on exactly what value the customer receives from that product or service. Sometimes we confuse the technology we apply to get something done with what we are really trying to do.
Over the weekend I returned from a 10 day visit to The Netherlands as a guest of Blom Consultancy. I am still compiling my experiences, and will be sharing them with you as I do so. (You already have one of them in the previous post.) However the purpose of this post is specifically to [...]