Category Archives: Management Articles

Six Sigma in Sales

Posted on September 14, 2006 by John Hunter

Can Six Sigma Work in a Sales and Marketing Environment? [the broken link was removed] by Paul Selden: The more systematic view demystifies sales…. As such, that system can be subjected to objective analysis using tools common to Six Sigma and other well-grounded disciplines. Sales is often an area that is treated as though it were separate from the company. That leads to all sorts of problems. Sales needs to be seen as part of the system of the organization … Continue reading →

Posted in Management Articles, Six sigma | Tagged | 1 Comment

Going Lean Brings Long-term Payoffs

Posted on September 10, 2006 by John Hunter

Going lean brings long-term payoffs [the broken link was removed] by John Torinus: The growing number of Wisconsin manufacturers, and the few service companies, taking the lean journey are learning that it is not a sprint. … The immediate paybacks come in the form of saved space, less distance traveled, fewer handoffs, faster throughput, lower inventories and man-hours saved. I would state the authors next point differently. The early successes provide resources to invest in making large more fundamental changes … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

More Lean Manufacturing Podcasts

Posted on September 2, 2006 by John Hunter

Another resource is providing worthwhile lean manufacturing podcasts. The first of an eight video podcast series by Gary Conner [the broken link was removed] is available now. He is author of Lean Manufacturing for the Small Shop (Shingo Prize – winner [the broken link was removed]) is a good introduction to lean manufacturing ideas. Related: blog posts on management improvement webcasts – Google Videocasts on Customer Focus – Lean Podcast: Bodek – Lean Blog: Liker Gary Conner also wrote Six … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Lean thinking, Management Articles, webcast | Tagged

Toyota Targets 50% Reduction in Maintenance Waste

Posted on August 30, 2006 by John Hunter

Inside the Toyota Maintenance Reduction 50 Percent by Paul V. Arnold (sadly the site broke the link, so I removed it): First, it is Maintenance Reduction 50 Percent, not Cost Reduction 50 Percent or Employee Reduction 50 Percent. “The goal is to reduce maintenance activities and the maintenance that you perform on a machine by 50 percent. That goal covers every machine and every activity,” says TMMK facilities control manager David Absher. This is not about arbitrarily chopping budgets or … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Process improvement, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Lean Leaders

Posted on August 28, 2006 by John Hunter

Lean leaders [the broken link was removed] by April Terreri: Tim Corcoran, vice president of ZF Sales & Services, NA, LLC, that re-manufactures automotive transmissions and steering systems in Vernon Hills, IL. “We had a number of false starts by implementing tools like kaizen, value stream mapping and the 5Ss,” he admits. “We found it’s really about the thinking and how we approach work.” Once he and his first-line managers participated in a lean workshop at Lean Learning Center, everything … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Psychology, Quality tools | Tagged , , ,

Making Changes and Taking Risks

Posted on August 24, 2006 by John Hunter

Sales Force by Curtis Hartman, 1996 explores Ron Rodin’s use of Deming’s ideas at Marshall Industries. Ron Rodin’s book, Free Perfect and Now, is excellent. The system had to change. “We eliminated commissions, incentives, promotions, contests, P&Ls, forecasts, budgets, the entire functional organization chart,” Rodin says. It was a radical move. Contests and commissions — internal competition — were a way of life in the industry, the universal motivational tool. Rodin was hammered when he unveiled the plan in an … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, IT, Management, Management Articles | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Danaher Practicing Lean Thinking

Posted on August 22, 2006 by John Hunter

Manufacturer’s Acquisition Strategy Sets It Apart From The Pack [the broken link was removed], Investors Business Daily: “It’s adapted from the Japanese Kaizen system,” Holmstead said. “Kaizen is a way of removing waste and standardizing processes and bringing underperforming or slow-growth companies with maybe single-digit margins up to midteen margins.” The keys are standardization, measurement and innovation — all directed toward the goal of continuous improvement. “It’s basically a set of tools that allows Danaher to make whatever widget they … Continue reading →

Posted in Investing, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Manufacturing | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Google Management

Posted on August 15, 2006 by John Hunter

Management a la Google [the broken link, wsj.com, was removed] by Gary Hamel This short article makes some interesting points, definitely worth a read. Google has invested heavily in building a highly transparent organization that makes it easy to share ideas, poll peers, recruit volunteers, and build natural constituencies for change. Every project team, and there are hundreds, maintains a Web site that is continuously monitored for peer feedback. In this way, unorthodox ideas have the chance to accumulate peer … Continue reading →

Posted in Google, Innovation, Management, Management Articles | 1 Comment

Lean Health Care Works

Posted on August 10, 2006 by John Hunter

Lean Health Care? It Works! [the broken link was removed] by Patricia Panchak In 1971, the U.S. spent 7.5% of its gross national product on health care — about $75 billion. We now spend 14.5%, which is about $1.3 trillion. The article was written in 2003, by 2005 health care spending reached 15.3% of the USA economy. A group of Iowa manufacturing executives has already taken Jimmerson’s recommendation a few steps further: They’re teaming up with their health-care providers, showing … Continue reading →

Posted in Health care, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles | Tagged

Interviews with Innovators

Posted on August 9, 2006 by John Hunter

Founders at Work: Stories of Startups’ Early Days by Jessica Livingston is an interesting looking book to be published in a few months. The book consists of interviews with founders of technology companies exploring the initial efforts to create a new company. Interviews include: David Heinemeier Hansson [the broken link was removed] (who many of our readers may not have heard of but who has recently done a great web development framework [Ruby on Rails] and development philosophy very compatible … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Creativity, Innovation, IT, Management, Management Articles, Software Development | Tagged , , , ,

Toyota Production System History

Posted on August 7, 2006 by John Hunter

Norman Bodek on TPS history: Who Can Shout Louder? [the broken link was removed] TPS focuses on improving the overall process from the customer’s demands to the delivery of the product. Prior to TPS, manufacturing companies were filled with smoke stakes, operational centers separated by machine types: the stamping machines, lathes, drilling, milling etc. each producing mountains of inventory taking weeks even months to produce an automobile. TPS focused on eliminating the wastes created by these separate machine centers. TPS … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged ,

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 — that include value stream mapping, 5S, total productive maintenance, and Kanban techniques, among others — to free up 32,000 square feet of floor space, reduce panelboard cycle time to six minutes, boost on-time delivery from 72 per cent to 92 … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management Articles, Manufacturing | Tagged

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 one day. More lean thinking articles.

Posted in Lean thinking, Management Articles

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 about 25% of the way. … Then we want to do everything we can to sustain the progress. That’s why we’re training the supervisors with the simulation. The TPM (total productive maintenance) teach is another way to sustain. It gives … Continue reading →

Posted in Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, Manufacturing

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 Japan operated by Panasonic, where there was no separate maintenance department. The company taught operators in the plant to fix their own machines. And since Shingo’s great breakthroughs on setup reduction, changeovers are often done in seconds, not in hours. … 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 are implemented on a small scale to get momentum rolling, but your thinking about change should embrace the entire business model. Well put. Over the past few months, I’ve attended industry conferences in Scottsdale, Orlando, Richmond and Chicago. Of note, … Continue reading →

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