Quality in the First Person: Failure of Inspection
Inspection often occurs at the end of the production line. As a result, the information gained from identifying problem pieces comes too late to make adjustments in the process, let alone isolate places in the process that are causing the problem....
Expert Answers: April 2008
Probability of failure ... Deming's contributions....
Watergate's Deep Throat – A Systems Thinker
The White House insider dubbed Deep Throat used systems thinking to link the events leading to the Watergate scandal. System thinkers transcend the tunnel vision of most thinkers to encompass the linear and tangible aspects of the big picture. History...
Deming and Me
Faced with a personal healthcare crisis involving major surgery, the author turned to the philosophy of her former mentor, W. Edwards Deming, for guidance. Deming had noted that it is inadvisable to make important decisions based on a single data point,...
Too Many Types of Quality Problems
Categorizing problem types can help practitioners in the quality field to focus their attention on relevant past experiences and problem solving techniques. This approach requires the definition of appropriate problem categories and communicating them...
Implementing Quality One Class at a Time
Total quality management (TQM) in the university setting empowers students to take responsibility for what they learn. One experiment aimed to improve an advanced university course in operations management. Titled "Manufacturing Processes," the course...
Creativity and Improvement: A Vital Link
Tools for creative thinking enhance quality improvement activities, which typically employ only critical thinking tools. Improvement requires change, and creativity reveals a variety of options, some not obvious, for implementing change. Creativity in...
TQM, Reengineering, and the Edge of Chaos
Complex-adaptive systems survive through evolutionary forces and self-organization (or positive feedback). This allows them to live on the edge of chaos, successfully balanced between the stagnation of stability and the self destruction of chaos....
