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All articles listed in reverse chronological order.

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Five Impactful Elements of the New Book, Facilitating with FINESSE

Five Impactful Elements of the New Book, Facilitating with FINESSE

Facilitating with FINESSE:  How to Guide People to Powerful Business Solutions is a practitioner’s guide for ten common applications that technically trained professionals are frequently asked to facilitate. The range of applications covers quality and reliability techniques such as block diagrams and tree diagrams through master plans and strategic plans. This article provides five impactful elements for professionals who are often enlisted to lead teams to workable solutions, despite having little or no facilitation training,

Content

The book focuses on ten practical applications and provides specific ways to facilitate them better. There is not a lot of wasted time on the basics covered by most facilitation books. Each self-contained application includes examples ­­­– good and bad – from my experiences on some complicated and controversial projects.

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Business Process Redesign the Plant Wellness Way

Business Process Redesign the Plant Wellness Way

A presentation slide set titled “Simpler Industrial and Business Process Redesign”. Presented by Mike Sondalini to The Institution of Engineers, Malaysia, Electrical Engineering Technical Division.

The presentation opens with examining three universal business problems:

  1. Wasted effort and resources
  2. Wrong business process for the purpose
  3. Wide and out-of-control process variation

He also explores the implication of the quality loss function and then incorporates the concept of maintenance work quality. Then Mike explore specific steps you can implement to improve the fundamental processes within your organization.

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Electoral Quality and Integrity

Electoral Quality and Integrity

Guest Post by James Kline (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

On September 15, 2021, ASQ announced the formation of the Center for Electoral Quality and Integrity. This announcement caused a conflicted reaction.  On the one hand I liked that the Government Division, which was pushing this action, was showing some level of activity, after almost none for several years. One the other hand, I just laughed at the idea that ASQ and Government Division was going to, or even be capable of, having an impact on electoral quality or integrity. This is not a case of believing the objective is bad.

It is a case of realizing that this is not the 1990s when quality was a key priority of governments around the world. And that ASQ does not have the same level of influence it had, when in the 1990s it was instrumental in getting Education added to the Baldrige Award.

This piece discusses the white paper on Electoral Quality and Integrity which the Center seeks to implement. It also discusses the forces likely to prevent ASQ from being successful.

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Self Ownership Part 3

Self Ownership Part 3

Think back to the restaurant mess we talked about a few pages back, who was responsible?

The lesson for grown-ups (and more importantly executives and business leaders) from The Boy Who Cried Wolf is that the boy was at fault when he lied the first time, but the person who was really responsible for the sheep being lost was the shepherd who left his flock with a boy who he knew couldn’t be trusted.

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Why Environmental Decision Making Is Difficult (and what to do about it)

Why Environmental Decision Making Is Difficult (and what to do about it)

All decisions require an allocation of resources. In the case of environmental decisions, the way we spend our time, money, or behaviors changes the quality of life and the people around us. In addition to two precursors, there are seven reasons environmental decisions are difficult. Approaching the many parts of environmental decision making as a system produces five ways we can allocate resources in an effective manner. [Read more…]

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The Instantaneous Cost of Failure from Breakdowns

The Instantaneous Cost of Failure from Breakdowns

The Instantaneous Cost and Failure from Breakdowns is Huge. When a failure incident occurs, there is a consequential loss of profits and amassing of costs. The cost of failure includes lost profit, the cost of repair, fixed and variable operating costs wasted during the downtime, and a myriad of consequential costs that surge through the business. They are all paid for by the organisation and seen as poor financial performance. The costs of failure cannot be escaped and are counted in fortunes of lost profit per year. Total defect and failure true costs are not normally recognised by managers, yet they can send businesses bankrupt. In the instance of a failure, all its costs and losses are automatically incurred on the business. These costs can only be prevented by not having the failure in the first place. This article explains the ‘Instantaneous Cost of Failure’ (ICOF) and introduces a proactive technique, ‘Defect and Failure True Costing’, that helps companies recognise and prevent this tremendous waste of money.

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Project Manager Lessons Learned: Bad Technical Decision

Project Manager Lessons Learned: Bad Technical Decision

Guest Post by John Ayers (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

This story is an example of centering your design around a high-tech solution to a problem when a low risk proven technology would have more than sufficed.   Technical expertise egos got in the way of a practical low-cost approach resulting in unplanned schedule and cost growth.

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Convert a Constant Failure Rate to Operating Hours

Convert a Constant Failure Rate to Operating Hours

Someone asked, “…if you can give me quick explanation: For Example, EPRD 2014 part, Category: IC, Subcategory: Digital, Subtype1: JK, Failure Rate (FPMH) = 0.083632 per (million) calendar hours! How do you convert that to operational hours?” I.e., time-to-failure T has exponential distribution in calendar (million) hours with MTBF 11.9571 (million) hours.

Did the questioner mean how to convert calendar-hour MTBF into operating-hour MTBF? David Nichols’ article does that for 217Plus MTBF predictions, based on “the percentage of calendar time that the component is in the operating or non-operating (dormant) calendar period, and how many times the component is cycled during that period.” I.e., MTBF/R where R is the proportion of operating hours per calendar hour. 

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Symptoms Of Oxygen Deficient Atmosphere

Symptoms Of Oxygen Deficient Atmosphere

Oxygen Deficient Atmosphere (<19.5%)

Oxygen Concentration (% Volume)Symptoms of acute exposure
15-19May impair coordination. Decreased ability to perform tasks
12-15Impaired coordination, perception, and judgment
10-12Increased breathing rate, poor coordination and judgment, lips slightly blue
8-10Mental failure, fainting, unconsciousness, ashen face, blueness of lips, nausea, upset stomach and vomiting
6-88 minute exposure: may be fatal in 50-100%; 6 minute exposure: may be fatal in 25-50%; 4-5 minutes exposure: Recovery with treatment
4-6Coma in 40-seconds, followed by convulsions, breathing failure, death

Source: Compressed Natural Gas Safety Bulletin, SB-2, 1992.

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Nine Questions on JD Solomon’s New Book, Facilitating with FINESSE

Nine Questions on JD Solomon’s New Book, Facilitating with FINESSE

I recently sat down with Ray Moore and chatted about my new book, Facilitating with FINESSE: How to Lead Others to Successful Business Solutions. The book is scheduled for release on May 31, 2023.

Ray: What is your new book about?

JD: It is a practitioner’s guide for 10 common applications that technically trained professionals are frequently asked to facilitate. The range of applications covers quality and reliability techniques such as block diagrams and tree diagrams through master plans and strategic plans.

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Priorities, priorities…

Priorities, priorities…

This is the sixth edition of the R for Engineering newsletter, and today we look at the ultimate prioritization tool – Pareto charts!

Pareto charts are a core tool for anyone who makes decisions, whether it is selecting a project or problem to solve, combing through last year’s spend or deciding on what equipment to purchase this year. The list goes on; bottom line is that Pareto charts simply allow you to focus on what’s important and cut through what may be interesting but unimportant.

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What is Agile Enterprise Risk Management

What is Agile Enterprise Risk Management

Guest Post by Howard M. Wiener (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

I am pretty close to completing my first book – Agile Enterprise Risk Management, Risk-Based Thinking, Multi-Disciplinary Management and Digital Transformation. It is now at the publishers, awaiting finalization. I have established a site for the book and this is the home page text that describes what AERM is all about.

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