Yearly Archives: 2006

Switching to Lean

Posted on August 3, 2006 by John Hunter

Switching to lean [the broken link was removed] by Vanessa Chris: Since Eaton implemented lean manufacturing practices across its 235 plants in 2003, this facility has ranked number one for three years running. It used Eaton’s eight lean tools — … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management Articles, Manufacturing | Tagged lean manufacturing | Comments Off

Health Care Pictographs

Posted on August 2, 2006 by John Hunter

New pharmaceutical pictograms The Risk/Benefit Assessment of Drugs-Analysis and Response (RAD-AR [the broken link was removed]) Council of Japan has released a new batch of pictograms for use on pharmaceutical packaging. No more deciphering complicated dosage directions and warnings — … Continue reading →

Posted in Health care | Tagged design, Health care, visual communication | 1 Comment

Countries Which are Easiest for Doing Business

Posted on August 2, 2006 by John Hunter

World Bank report on doing business in countries worldwide [the broken link was removed]. Top 10 countries, based on the ease of doing business: 1 New Zealand 2 Singapore 3 United States 4 Canada 5 Norway 6 Australia 7 Hong … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics | 2 Comments

Lean Healthcare – Year One

Posted on August 1, 2006 by John Hunter

A Year in Healthcare by Mark Graban – interesting thoughts on his first year in lean healthcare, after working in lean manufacturing previously. Not that I used to operate as a “know it all” in manufacturing settings, but being in … Continue reading →

Posted in Health care, Lean thinking, Management | Comments Off

Lean Efforts at a University

Posted on July 31, 2006 by John Hunter

Bringing Lean To the Office [the broken link was removed] A team of college students used lean to streamline processes in their university’s admissions office. The students were able to reduce a process took two to three weeks to about … Continue reading →

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Curious Cat Articles

Posted on July 29, 2006 by John Hunter

We have added several articles to Curious Cat Articles. Recent articles added include several by Katie Gatto: Antibiotic Resistance and You, Cost of Health Care, To go or not to go, when is a virtual internship right for you? and … Continue reading →

Posted in curiouscat.com, Management | Comments Off

La-Z-Boy Lean

Posted on July 28, 2006 by John Hunter

Richard K. — More about the Dayton plant Nice example of the process of transitioning to lean manufacturing. Two years ago La-Z-Boy embarked on its lean journey, moving from batch and queue to cellular manufacturing. The Dayton (TN) plant is … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Manufacturing | Comments Off

What Is Muda?

Posted on July 27, 2006 by John Hunter

What Is Muda? [the broken link was removed] by Norman Bodek Excellent article on lean thinking, management improvement and eliminating waste. Setup time and machine downtime are wastes and should be eliminated. I remember visiting a washing machine plant in … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles | Tagged lean manufacturing, waste | 1 Comment

Investing Update

Posted on July 27, 2006 by John Hunter

The recent performance of some of the long term stock picks has not been good. Several continue to have pretty good results so far, including: Google, Toyota, Templeton Emerging Market Fund, Petro China. Several have had sharp declines recently including: … Continue reading →

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Lean Thinking in Printing

Posted on July 26, 2006 by John Hunter

How Going Lean Made Kell Better [the broken link was removed] by Kevin Cooper Lean is a total enterprise strategy. Lean thinking is not constrained to only manufacturing but a business strategy that involves the entire company. Many lean tools … Continue reading →

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