Every year I get together with a group of my good friends, Bobby, Dudley, Doug and Woody, all fellow Harley-Davidson enthusiasts, and take an epic ride to “parts unknown”. As we were sitting around the campfire one night during this year’s trip, I mentioned that I was writing the Quality 101 book and was struggling […]
“But we already made a process flowchart – isn’t that good enough?” In a word, no. Process flow diagrams are a great first step, but they don’t tell the entire story. Value stream maps add one critical ingredient that standard process flowcharts don’t have; time. Process flowcharts, whether drawn by hand or electronically, do not […]
Process Analysis Terms The following terms may be useful to an organization during the activity of process flowcharting, value stream mapping, and analysis. Blocking: Occurs when the activities in a process stage must stop because there is no place to deposit the item just completed Bottleneck: Occurs when the limited capacity of a process stage […]
In the global economy that is today’s business environment, there are no guarantees as indeed, survival is not mandatory! The need for best practices is present in every industry, but mandatory in both high technology industries and commercial manufacturing operations. Over the course of the next few weeks I will try to present some of […]
One of the fascinating things about lean is that it is occurring everywhere, and many times without the knowledge of the person or organization doing it! How can this be? I recently visited a small sheet metal fabrication company, and during the course of a discussion with the owner the topic of lean came up. […]
PRESS RELEASE March 7, 2014 Steve Williams Publishes Practical Implementation Guides for ISO & Lean Best practices guru writes blueprints for implementing lean practices & an ISO quality system. DB Publishing announces the publication of two new eBooklets by industry icon Steve Williams. The books are the latest addition to the company’s eBooklet series, called […]
In Summary After a very challenging 2012 for the domestic PCB industry, global business conditions are slowly improving. Let’s take a look back at 2013 and what we can expect as we move into the new year. Like many of you, I grew up in this business. I cut my teeth (and more than a few […]
As we all return from the holiday break and get back to business, is it time to take a hard look at what it will take to be successful in 2014? With an economy that is showing little ability for sustainable growth, at least for the foreseeable future, will 2014 be the year that US […]
Most lean principles fall under a very old-fashioned ideal that some of us still remember; common sense. During another recent visit with a wire harness and cable manufacturer, I had a great discussion with a fellow old-school manager on the merits of lean. He told me “Steve, I really don’t know what all the fuss […]
One of the most important decisions a company can make is the selection of the person that will be lead the quality organization. This person will most likely be the face of the company with customers, suppliers, and your ISO registrar as the organization’s ISO Management Representative. To differentiate yourself as a world-class organization, the […]
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