Improvement Insights Blog

I’ve been working in quality improvement for 35 years. Why isn’t anything any better?

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

“I’ve been at this for over 30 years (Quality Improvement), and I have to ask myself why isn’t anything any better? Why isn’t Quality pervasive? I think it’s because we made it too complex and time-consuming and too hard to do… that’s just me.

“But I have this Groundhog Day experience, right? I feel like Bill Murray. I wake up every morning and it says “same old same old.” I keep hoping that somehow there will be a transition where everybody wakes up and [says] “Oh my gosh, we could use these tools to make everything simple, streamlined, optimized… faster, better, cheaper, free, perfect and now.”

“You know, we’re not getting any younger, and Quality still seems to be stuck in the last century. I’d invite you all: Let’s play! Let’s see if we can’t figure out a way to make Quality all-pervasive… [make] Quality thinking all-pervasive.

“I was talking to some guy from Singapore, and he said “We’re teaching it in kindergarten through K12.” You’re doing what? “We’re teaching it to all of our students across Singapore.” Oh my gosh! People out there want to get ahead; we may be falling behind.

“So that’s my Improvement Insight for this week: Let’s go out and do something this week to advance the mission, the belief, the success of the quality paradigm.”