Category Archives: quote

Bad Management Results in Layoffs

Posted on June 3, 2007 by John Hunter

In response to Is Laying People off Really Anti-Lean? [the broken link was removed]: Let’s say you, a Lean enthusiast, are named CEO of a mid sized manufacturing company. Let’s also assume your market has turned down and the constraint … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Popular, quote, Respect, Toyota Production System (TPS) | Tagged , , , | 18 Comments

All Models Are Wrong But Some Are Useful

Posted on March 4, 2007 by John Hunter

“All Models Are Wrong But Some Are Useful” -George Box A great quote. Here is the source: George E.P. Box, Robustness in the strategy of scientific model building, page 202 of Robustness in Statistics, R.L. Launer and G.N. Wilkinson, Editors. … Continue reading →

Posted in Fun, quote | Tagged , , , , , | 6 Comments

Write it Down

Posted on March 1, 2007 by John Hunter

Why Write it down? The longer I pursue Lean, the more I am amazed with its fundamentals. I may write more about this in the near future. Like the emphasis to write things down. In meetings, writing down decisions (what … Continue reading →

Posted in Management, Process improvement, Quality tools, quote, Systems thinking | Tagged , , , , | 6 Comments

Illusions – Optical and Other

Posted on February 12, 2007 by John Hunter

If the output for working for the year is a square. And the job is to produce dark squares who do you pay more A or B? Of course it is a trick question, the squares are the same color. … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Deming, Management, Popular, quote | Tagged , , , , , | 10 Comments

3M CEO on Six Sigma

Posted on February 8, 2007 by John Hunter

3M in building spree to end capacity constraints 3M should complete the first of an 18-factory build-out in the third quarter, said its chief executive late Tuesday, as it makes up for years of underinvestment on the factory floor – … Continue reading →

Posted in Management, Manufacturing, quote, Six sigma, Systems thinking | Tagged | 1 Comment

Transforming With Lean

Posted on January 31, 2007 by John Hunter

Dave Gleditsch, Chief Technology Officer, Pelion Systems, makes many excellent points in: Transforming Your Business To Lean: Lessons Learned [the broken link was removed]: First and foremost, we should always keep the customer at the forefront of the planning and … Continue reading →

Posted in Customer focus, Deming, Lean thinking, Management, Management Articles, quote | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Ackoff’s F-laws: Common Sins of Management

Posted on November 11, 2006 by John Hunter

Russ Ackoff once again does a great job of providing insight into management. I highly recommend A Little Book of f-Laws [the broken link was removed] where Ackoff, with Herbert Addison and Sally Bibb, present 13 common sins of management, … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Deming, Management, Management Articles, quote | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Toyota IT Overview

Posted on September 5, 2006 by John Hunter

What’s Driving Toyota? by Mel Duvall is an interesting, long article discussing Toyota overall and focusing on Toyota’s Information Technology systems. Technology does not drive business processes at Toyota. The Toyota Production System does. However, technology plays a critical role … Continue reading →

Posted in IT, Management, Popular, quote, Toyota Production System (TPS) | 9 Comments

Complicating Simplicity

Posted on August 31, 2006 by John Hunter

Complicating simplicity: Gah! Trying to read about the “Simplicity: The Art of Complexity” (er, what?) conference. But the description at the conference site is the exact opposite of simple, clear writing: An investigation of the essence of simplicity must necessarily … Continue reading →

Posted in Creativity, Management, quote, Software Development | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Manufacturing Value Added Economic Data

Posted on August 16, 2006 by John Hunter

In our post on Manufacturing and the Economy we examined global manufacturing value added economic data. The World Bank has provided updated data, for 2002, which we provide below. In, Global Manufacturing Data by Country, we explored data from the … Continue reading →

Posted in Data, Economics, Manufacturing, quote | 3 Comments