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Improvement Insights Blog
Latest "Agile Lean Six Sigma" Posts
Sometimes you’ll hear people say that software isn’t necessary for Quality Improvement. Let me demonstrate how much time you’re wasting if you create ONE Pareto chart by hand, instead of using software.
“Hi, I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma Demystified” and the QI Macros [software].
“If you’ve listened to any of my Insight videos or seen me present at conferences or [had me] train you in a workshop, you know that I don’t believe you can do Quality Improvement without software. We have to stop doing Quality Improvement the 20th century manual, slow way. We have to start doing it the 21st century way, and we have to start doing it quickly.
Continue Reading "Making Pareto Charts by Hand?"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights, QI Macros.
Ordered a snowthrower as a wedding gift for two day delivery. Eight days later it was delivered to someone’s home (not mine). How can we mistake-proof these kinds of problems?
“One of the guys in my office is getting married this June and so I got him an early wedding gift: a snow thrower. So I ordered it from Amazon. I ordered it on Monday, it was supposed to arrive on Wednesday; two days shipping on Prime.
“Then on Wednesday I get this notice that said, “Well, it’s sort of delayed.” So then it said maybe Friday, but of course on Friday it wasn’t here, and they tried to deliver it on Saturday, of course, which is when we’re closed.
Continue Reading "Snowthrower Delivery Debacle"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights, Lean, Service, Six Sigma.
At the ASQ Lean Six Sigma Conference in Phoenix this week, Katie Castree with Accumen presented an excellent improvement story about reducing over-collection of blood tubes in a hospital. Here’s the story:
Baseline: 317 extra tubes of blood collected every day (115,705/year)
93% of tubes were not used (clinicians thought it was much higher and resisted changing)
Most of the unused tubes were collected in the Emergency Department (focus on the ED, not the entire hospital).
After the countermeasure (not collecting tubes unnecessarily), extra tubes dropped from 317 per day to 118 per day saving $12,335/year and 0.27 FTEs. Over time, extra tubes dropped to only 84 per day, a 74% reduction.
Continue Reading "Reducing Blood Sample Over-Collection"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Healthcare, Jay Arthur Blog, QI Macros, Six Sigma.
Nobody wants to look bad, which can make it impossible to make improvements. Here’s why:
“One of the things I’ve learned in all these years working in Quality Improvement is nobody, but nobody, wants to look bad. With the recent coronavirus [outbreak], the doctor who found that and [leaked news] out to the world, the Chinese government tried to shut him down, tried to keep that bit of information inside because they didn’t want to look bad.
“Well, this isn’t just a Chinese or Asian thing – saving face. In any business you walk into, somebody is in charge of how things are working and they’re in charge of trying to make it better, faster, cheaper.
Continue Reading "Nobody Wants to Look Bad"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Healthcare, Improvement Insights, Lean, Six Sigma.
People can learn Lean Six Sigma quickly, in a day or less. Here’s why:
“When I was about six years old, I was playing in a neighbor’s yard; we were rolling around in the grass and stuff like that. I came home and I went into my bedroom and I started digging around in my pocket and I felt something kind of fuzzy. I thought maybe there was a lint ball or something. I pulled it out of my pocket, threw it down and it came back and stung me in the neck.
“That bee sacrificed his life, but I learned a phobia of bees.
Continue Reading "People Can Learn Quickly"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights.
Webinar 1 of 3: February 12, 2020
More than 60 people signed up for this webinar, with Jay Arthur doing an overview on the IHI’s goal, and how implementing Agile Lean Six Sigma can speed an organization’s improvement process and better sustain results.
Continue Reading "IHI Trillion Dollar Checkbook Webinar, 1 of 3"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Data Mining, Healthcare, Webinar.
How big is your Fix-it Factory?
“I talked to a contractor at a building site and he told me, “I get paid to do it the first time, but I don’t get paid to do it the second time (to rework things),” so he’s very much focused on doing it right the first time.
“I think we’d all say that, but if you look at most companies, they all have a giant Fix-it Factory, fixing this, that and the other thing. Those people are being paid to fix things that shouldn’t have been broken to begin with. Or to trash the things they can’t fix.
Continue Reading "I Only Get Paid to Do It the First Time"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights, Lean, QI Macros.
Some companies are discovering Agile methods for implementing Lean Six Sigma. Over 50 years of research into how cultures adapt, adopt and reject change can explain why Agile works and why it accelerates Lean Six Sigma adoption.
“I recently did a video about how Christus Health and Novartis and Underwriters Laboratories were all using Agile methods to implement Lean and Six Sigma with one day (sometimes two day) training classes that created Yellow Belts focused on making improvement. I got to thinking about that a little bit, and it turns out that there’s over 50 years of research into how cultures adopt, adapt and reject change.
Continue Reading "Agile Hacks for Making Lean Six Sigma Sticky"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights, Lean, Six Sigma.
My career was dipped in various management methods such as MBO and MBWA. Recently I read a new term: Management by Spreadsheet (MBS). Maybe there’s a better way.
“When I was working at the phone company we had a variety of management fads. I think first there was MBO, or “Management By Objectives.” Of course, that assumed that you know what your objectives were. We had MBWA, “Management By Wandering Around,” so the management team was wandering around all the time and just getting in our way. Recently I saw a different phraseology and I kind of liked it: MBS, which stands for “Management By Spreadsheet.”
Continue Reading "Management By Control Chart"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights, Lean, QI Macros, Six Sigma.
IHI set a goal to reduce healthcare waste by 50% by 2025. Here’s how to do it with the Trillion Dollar Prescription.
“Hi, I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma for Hospitals.” We were just out at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement conference in Orlando, Florida. [There were] like, 4500 medical doctors and nurses and CNO’s and CNMO’s and people all involved in improving healthcare quality. This is their 31st annual conference. (I can tell you based on what I was looking at on the posters, people are not really aggressively going after change…)
“The IHI announced that it’s tackling what they call the “Trillion-Dollar Checkbook.”
Continue Reading "IHI’s Trillion Dollar Aim – Reduce Healthcare Waste by 50% by 2025"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Healthcare, Improvement Insights.
