Improvement Insights Blog

Use Excel PivotTables to Find the Invisible Low-hanging Fruit

Everyone talks about low-hanging fruit, but only a few find it. Here’s why:



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

“I find that a lot of people are afraid to use Excel pivot tables to summarize data. Every company has raw data about mistakes and errors and defects and whatever it is, but it’s all individual events. People are afraid to learn how to use pivot tables to summarize that.

“I’m telling you what, that’s where the ‘invisible low-hanging fruit’ lives. Everybody talks about ‘low hanging fruit,’ but this is where the ‘invisible low hanging fruit’ lives.

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Posted by Jay Arthur in Improvement Insights.

Seeing the Invisible

Absence blindness means that you can’t see what isn’t there. The tools of quality can help you see the invisible so that you can do something about it. Here’s how:



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

“There’s a concept called “absence blindness,” and basically what that says is you can’t see what isn’t there. That’s why it’s kind of difficult to see things that are working well, because they just work well, but a defect or some sort of complication or issue raises this ugly head and you can see that one.

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Posted by Jay Arthur in Data Mining, Improvement Insights, Jay Arthur Blog, Six Sigma.