Quality in the First Person: Street Smarts
When I was 18, I started my career on a production line at my father’s place of employment. Up to that point, my father, an engineer, had always shown me how things were made and how they could be better....
Career Corner: Laugh It Off
Assuring quality, and laughter, might seem at diametrically opposite sides of the human behavior spectrum. Many studies and articles have been published about the benefits of laughter and humor when managing people or projects, or when trying to overcome ...
Statistics Roundtable: In With the Right Crowd
First, the good news: The importance of statistics related to the way the world does business has never been greater. Now, the bad news: The statistician and quality professional might become the proverbial middle man who gets cut out by these advances....
Career Corner: Full-Time Quality Manager or Part-Time Quality Consultant?
As companies become leaner and the workforce becomes older, it seems the use of highly qualified quality assurance consultants would be an attractive alternative to hiring full-time regular quality managers....
Quality Glossary
Five years after it published its first glossary of quality terms, ASQ has revised that glossary with updated definitions and new entries, many from the lean glossary published in 2005. This reference of terms, acronyms, and prominent figures in the...
3.4 per Million: Six Sigma Start-up at Small Companies
An executive chef oversees the activities of a tightly run kitchen operation at his fivestar restaurant, pairing the right foods together, guiding other chefs and staff in preparing exquisite offerings on the menu....
Seduce Them With Success
The first commandment of Six Sigma quality is that you must get top management commitment in order to succeed. The truth is that half the firms that have taken that path have failed. Six Sigma's strength is in resolving linear cause-effects, but culture...
Lean Glossary
A glossary defines terms commonly associated with lean...
The Human Side of Change Leadership
Even carefully planned efforts to introduce change can be short lived if the human element is neglected or left to chance. When planning a change it is important to identify potential resistance to the changes and then design motivation into the...
Quality Intervenes at a Hospital
The Nebraska Medical Center, the state's largest teaching hospital, began implementation of Six Sigma in 2002 in response to a decline in patient volume in its interventional radiology department. A Six Sigma team was assembled to address problems in...
Flip the Clip
In all the discussion and debate about what Six Sigma means, one thing remains clear: Six Sigma is a broad subject. It is daunting for us trainers to try and produce experts called Black Belts (BBs)....
Handling the Human Side of Change
Quality efforts and their accompanying flurry of training activities continue unabated in many organizations. Many have morphed to adapt to the current crazes of Six Sigma and lean....
Column: Career Corner: Be a Change Agent
The quality profession is no longer static but is in a state of unprecedented transition. Practitioners must begin to see themselves as change agents facilitating an ongoing organizational quality improvement process....
From Good to Great
In his book "Good to Great," Jim Collins noted that good is the enemy of great. Central College in Pella, Iowa is a "good" college that faces the challenge of how to become a great institution. Central found its agent for change in David Roe, whose...
Quality Glossary
A handy reference is provided of quality terms, acronyms, and key people in the history of quality. Information is derived from a variety of sources and compiled by the editorial staff of the American Society for...
ASQ's Black Belt Certification - A Personal Experience
Together with the growing interest in and use of Six Sigma techniques comes the need to assess the qualifications of those seeking quality leadership roles in organizations. The ASQ certified Six Sigma Black Belt (CSSBB) exam is a practical and cost...
Implementation and Institutionalization
Learn how to properly handle a large amount of change in your organization
Just as change needs the infrastructure of a change policy, a change policy needs the infrastructure of a business operating system. A standalone change policy, which is not an integral part of a business operating system, is as likely to fail as no chang...
Column: Frontiers of Quality: Implementation and Institutionalization
[abstract from article]
Effectively managing the overwhelming volume of change is the only option for today's leadership teams. Some basic things to help enable other change efforts are:
- Create a change program.
- Create an...
A Road Map to Six Sigma Quality
At the very least, the champion must have the authority to reject Q U A L I T Y P R O G R E S S I N O V E M B E R 2 0 0 1 I 25 Road Map Implementation Steps FIGURE 1 1. Appoint a Champion 2. Select a cross functional team 3. Develop quantifiable goals 4....
Intentional Change By Design
Intentional Change By Design Two models help stakeholders implement change by Gregory S. Shinn C H A N G E M A N A G E M E N T 46 I Q U A L I T Y P R O G R E S S I M A Y 2 0 0 1 CONSTRUCTION SUBCONTRACTOR noted for providing quality products and services...
