Quality Management : Teams
Shift Into High Gear
When customers of tgestiona began expressing dissatisfaction about the its inefficient service and delivery processes, it began a transport optimization project that earned gold-level status in the 2012 ASQ International Team Excellence Award process....
Surf's Up
In essence, a disconnect within the Telefónica Group was throwing off and disconnecting its customers from the internet....
3.4 per Million: An Everyman's Guide to Handling Data
I have been an applied statistician for many years. Regardless of the industry or project I encounter, the most common request I get is, “How big a sample size do I need?” That one is usually fairly straightforward, but not always....
Seamless Transactions
Customer service is certainly important to any business, in any industry. But when a company’s purpose is to process millions of financial transactions on behalf of its customers—who depend on the company’s speed, accuracy and professionalism...
Off the Ground
None of the 4,000 fasteners that were hand drilled into the fuselage of any C-17 cargo plane was misaligned or had gone missing. For years, Boeing has been building these top-notch planes. It just wanted to build them better....
Incredible Journey
In response to personnel’s safety concerns and rising workers’ compensation costs, a team at Boeing’s C-17 site developed a solution to thwart injury and save money....
Testing the Limits of Team Development
The stages of team development are well known. Not as defined are practical techniques for moving through the process quickly without sacrificing performance. There are examples of how this can be done, including ASQ’s exam review workshops....
Building Task Cohesion to Bring Teams Together
Traditional, homogeneous teams made up of members of the same gender, race, and age tend to be more cohesive and more successful and effective in problem solving, but such sameness can produce bland and predictable solutions. On the other hand, a team...
A Quest For Quality
Hamilton Health Services, a Canadian healthcare organization with a multi-site emergency room program, used quality facilitators in six continuous quality improvement projects over a period of one year. Quality facilitators provide resources needed to...
Lean Six Sigma Reduces Medication Errors
Medication errors are a serious threat in the healthcare industry. One mid-sized hospital interested in quality management in several areas undertook a Six Sigma project to determine what policy and practice changes might be needed to remedy the...
Building Customer Satisfaction With Quality
Competition in the marketplace has forced Grayson Homes of Ellicott City, MD to refocus its operating strategy from a family company culture to a team culture stressing mutual respect. A new strategy with a business model approach was devised that...
Effective White-Collar Teams: The New Quality Imperative
In nonmanufacturing environments, quality has not had the impact that it has had in production environments because the input, process, output equation is less visible and more difficult to measure. In today’s competitive environment,...
Offense and Defense
To improve its quality, an enterprise must fight two battles. It must prevent new problems, such as wear and tear on equipment, increasingly stringent customer requirements, new product introductions and employee turnover, from affecting its processes....
Column: Frontiers of Quality: The Six Sigma Sweep
Like the Packer Sweep, Six Sigma was not totally original. It was built on the work of others and continues to be enhanced. Six Sigma works because it emphasizes focus, planning, constant practice (every project is a practice session) and dedicated...
QOS – A Simple Method for Big or Small
Although there are many quality initiatives in the marketplace, many of them involve a degree of hype. Ford Motor Company’s quality operating system (QOS) is recommended as one offering the most value for the money. A QOS assessment looks at...
AQP Awards Promote Business Results
The National Team Excellence Award competition combines the application of continuous improvement tools, problem solving processes, team dynamics, project management, and communications skills to generate performance improvements. Many organizations use...
Forming Virtual Teams
Despite the continuing growth of virtual teams, not all of them are successful. Reasons for negative attitudes toward virtual teams include lack of facial and body language cues, feelings of isolation, changes in operational norms, and demand for...
The Essential Six Sigma
The disciplined quality improvement features of Six Sigma methodology offers companies nearly all of the elements of Total Quality Management (TQM), and it is much easier to incorporate into a business system. In addition, Six Sigma utilizes technical...
7 Steps to Improved Safety for Medical Devices
In medical devices, Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) is a quality control process that covers every production phase from raw material procurement through distribution of the finished product. HACCP is a standalone program that...
American Statistical Association Conference on Statistical Practice
February 16–18 | Orlando, FL
Visit www.amstat.org/meetings/csp/2012/index.cfm.
ASQ Lean and Six Sigma Conference
February 27–28 | Phoenix, AZ
Visit http://asq.org/conferences/six-sigma.
ASQ members exchange comments, suggestions, questions and ideas inspired by articles or letters in Quality Progress.
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