Lean opportunities coming to Central Texas I’ve been critical of folks who lump Dell into the “lean” world, since Dell hasn’t really done much according to the Toyota model (previous posts on Dell). Dell developed its own model, the Dell…
lean – Google Book Search A friend just tipped me off to this Google feature, the ability to view limited pages from books, including a wide selection of Lean books. This list includes Jamie Flinchbaugh’s “Hitchhiker’s Guide to Lean.” It’s…
Since I’ve been working exclusively in healthcare for almost two years, I haven’t been in too many factories lately. I was excited to get an invitation from the local Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) chapter to tour a local factory.…
By Dean Bliss (bio below) At the recent Shingo Prize conference, I was reminded of the power of Lean. Not just because of the award winners, but because of a humble dentist who practices in Jacksonville, Florida. And who practices…
ABC News: UPS Figures Out the ‘Right Way’ to Save Money, Time and Gas “Efficiency is so much a part of the culture at UPS…” UPS has always been known as an Industrial Engineering driven company. Here’s an example of…
IndustryWeek : Where Is Your Company’s Next Big Idea Coming From? Chuck Yorke was co-author, along with our friend Norman Bodek, of the book All You Gotta Do Is Ask. In an Industry Week column, Chuck continues to make the…
Here’s an interesting video showing Boeing’s 737 line, moving at a takt time pace of 2 inches per minute. The referenced video has been removed at Boeing’s request (5/18/2010). I was embedding a video from YouTube that Boeing considered an…
Worldandnation: Scandal sires bureaucracy It’s too bad that the Lean Six Sigma component of the response to the problems at Walter Reed has been lumped into the category of “bureaucracy.” There are no less than nine blue-ribbon committees, task forces…
Worldandnation: Backlog has veterans waiting for disability claims Here is a sad case of bad flow, an imbalance in demand and capacity, and the impact it has on our country’s injured and disabled soldiers. Nearly 400,000 disability claims were pending…
Star-Telegram.com | 04/06/2007 | America’s Great Automotive Stuntmen Local car columnist Ed Wallace seems like a friendly curmudgeon. This week, he writes about Ford’s CEO Allan Mulally and his adventures at Village Ford (back in Dearborn). Wallace rightfully takes on…
Hospitals try to reduce wristband code risks To put this in manufacturing terms, imagine how you might have to change your process if your product might get transferred to another factory for additional processes. In recent years, hospitals have widely…
Here’s another example of “Everyday Error Proofing‘ courtesy of the new cable box from my cable company (part of the federally mandated transition to digital-only service). The manual for the remote says (not that I was reading it, but I…