Category Archives: Quality tools

How to Get a New Management Strategy, Tool or Concept Adopted

Posted on December 6, 2010 by John Hunter

Often when learning about Deming’s ideas on management, lean manufacturing, design of experiments, PDSA… people become excited. They discover new ideas that show great promise to alleviate the troubles they have in their workplace and lead them to better results. … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Innovation, Lean thinking, Management, Popular, Process improvement, Psychology, Quality tools, Systems thinking | Tagged continual improvement, culture, curiouscat, Deming, leadership, lean management, lean six sigma, management tools, managing people, Popular, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote, uncategorized | 15 Comments

Managing Our Way to Economic Success

Posted on August 23, 2010 by John Hunter

From Managing Our Way to Economic Success, Two Untapped Resources by William G. Hunter, my father. Written in 1986, but still plenty relevant. We have made some good progress, but there is much more to do: we have barely started … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Economics, Management, Process improvement, Quality tools, Respect, Statistics, Systems thinking | Tagged Bill Hunter, Creativity, Data, Deming, Economics, management, Management Articles, Process improvement, Quality tools, respect for people, SPC | Comments Off

Stop Starting and Start Finishing – Jason Yip

Posted on August 5, 2010 by John Hunter

Jason Yip explores the value of reducing work in process and reducing context switching costs to optimize throughput. By designing processes to work on projects serially instead of in parallel we reduce context switching, and other costs, of multitasking. Related: … Continue reading →

Posted in Management, Process improvement, Quality tools, Software Development, Systems thinking, webcast | Tagged agile management, management, management webcast, Process improvement, Software Development, Systems thinking, teams | 1 Comment

People Cannot Multitask

Posted on May 24, 2010 by John Hunter

There is plenty of research showing that people can’t multitask. But this knowledge is missed by many people. Here is another study showing this: Why We Can’t Do 3 Things at Once That’s because, when faced with two tasks, a … Continue reading →

Posted in Psychology, Quality tools | Tagged managing people, Psychology, Quality tools | 2 Comments

Mistake Proofing Deployment of Software Code

Posted on May 19, 2010 by John Hunter

This is a continuation of my previous post: Improving Software Development with Automated Tests. Lets look at a typical poka-yoke example. A USB connector must be put in the right way up – for the connection to work properly and … Continue reading →

Posted in Management, Quality tools, Software Development | Tagged management, Process improvement, Quality tools, Ruby, Software Development | 6 Comments

Combinatorial Testing – The Quadrant of Massive Efficiency Gains

Posted on May 17, 2010 by John Hunter

My brother, Justin Hunter, gives a lightning talk on Combinatorial Testing – The Quadrant of Doom and The Quadrant of Massive Efficiency Gains in the video above. The following text is largely directly quoted from the talk – with a … Continue reading →

Posted in Quality tools, Software Development | Tagged Design of Experiments, Quality tools, Software Development, software testing, webcast | 3 Comments

Nice Non-technical Control Chart Webcast

Posted on April 28, 2010 by John Hunter

This very brief introduction to control charts by PQ Systems provides a very watchable non-technical overview. Getting people to understand variation is important, and not easy. This video is one more quick reminder for those still trying to incorporate an … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Process improvement, Quality tools, Systems thinking, webcast | Tagged control chart, Deming, problem solving, Process improvement, Systems thinking, variation, webcast | 1 Comment

Toyota’s Journey to Lean Software Development

Posted on March 18, 2010 by John Hunter

Toyota’s journey from Waterfall to Lean software development by Henrik Kniberg Toyota builds cars (duh). In the past that didn’t involve much software, and the little software that was needed was mostly developed by suppliers and embedded in isolated components. … Continue reading →

Posted in Innovation, IT, Lean thinking, Management, Quality tools, Software Development, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged agile management, IT, Japan, Lean thinking, Software Development, Toyota, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Comments Off

Improving Software Development with Automated Tests

Posted on March 8, 2010 by John Hunter

Automated software testing is a mistake proofing (poka-yoke) solution for software development. The way automated testing works is that software code is written that tests the software code of the application. This automated testing code test that business rules are … Continue reading →

Posted in IT, Lean thinking, Management, Process improvement, Quality tools, Software Development | Tagged agile management, Deming, John Hunter, Lean thinking, poka yoke, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote, Ruby, Software Development, software testing | 8 Comments

Understanding Psychology: Slogans – Risky Tools

Posted on February 3, 2010 by John Hunter

Slogans mainly are bad. But like most things they can be used in ways that help or hurt. The main problem is when they substitute for a method to achieve the aim (most of the time). If the slogan serves … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Psychology, Quality tools, quote, Respect | Tagged curiouscat, Deming, John Hunter, management, management tools, motivation, Psychology, quote, respect for people | 2 Comments