Pyzdek Institute

Lean Six Sigma Improvement and Work Design, Part 7

This is the seventh post in a series taken from a lesson in Pyzdek Institute Lean Six Sigma Black Belt training. Future posts will continue the topic. You can find all of the articles in the series by searching this site for the title. How many people are needed? Consider the process described in Figure…
Lean Six Sigma Improvement and Work Design, Part 6

This is the sixth post in a series taken from a lesson in Pyzdek Institute Lean Six Sigma Black Belt training. Future posts will continue the topic. You can find all of the articles in the series by searching this site for the title. How should the workplace be arranged? Cell design is performed in…
Lean Six Sigma Improvement and Work Design, Part 5

This is the fifth post in a series taken from a lesson in Pyzdek Institute Lean Six Sigma Black Belt training. Future posts will continue the topic. You can find all of the articles in the series by searching this site for the title. Which non-value added activities can be eliminated immediately? Of course, the…
Lean Six Sigma Improvement and Work Design, Part 4

This is the fourth post in a series taken from a lesson in Pyzdek Institute Lean Six Sigma Black Belt training. Future posts will continue the topic. You can find all of the articles in the series by searching this site for the title. What methods should be used to accomplish the goal using the…
Lean Six Sigma Improvement and Work Design, Part 3

This is the third post in a series taken from a lesson in Pyzdek Institute Lean Six Sigma Black Belt training. Future posts will continue the topic. You can find all of the articles in the series by searching this site for the title. What do we need to produce? How many and when? How…
Lean Six Sigma Improvement and Work Design, Part 2

This is the second post in a series taken from a lesson in Pyzdek Institute Lean Six Sigma Black Belt training. Future posts will continue the topic. You can find all of the articles by searching this site for the title. You can read Part 1 here. Principles of Motion Economy The rigorous study of…
Lean Six Sigma Improvement and Work Design

This article is an excerpt from a lesson in Pyzdek Institute Lean Six Sigma Black Belt training. Future posts will continue the topic. In previous lessons you learned how to change a traditional batch-and-queue value stream into a lean value stream. Now we will discuss the design of the actual work that will take place…
Quality Problems Plague Arlington National Cemetery

At least 211 people are in unmarked or unrecorded graves in Arlington National Cemetery, according to Stars and Stripes. Army officials announced the findings of an investigation into Arlington that found remains buried in graves listed as empty, unmarked graves and improperly handled cremated remains. The inspection found that 117 grave sites marked as occupied…
How to Lie With Statistics-Schwab Chart

Normally when the bottom axis represents time periods, the more recent time periods are on the right side. Not so with this graphic of Schwab U.S. Treasury Money Fund dated April 30, 2010. On this chart the most recent period is on the left, not the right. Nice try Schwab! When using graphics in quality…
A Trip to the World Conference on Quality and Improvement

I am of the belief that Lean, Six Sigma and Quality have gone a long way in improving the quality of manufacturing operations and many service businesses as well. However, a recent trip to the ASQ World Conference on Quality and Improvement leads me to believe that there is still a lot of room for…