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At a recent ASQ Webinar on Agile Lean Six Sigma, someone asked what I thought the number one soft skill would be for quality improvement professionals. Here’s my answer:
“I was doing an Agile Lean Six Sigma workshop for one of the ASQ sections, and in the question and answer part somebody [asked], “What do you think is the number one soft ‘people skill’ that change management agents need?” I thought about it for a second; I thought, “Well, listening.” Listening. You have to learn how to listen to what your people are saying.
“I remember I went to the first hospital that I ever worked with, and they said, “We have a problem with nosocomial infections.”
Continue Reading "Number One Soft Skill for Quality Improvement"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights.
Ever seen a puff of smoke rising from some debris? What did you do about it? The same is true in businesses; a small error in production can be put out quickly at the beginning. Become a volunteer firefighter in your company. Here’s how:
“Hi, I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma Demystified” and QI Macros [software].
“A few years back I was at the American Society for Quality Audit Conference down in Memphis, Tennessee. We were staying at the Peabody Hotel where they have the famous duck walk at night, where the ducks come out and get into the pond.
Continue Reading "Stomp Out Fires When You See Them"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights, Lean, Six Sigma.
Have you ever noticed that no one wants to admit the problems in their life or work? It’s time to start airing our dirty laundry and here’s why:
“You know, I grew up in Tucson, Arizona and I think Tuesday was wash day. We had this washing machine that sat out on the back porch because it never got cold enough to freeze the hoses for the thing. It was a roller washing machine, so you had a big tub about the size of a keg of beer and it would do the wash, but then there was a set of rollers on top.
Continue Reading "Airing Your Dirty Laundry"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Healthcare, Improvement Insights, Manufacturing.
At an Agile Lean Six Sigma workshop I did for ASQ Phoenix, one participant asked me if I’d applied Six Sigma to Bitcoin. While I haven’t, my insightful answer surprised me and the participant.
“Last week I was doing a presentation, a nightly webinar on Agile Lean and Six Sigma for the ASQ section in Phoenix, and if your section wants me to do a one hour whatever for your section meeting I’m happy to do it. But anyway, in this section meeting we broke out into some work rooms and one gentleman asked me, “Well,” he asked. “Have you ever worked with Bitcoin?”
Continue Reading "Bucks or Bitcoin?"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights.
Thanks for attending the 2021 ASQ World Conference on Quality & Improvement. Click below to see a quick demo of how QI Macros can help you prevent waste, rework and lost profit.
Continue Reading "QI Macros Software Demo"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Lean, QI Macros, Six Sigma.
When I started in quality improvement, everyone preached Total Quality Management (TQM). Before that it was quality circles. I’d like you to consider that the gospel of Six Sigma is holding back progress. Here’s why:
“Hi, I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma Demystified” and the QI Macros [software].
“The other day I was [presenting] a webinar for one of the ASQ sections; I’ve been doing Agile Lean Six Sigma webinars for the Agile sections that want something to do during this pandemic. One of the guys said, “Well, you’re sort of telling me that that we don’t need Green Belts and Black Belts to do a project.
Continue Reading "Six Sigma Dogma"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights, Lean, Six Sigma.
At the ASQ Lean Six Sigma Conference in Phoenix, keynoter Gregory Watson asked: “Is it time to rethink and simplify quality improvement?” I believe Agile is the answer:
“I was out at the ASQ Lean Six Sigma conference in Phoenix [earlier this year]. Dr. Gregory Watson, the keynote [speaker], was also the keynote [speaker] at the very first conference back in 2000. He said, “Is it time to start to rethink what we’re doing in Quality? Can we simplify what we’re doing?”
“I say the answer to that question is yes, obviously, because I’ve been talking about Agile Lean Six Sigma: How do we take the skills of Agile and apply them to Lean and Six Sigma so we can get results in a day or two; not in weeks and months and years.
Continue Reading "Is It Time to Rethink and Simplify Quality Improvement?"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights.
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.
No matter how well you design something using DFSS, users will find ways to use it or break it in ways you can’t imagine!
“In Six Sigma we have all these tools for designing for Six Sigma, so we have Quality Function Deployment and Failure Modes and Effects Analysis and all this other stuff; PPAP forms in automotive to help you design an entire sub-assembly or whatever it is… but what are these things designed to do?
“Well, they’re designed to help you come up with something that’ll come out at least a four signal level, maybe a four and a half signal level, but one of the things I’ve learned from software is “No design survives contact with the end user.”
Continue Reading "No Design Survives Contact with the End User"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights, Lean, Six Sigma.
21st Century Quality is changing how companies implement Lean Six Sigma. Here’s how:
“Hi, I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma Demystified” and the QI Macros [software].
“Over the last couple of years I’ve been going all of the Quality conferences, and I’ve seen some presentations that I think point us in a useful direction in terms of how to go about implementing Quality and getting results more quickly, and to accelerate, to develop some exponential growth in terms of how we achieve these results.
“About a year and a half ago I was at the Lean Six Sigma conference in Phoenix , and I saw Christus Health, and they talked about how they started out trying to do the traditional “Big Sigma Black Belt / Green Belt” whole thing, but they weren’t getting any results.
Continue Reading "Agile Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt Training for Results"
Posted by Jay Arthur in Agile Lean Six Sigma, Improvement Insights, Lean, QI Macros, Six Sigma.
