Lean Six Sigma Moneybelt

Improvement Insights Blog

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7/23/24 Healthcare Data Analytics Webinar

Over 90 people signed up for this webinar, with Jay Arthur demonstrating how to implement Healthcare Data Analytics to save time, save money, and (most importantly) save lives.



You can view a short two-page illustrated guide to the Zero Harm – Trillion Dollar Prescription by clicking HERE.

If you’d like to see a short demo video to see how our software is used in healthcare organizations like yours, click this DEMO link.

If you’ve never used QI Macros and would like to try it out for free, you can sign up for a free 30 day trial at THIS link.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Jay Arthur Blog.

The Law of Least Effort

Ever wonder why quality doesn’t get any better? Might the law of least effort.



“I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma for Hospitals” and QI Macros [software].

“You know, as I look around, there’s this thing called “The Law of Least Effort,” which means humans (animals… whatever) will do the easiest thing possible. That’s why in Boston, the cows all walked certain paths and when it came time to… put in [roads for] cars and stuff, they paved the cow path because the cows knew where the [most level] ground was. Of course, that makes Boston almost impassible if you’ve ever been there.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights.

*Next Free QI Macros Live Webinar: Tuesday, August 6th, 2024

Register for the upcoming FREE QI Macros Live Webinar, happening Tuesday, August 6th, 2024 at 9:00 a.m. MDT.

Learn more about it in the video below, and register at THIS link.



What:  FREE QI Macros – Lean Six Sigma SPC Software for Excel Webinar.

When: Tuesday, August 6th, 2024 at 9:00 a.m. MDT.

Where:  Join online from wherever you are.

How:  Register for the webinar HERE.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Data Mining, Excel, QI Macros, Webinar.

*Latest webinar: 7/16/24 QI Macros webinar

Over 30 people signed up for this webinar, with Jay Arthur demonstrating some of the software’s most frequently used tools and answering questions asked by attendees.

 



If you saw a feature demonstrated in the webinar that might have been added to QI Macros after the version you’re using (for instance, the Improvement Project Wizard or the automated Process Change Wizard), you may need to purchase an upgrade to bring your QI Macros to the current version.

Send an email to support@qimacros.com and we can help, for instance in generating a quote to upgrade all the users at your organization or just guiding you through the purchasing process.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Data Mining, Excel, QI Macros, Webinar.

Detective Number Two

Detective shows usually have two detectives: one who leaps to arrest an obvious suspect and one who continues investigate the evidence. Which one are you?



“If you’ve ever watched detective shows, there’s always one detective that wants to leap to a solution and arrest the wrong person and just get him off the off the books, right? Then the other detective [says], “Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa… wait… wait a minute. We haven’t looked at all the evidence.”

“I see the same thing in Quality Improvement. Every time a team comes together, they all think they know what the right answer is.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights.

If It Don’t Fit You Must Forget

Trendlines are often fake news. How can you separate fact from fiction? It’s easy.



“I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma Demystified” and QI Macros [software].

“One of the things that really irritates me about Excel is it’ll add a trend line to any data, but it does not add a “goodness-of-fit” metric automatically. It’s called “R squared,” and R squared should be like .8 or 80% fit in general.

“I’ve seen lots of charts and lots of posters at lots of improvement conferences where the goodness of fit metric is less than 50%. What?! So it’s not really an improvement.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights, Jay Arthur Blog.

More than One Way to Ken a Stat

There’s often more than one way to get an answer with statistics.



“I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma for Hospitals” and QI Macros [software].

“The other week we had somebody call in and say, “Can you do XYZ stat?” Well, by that name I didn’t understand what they were talking about, but then I looked up XYZ stat and it was our ABC stat in the QI Macros. Right?

“There’s more than one way to do things in statistics. There’s all kinds of things, all right? I just found out about something called Dixon’s Q and Grubbs’ Outlier Test for small samples… okay.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights, Jay Arthur Blog.

6/25/24 Healthcare Data Analytics Webinar

Over 100 people signed up for this webinar, with Jay Arthur demonstrating how to implement Healthcare Data Analytics to save time, save money, and (most importantly) save lives.



You can view a short two-page illustrated guide to the Zero Harm – Trillion Dollar Prescription by clicking HERE.

If you’d like to see a short demo video to see how our software is used in healthcare organizations like yours, click this DEMO link.

If you’ve never used QI Macros and would like to try it out for free, you can sign up for a free 30 day trial at THIS link.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Healthcare, Webinar.

Lean Kitchen Confidential

In Kitchen Confidential, Anthony Bourdain describes the essence of a chef’s station, which could apply to any lean cell design.



“I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma Demystified” and QI Macros [software].

“I was reading Anthony Bourdain’s book Kitchen Confidential, which is about the high-end cooking business out there, but I found a passage that I think applies to Lean Cell Design. I’ll read that to you:

‘As a cook, your station, and its condition, its state of readiness, is an extension of your nervous system – it is profoundly upsetting if some other cook or, God forbid, a waiter – disturbs your precisely and carefully laid-out system.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights.

Automate Measurements to Sustain Improvement

DMAIC suggests that we need to Define and Measure something. Doing it manually won’t work long term. Here’s why:



“I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma for Hospitals” and QI Macros [software].

“I have an Apple iPhone and I carry it along and it has a little Health app in it. At the end of the day I can open it up and see how many steps I did that day: 3,000, 5,000, 8,000… whatever it is. It’ll tell me if it was above or below what I’ve done for the last weeks or so.

“What I want you to do is get this idea about measurement: Measurement, as much as possible, should be automated so that it just happens… it just happens.

Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights.