A new process will make solid-state rechargeable batteries that should greatly outperform existing ones

Solid-state batteries
The power of the press

Jan 27th 2011 | ORLANDO, FLORIDA | from the print edition

ELECTRONICS made a huge leap forward when the delicate and temperamental vacuum tube was replaced by the robust, reliable transistor. That change led to the now ubiquitous silicon chip. As a consequence, electronic devices have become vastly more powerful and, at the same time, have shrunk in both size and cost. Some people believe that a similar change would happen if rechargeable batteries could likewise be made into thin, solid devices. Researchers are working on various ways to do this and now one of these efforts is coming to fruition. That promises smaller, cheaper, more powerful batteries for consumer electronics and, eventually, for electric cars.

Read complete article clicking here

City Deploys Baldrige Criteria to Survive Difficult Economy

03/31/2011
Posted by Dawn Marie Bailey

I'm sure I don't need to tell you that the current economic forecast for America's cities is not good. But maybe I can share a little hope connected to the Baldrige Criteria.
In October 2010, the National League of Cities published a study on city fiscal conditions, reporting that the effects of the economic downturn continue to adversely impact our nation's cities. City finance officers report struggling housing markets, slow consumer spending, and high levels of unemployment that are driving declines in revenues. According to the report, in response, cities are cutting personnel, infrastructure investments, and key services. The report also notes that nearly nine in ten cities were less able to meet fiscal needs in 2010 than in 2009, property tax and sales tax revenues continued to decline, and fiscal pressures regarding public safety and employee-related costs continued to rise. Also in 2010, CNNMoney.com reported that several U.S. cities were on the verge of defaulting on their debt, and it named three cities on "the verge of broke."
So what about an inspirational story for America's cities?

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Lean Thinking is Horizontal Thinking

by Chet Marchwinski

The most fundamental issue in management is how to think horizontally in our inherently vertical organizations, according to management expert Jim Womack, founder and senior advisor at the nonprofit Lean Enterprise Institute (LEI). “Senior managers must keep in mind that there is often a disconnect between the needs of  processes, which run horizontally across the company to customers to create value, and the needs of vertical silos which are how organizations are put together,” Womack said.
Womack made his remarks in a podcast interview with Mark Graban, founder and lead contributor of LeanBlog.org. Graban also is a senior fellow at LEI and is the author of Lean Hospitals: Improving Quality, Patient Safety, and Employee Satisfaction, winner of a 2009 Shingo Research and Professional Publication Award.

read more>>

How Good Is Your Problem Solving?

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Good problem solving skills are fundamentally important if you're going to be successful in your career. But problems are something that we don't particularly like. They're time-consuming. They muscle their way into already packed schedules. They force us to think about an uncertain future. And they never seem to go away!
That's why, when faced with problems, most of us try to eliminate them as quickly as possible. But have you ever chosen the easiest or most obvious solution – and then realized that you have entirely missed a much better solution? Or have you found yourself fixing just the symptoms of a problem, only for the situation to get much worse?
To be an effective problem-solver, you need to be systematic and logical in your approach. This quiz helps you assess your current approach to problem solving. By improving this, you'll make better overall decisions. And as you increase your confidence with solving problems, you'll be less likely to rush to the first solution - which may not necessarily be the best one.

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Personal SWOT Analysis

Making the Most of Your Talents and Opportunities.

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"Chance favors the prepared mind."
– Louis Pasteur

You are most likely to succeed in life if you use your talents to their fullest extent. Similarly, you'll suffer fewer problems if you know what your weaknesses are, and if you manage these weaknesses so that they don't matter in the work you do.
So how you go about identifying these strengths and weaknesses, and analyzing the opportunities and threats that flow from them? SWOT Analysis is a useful technique that helps you do this.
What makes SWOT especially powerful is that, with a little thought, it can help you uncover opportunities that you would not otherwise have spotted. And by understanding your weaknesses, you can manage and eliminate threats that might otherwise hurt your ability to move forward.

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Flow Model - Balancing Challenge and Skills

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Have you ever been so involved in doing something that you lost track of time?  Everything around you – from the ringing of phones to the people passing in the hallways – seemed to fade away. Your attention was focused entirely on what you were doing, and you were so engaged that you might even have missed lunch. You felt energized, even joyful, about what you were doing. Most of us have had this experience at one time or another. Psychologists call this "flow." When it happens, we lose our sense of self, and move forward on instinct, completely devoted to the task before us.

In this article, we'll examine flow in detail by looking into the Flow Model. We'll review how the model can help us understand why we find some tasks much easier than others. We'll also look at how you can use the ideas behind the Flow Model to experience flow more often, so that you can be more productive.

The Flow Model article clicking here

Getting it right first time

Zero Defects

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How much do quality failures cost your company?
Quality defects have significant costs associated with them – some of the most obvious being money, time, resources, and lost reputation. And programs to eliminate quality defects can be expensive and time consuming. Do you insist on eliminating defects entirely no matter the cost? Or, do you accept that a certain, albeit very small, percentage of defects is acceptable, and just accept the costs and learn to live with them?
One of the most influential ideas about this was the notion of "zero defects." This phrase was coined by Philip Crosby in his 1979 book titled, "Quality is Free."

Continue reading>>

Studies of calibration procedures for load cell and proving ring

Technical Note 436 from NBS (National  Bureau of Standards)

http://www.nist.gov/calibrations/upload/tn436.pdf

DC motors basic characteristics

relationship between torque, current, speed, mechanical power and efficiency of a typical DC motor

see it on pdf file clicking here

Hybrid cars: a guide

Hybrid cars are at the centre of a green car revolution. As fuel prices rise at an astronomical rate and the world searches for alternatives to fossil fuels, hybrid cars have emerged at the head of the pack as the most realistic alternative to conventional vehicles. So what makes hybrid cars such a good alternative, how do they work and who are they right for? We’ll explain all in this guide to hybrid cars.
Quick links:

• What is a hybrid car?
• How do hybrid cars work?
• What are the advantages of hybrid cars?
• What are the disadvantages of hybrid cars?
• Why have hybrid cars earned celebrity status?
• What is it like to own a hybrid car? How much do hybrid cars cost?
• What hybrid cars are available?
• Where can you find a hybrid car?

China to beat US to electric vehicle rollout

According to a new report by Accenture, China could actually be ahead of the US when it comes to the rollout of electric vehicles and deploying disruptive new transport technologies.
However, when it comes to creating new innovations across several platforms, including advanced combustion engines, electric and advanced biofuels that can be integrated into the existing infrastructure the US is thought to have the edge.
The authors state that China should win the race in terms of supporting alternative energy and allocation of funds to research and deployment, meaning it should reach its targets faster. However, the US is more likely to generate a breakthrough solution despite being slower in development.
China’s competitive advantage comes from its domestic supplies of lithium and current battery production capabilities. The rise of new fuel technologies should also allow both countries to enjoy greater energy independence with the reduction in the US potentially reaching 22billion gallons per year by 2030. This would reduce crude oil imports by one billion barrels per year; while China, which imports over half of its petrol demand, could reduce crude oil imports by 676million barrels by 2020.
The increase in new fuels will however, have a negative impact on the US refining industry with the blending of biofuels expected to replace more than 30 per cent of US petrol and diesel demand by 2030 compared to 2010. However, in China there should be no losers because car ownership is expected to triple between now and 2020 creating growth across the biofuel, electric vehicle and oil industries.

California holds the key for electric vehicle policies

According to a new report by the International Council on Clean Transportation, California’s zero emission vehicle mandate is indispensable for electric vehicle policies worldwide.

Its five part analysis of public policies is known as the Vehicle Electrification Policy Study and highlights the declining cost of electric vehicle technologies coupled with persistent market uncertainties. It calls the California Air Resources Board’s targets reasonable and emphasises that policymakers must pay attention to the second wave of consumers.
Currently, the California ZEV programme has three state-wide policy goals: to reduce pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions; to reduce petrol and diesel fuel demand; and to maintain leadership in environmental technology policy. In addition, the study looks at five additional topics: the current status of vehicle and infrastructure technologies; appropriate metrics for measuring commercialisation; costs of transitioning to a self sustaining market; complementary policies for electric vehicle deployment; and the state of practice in electric vehicle policy worldwide.
Three reports have already been released:
- Technology status: The report indicates declining costs with fuel cell vehicles dropping from several hundred thousand dollars today to roughly $75,000 in 2015 and $50,000 or less in 2020. The projected cost per kilowatt hour for battery electric vehicles is expected to fall from $650-$1,000 today down to $400-$700 in 2015 and $300-$500 in 2020.
- Metrics: It is believed that metrics should allow manufacturers the flexibility to design, manufacture and market vehicles to meet zero emission vehicle goals and customer needs.
- Complementary policies: This study identifies the policies that support vehicle electrification with several steps recommended to assist the transition including incentives that focus on research and development as well as deployment; work continuing on approaches to ensure the deployment of hydrogen infrastructure; and continued efforts to forge a mutual commitment among auto companies and fuel providers that vehicle and hydrogen infrastructure deployment will proceed hand in hand.

Author: Paul Lucas, March 12, 2011
Filed under: Electric cars,Green cars,Latest news

Top 5 green hatchbacks and superminis

Superminis and hatchbacks make some of the very greenest cars on the market thanks to their diminutive dimensions. But this doesn’t necessarily mean you have to drive with your knees next to your ears, many people currently drive a car much bigger than you need. A lot of motorists would be surprised by how much they can fit into a ‘small’ car and just how much they can save in fuel costs as a result of downsizing. If you are looking for a small yet mighty green car, TheGreenCarWebsite.co.uk has the rundown of the ‘Top 5 Green Car Hatchbacks and Superminis’:

• smart fortwo with emissions from a tiny 86g/km of CO2 and 85.6mpg on a combined cycle.
• Toyota Auris HSD with 89g/km of CO2 and 74.3mpg combined.
• Volkswagen Polo Bluemotion TDi  with 91g/km of CO2 and 80.7mpg combined.
• SEAT Ibiza 1.2 TDi Ecomotive with 92g/km of CO2 and 80.7mpg combined.
• Fiat 500 TwinAir with 92g/km CO2 and 70.6mpg combined.
• Ford Fiesta 1.6 Duratorq TDCi with 98g/km of CO2 and 76.3mpg combined.

Last updated: November 2010

Chinese carmaker makes breakthrough in Brazil

China may be the world’s largest automotive market, but its home-grown manufacturers have yet to make a significant breakthrough overseas – until now.
Jianghuai Automobile Company shipped 500 ethanol powered cars to Brazil at the end of December thanks to a deal signed in August with Brazilian dealer SHC to export 620,000 units during the next 10 years.
SHC has more than 60 outlets in Brazil and is the country’s largest dealer. It currently sells Ford, Volkswagen, Jaguar, Aston Martin and Citroen vehicles and has annual vehicle sales of around 80,000 units.
Now, JAC will send 1,500 more units this month and a further 2,500 in February.
The breakthrough in Brazil is important because the country is now the world’s fourth largest auto market. It is also an exciting marketplace for Chinese automakers with Chary building a plant in Sao Paulo and Great Wall Motor expressing interest in establishing Brazilian production.

New NIST Testing Device May Help to 'Seal the Deal' for Building Owners

From NIST Tech Beat March 15, 2011
Contact: Mark Bello
(301) 975-3776

Just as a chain is as strong as its weakest link, a building is as secure against the environment as its most degraded joint sealants, about 50 percent of which fail in less than 10 years after installation.

Mounted on the roof of a building on NIST’s Gaithersburg, Md., campus, this NIST-developed device is designed to induce temperature-caused strains on sealant specimens while monitoring loads and displacements. Affixed to a rigid base, the top segments of PVC pipe expand and contract with changes in temperature. Sensors, load cells, and specimens--sandwiched between aluminum blocks--are suspended from the top crosspiece, which moves, and are attached to the same rigid base. Credit: NIST View hi-resolution image

The upshot for U.S. homeowners is that moisture damage due to failed sealants is responsible for much of the $65 billion to $80 billion they collectively shell out for house repairs annually.
Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) are assembling a toolkit of measurement devices and scientific data that will help manufacturers of sealants systematically improve the protective performance of their products. Their latest contribution, described in the current issue of the Review of Scientific Instruments,* is an outdoor testing system that tracks real weather conditions—by the minute—and measures the squeezing and stretching that occur in sealants as the building moves with temperature changes.

Continue reading, clicking here

China automaker Chery's Brazil project approved by NDRC

BEIJING, Mar. 3, 2011 (Xinhua News Agency) -- Chinese automaker Chery Auto has received go-ahead from China's top economic planner, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), for its assembly plant project in the St. Paul state of Brazil, reported Shanghai Securities News.
Chery inked a framework agreement with the local government of St. Paul state last September, becoming the first Chinese automaker that has invested in a plant in Brazil.

The 1 million-square-meter assembly plant will be solely-invested by Chery, with total investment of 400 million US dollars.
The whole project will be divided into two phases.

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Bolt Preload Calculation

Question:  How is bolt installation preload calculated?
Answer: click here

Universal Belt Tension Meter/Measurement

Access booklet with basic concepts/calculus to deal with Belt Tension measurement, clicking here

Is the United States losing its competitive edge?

By Ben Wildavsky Marketplace, Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Education advocates point to a recent spate of test scores that show the United States falling behind other nations. But what's the real story?

read it clicking here

Japan crisis, rate hikes pose threat to Indian car-makers

Mumbai: Faced with surging raw material costs, Indian car-makers now face three additional serious challenges, including a shortage of key components, which could impact their performance this year.
While they could pass on the burden of increased input costs to customers, a shortage of components, compounded by the March 11 tsunami and quake in Japan and the Reserve Bank's latest rate hike -- which could affect car financing -- have made them jittery over their prospects in the short-to-medium term.
General Motors India Vice-President P Balendran said, "Yes, the industry is facing problems, but we are taking it as a big challenge. We think this is a passing phase -- we see light at the end of tunnel.”

continue reading....

Japan disaster poses threat to global auto industry

ALY SONG/REUTERS

A car sits atop another in an area affected by an earthquake and tsunami in Miyako, Iwate prefecture March 14, 2011.

Reuters 

PARIS—The closure of Japanese car and parts plants poses a threat to the auto industry’s global supply chain and companies are hoping the disruption does not last long enough to affect parts deliveries and customer shipments.

Read more>>

What are your team's most effective practices?

Steve Arneson

I want to explore (and shamelessly steal) a term that a reader coined this past week in the comments section of this column. In case you missed it, the reader weighed in with this gem… “It’s about time we all stopped using the term "best practice" - really, it's almost impossible to say that one practice is going to be the best one across industries and organizations. I think we need to start using the term ‘effective practice’… it's our job to determine which practices and which examples are going to be the best fit for our own organizations, rather than to simply adopt practices that have worked somewhere else.”
Taken by itself, I think that’s a profound statement; one that could spark some interesting dialog for you and your colleagues. It’s the term “effective practice” that caught my eye, though, and got me to thinking about this question: “what are your team’s most effective practices?” In other words, what would others around the organization say your team does really well? What is your team known for? And more importantly, do you (and the team) know what those things are?

Take a stab at a quick “Top 10” list of macro practices that your team probably engages, clicking here

 

The 25 most important leadership behaviors

Steve Arneson

Recently, I reviewed a number of leadership competency lists in order to make a recommendation for a company that was interested in updating their competency mandate for leaders. There are a number of good lists out there, including one that I wrote about last fall - Michael Lombardo and Robert Eichinger’s list of 67 competencies (The Leadership Machine, 2001). As I said then, leadership may be a complex animal, but it certainly has been well examined and classified.
Anyway, all of these competencies lists got me to thinking about what a list of “leadership behaviors” might look like. You see, most competency lists include a collection of traits like courage, compassion, technical skills, intelligence, etc. Critical terms, to be sure – but they read as a list of characteristics leaders need as opposed to a list of what leaders actually do. If you take all of the traits and characteristics and bundle them together, you could potentially generate a list of what leaders do on the job, not just what it takes to be a leader. So naturally, I had to take a stab at it…here’s what I came up with:

The 25 Most Important Leadership Behaviors clicking here

 

Follow my leader - A group’s “intelligence” depends in part on its members’ ignorance

Collective behaviour

HUMAN beings like to think of themselves as the animal kingdom’s smartest alecks. It may come as a surprise to some, therefore, that Iain Couzin of Princeton University believes they have something to learn from lesser creatures that move about in a large crowd. As he told the AAAS meeting in Washington, DC, groups of animals often make what look like wise decisions, even when most of the members of those groups are ignorant of what is going on.
Coming to that conclusion was not easy. Before lessons can be drawn from critters perched on the lower rungs of the evolutionary ladder, their behaviour must first be understood.

continue reading it at  www.economist.com

M&A's Overlooked Pitfall: The False Negative

Plenty of merger deals should never happen: Buyers are too often attracted to "false positives" in targets that are overvalued. Less noticed are the deals that get away, but shouldn't, because of "false negatives" -- an undervaluation based on outdated methodologies that leads to a losing bid. The true value of a target company can be determined only if the buyer looks beyond current core operations to include future potential, argue three M&A experts -- Alexander B. van Putten, a principal of consulting firm Cameron & Associates and a lecturer at Wharton; Mehrdad Baghai, managing director of Sydney, Australia-based Alchemy Growth Partners, a boutique advisory and venture firm, and a co-author of the book The Alchemy of Growth; and Ian C. MacMillan, a professor of innovation, entrepreneurship and management at Wharton.
"When will we finally close a deal?" The frustration around the management table at Bank X was palpable. The company had just been outbid by its archrival in the pursuit of a key competitor in its rapidly consolidating sector. It was déjà vu all over again.

continue reading....

Is Business-centric Social Networking a Revolution -- or a Ruse?

Programs like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn have become a popular way for families and groups of friends (or groups of strangers) to share information and organize their lives. Now corporations are hoping they can tap into those capabilities as a way to improve employee productivity, collaboration and communication on the job -- and a long line of software vendors are hoping to position themselves as the ones to help make the integration of social networking and business a reality. Is it worth the effort?
But will it work? And is it worth it? Research firm IDC projects that the global market for social platforms will jump from $630 million in 2011 to $1.86 billion by 2014. But while proponents tout the push for a more "social" business sector as a new era that will alter the way companies manage employees, skeptics say it could amount to nothing more than a ploy to help software companies sell more products.
"Clearly, social media has revolutionized how human beings interact," says Kendall Whitehouse, director of new media at Wharton. "It's logical to ask how it can transform internal business processes." Shawndra Hill, a Wharton operations and information management professor, agrees, but says there is a lack of concrete measurement on the impact of social networking on business returns. "Social networking in the enterprise sector is relatively new, and better tools can enable people to communicate across an organization. But before this really takes off, there needs to be some proof that these things are useful."

continue reading .....

Japan Earthquake: Wharton's Howard Kunreuther and Erwann Michel-Kerjan on Crisis Planning

It may be years before the costs -- human and economic -- of the devastating earthquake and tsunami on March 11 in Japan are fully known, but they will be enormous. With thousands confirmed dead throughout the northeastern part of the country and officials scrambling to contain a nuclear disaster, there are now more questions than answers. Three days after the major earthquake hit, Knowledge@Wharton asked Howard Kunreuther, professor of decision sciences and business and public policy, and Erwann Michel-Kerjan, managing director of Wharton's Risk Management and Decision Processes Center, to size up the lessons risk managers and other corporate executives need to take away from the earthquake and its aftermath.

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Containment Theory

This page discusses containment theory. It is broken down between external containment (at your customer location) and internal containment (at your facility). In addition, I cover warranty issues and containment.

Read more: quality-assurance-solutions.com/containment-theory.

Dealing with Customer Complaints

Here are some tips when dealing with customer complaints. Consumer complaints causes stress to the consumer and the business receiving the complaint.
This page helps relieves the stress because it provides an approach to handle business complaints. I discuss the reasons not to ignore issues, the information to include in the initial response, the reasons for requesting additional information, and the reasons to log the issue. The end of this article has multiple links to resolving the complaint.

Read more: quality-assurance-solutions.com/dealing-with-customer-complaints

Supply Cost Reduction in The Physicians Practice

by
Michael Lawson
DOCTORSMANAGEMENT, LLC

The cost of practicing medicine continues to rise while reimbursements continue to fall. Add to this the cost of providing employee benefits, which are also rising, and it is becoming more difficult to operate a financially healthy medical practice. Assuming that coding and billing operations are functioning at proper levels of performance and employees are operating at peak levels of performance, there are basically two ways to increase revenue and, hopefully, increase profit as a result: see more patients or take on ancillary services. These are not always options for every practice, so the next opportunity to increase profits is to reduce overhead. Again, there are two basic ways to do this: cut supply cost or reduce HR cost. With each of these, the implication for the practice is the possibility of reduced practice performance and reduced revenue.
Reducing supply cost can be a formidable assignment. A supply program running at peak efficiency requires time, knowledge, resources, and dedication. However, by focusing on what is most within your control, you can achieve substantial savings. The obvious question for the practice manager concerning the cost of supplies and services is this: Am I getting the best balance of price versus product quality and service? In other words, am I getting value for the money?
An old adage states, “The bitter taste of poor quality remains long after the sweet taste of low price is forgotten.” The desired result is to not sacrifice quality for price. A cheap price often brings tradeoffs in other areas: service, performance, and durability. A sacrifice in any of these areas will increase the cost of the product through downtime, poor work output, and premature repurchasing.

continue reading it.....

Lean Manufacturing and Lean Six Sigma Training Update

from

We have recently launched new Lean Six Sigma Green Belt and Black Belt online programs to complement our online Lean Certification program. A discount is available for newsletter subscribers. (See below.)

Also, we want to remind our subscribers about our instructor-led workshops next month. There are only a few days left to register for our April 6th "Quick Changeover and Total Productive Maintenance" workshop and/or our April 7th "Creating Continuous Flow Manufacturing Cells" workshop at the early registration price of $449 per person per workshop. A 10% discount is now available for 4 or more registrations made at the same time (4 workshops, 4 people, or any combination).

These classes will take place at the Doubletree Club Hotel Orange County Airport in Santa Ana, CA. Of course, if Orange County isn't convenient for you, you might consider our self-paced, online programs.
April 2011 Courses
Quick Changeover (SMED) and Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) - Santa Ana, CA. Wednesday, April 6th, 8:30am - 4:30pm. Through case study, video, and instruction, this course will teach attendees how to implement TPM and SMED, two essential ingredients in a lean manufacturing program. The TPM system addresses production operation with a solid, team-based proactive program. It helps eliminate losses from breakdowns, defects, and accidents and improves Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE). The SMED system for quick changeover is a three-phase system aimed at reducing changeover time on equipment; this allows for smaller batches and less inventory throughout the value stream. $449 if registered by 03/25, $549 after.

Creating Continuous Flow Manufacturing Cells - Santa Ana, CA. Thursday,
April 7th, 8:30am - 4:30pm. In this workshop, participants will learn how to design manufacturing cells for true one-piece flow. The course is comprehensive in that it covers all facets of this discipline: understanding takt time, physical layout, analyzing standard work and creating standard work charts, line balancing, load-leveling, setting up a system for auditing, and more. $449 if registered by 03/25, $549 after.

Complete Schedule

Quick Changeover (SMED) and Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) - April 6, 8:30am - 4:30pm
Creating Continuous Flow Mfg. Cells - April 7, 8:30am - 4:30pm
Lean Production Control and Inventory Management - May 11, 8:30am - 4:30pm

click here to read more and/or register
Online Lean and Lean Six Sigma Training and Certification - Now Available for Registration

We have recently released new lean six sigma training programs online; the programs are based on our classroom/on-site versions and are entirely self-paced. We are currently offering the following programs at a discounted price:

1. Lean Manufacturing Certification Program (Certified Lean Practitioner)

2. Lean Six Sigma Black Belt

3. Lean Six Sigma Green Belt

Additionally, as a newsletter subscriber, you can get an additional 15% discount on our online training by using the coupon code "newsletter" when registering. This does not apply to our instructor-led workshops in Orange County.

We also continue to offer individual programs that are analagous to our single-day workshop offerings covering such topics as Value Stream Mapping, Continuous Flow Manufacturing, Kanban and Pull Systems, Standardized Work, 5S, Total Productive Maintenance, Quick Changeover, Kaizen Events, and Problem Solving. All of the programs allow for instructor interaction and grant access to the online materials for 1 year.

click here to read more and/or register
If you have any questions about our online or instructor led training, please e-mail me at darrend@emsstrategies.com to discuss your options.

Best Regards,

Darren Dolcemascolo
EMS Consulting Group, Inc.
darrend@emsstrategies.com
866-559-5598, ext. 33

Indecision is the Bane of Productivity

When in doubt, leave it out

BY Michelle LaBrosse

Imagine you are sitting in your car, wondering, “What shall I do for dinner? Shall I pick up Chinese food to go, meet my friend Sally, or go home and cook dinner myself while watching American Idol?” All of a sudden you’re sitting there, frozen in time, unable to make a decision about what to do for dinner. And this is one of the easier choices in life. 

Don’t be upset. Indecision can happen to anyone and often occurs when you least expect it. The pause that takes place when you are in the midst of making any important (or not so important) decision is like a comma in your life, separating one idea from the next, and one task from another. As anyone who has passed the third grade knows, the comma rule states: “When in doubt, leave it out.” This rule can be applied similarly to life’s frozen moments of indecision. When it doubt, leave that pause out.
Now, I’m not encouraging you to stop making decisions altogether. I’m talking about decisions that take an inordinately long time to process. Some of the reasons we succumb to prolonged indecision are the following.

CONTINUE READING...


 

Employee Management Fundamentals

Looking for all of the basics about employee management? Employee management is the most important job that managers do in an organization. You'll want to learn how to find, interview, and hire a superior workforce. Then, you need to understand and perform the employee practices that keep employees motivated, inspired, developing, and attaining goals with your guidance. You can be the successful manager who makes a serious difference in the work life of employees and for your organization.

• Seven Tips for Management Success
• Two Most Important Management Secrets
• What Great Managers Do Differently
• Bottom Line for Employee Retention
• Twenty Dumb Things Organizations Do to Mess Up...
• Motivation and a Profitable Business Are All About the Managers...Duh!
• You Can Make Their Day: Ten Tips for the Leader
• Human Resources, Business, and Management Tips
• Tips for Effective Delegation

• Why Leave Your Integrity to Chance?
• Team Building and Delegation
• Prevent Predictable Decision Making Errors
• Recession Planning for Employees
• The Role of the Supervisor in Managing Absenteeism
• Talent On-the-Bubble: Addressing Human Behavior at Work
• Award Winning Business and Management Books
• Human Resources Management Books for Small Business

New Camera Makes Seeing the 'Invisible' Possible

ScienceDaily (Mar. 7, 2011) — The science similar to the type used in airport body scanners could soon be used to detect everything from defects in aerospace vehicles or concrete bridges to skin cancer, thanks to researchers at Missouri University of Science and Technology.

link to the article..

Design of Experiments (DOE)

Introduction

The term experiment is defined as the systematic procedure carried out under controlled conditions in order to discover an unknown effect, to test or establish a hypothesis, or to illustrate a known effect1. When analyzing a process, experiments are often used to evaluate which process inputs have a significant impact on the process output, and what the target level of those inputs should be to achieve a desired result (output). Experiments can be designed in many different ways to collect this information. Design of Experiments (DOE) is also referred to as Designed Experiments or Experimental Design - all of the terms have the same meaning.

Experimental design can be used at the point of greatest leverage to reduce design costs by speeding up the design process, reducing late engineering design changes, and reducing product material and labor complexity. Designed Experiments are also powerful tools to achieve manufacturing cost savings by minimizing process variation and reducing rework, scrap, and the need for inspection.

This Toolbox module includes a general overview of Experimental Design, instructions and templates for conducting simple experiments, and links and other resources to assist you in conducting more complex experiments. A glossary of terms is also available at any time through the Help function, and we recommend that you read through it to familiarize yourself with any unfamiliar terms.                  continue learning.....

Either-Or Thinking Doesn't Work

Column by David Silverstein

Operational efficiency and creativity both play a part in business success.

In my last column I wrote about the concept of convergence as it relates to the integration of business-excellence tools and approaches: Lean, Six Sigma, Design for Six Sigma and Innovation. Since then, I read an interesting Harvard Business Review article, titled "How Successful Leaders Think" (June 2007). In it, the author focuses on the central idea of the "opposable mind," making an analogy to the profoundly primate trait of the opposable thumb. Essentially, an opposable mind can use integrative thinking to adeptly combine two seemingly competing ideas into a higher-order idea, or solution. This column is about how essential this integrative thinking is to successful businesses.

Continue reading....

Is Business Ethics an Oxymoron?

by Aseem Rastogi

Business ethics and corporate governance are the buzzwords in today’s corporate circles. It seems as though everyone is talking about them right from economic stalwarts to B-school professionals. In fact, there are courses being taught on this everywhere. But, with the corruption scams and scandals ranging across the board – be it sub-prime …

Continue Reading →

More the country’s average IQ, more is the GDP!

by Aseem Rastogi

Intelligence quotient (IQ) involves a series of tests to predict a person’s intelligence. The tests include a mix of observations, analytical, quantitative and qualitative questions which judge his / her ability to react to situations. And the higher the IQ of a person, the more he / she is regarded as having done something great [...]

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‘Hands-on' project management service launched

One of the UK's leading developers and manufacturer of metrology, inspection and optical measuring equipment Vision Engineering Ltd, has set up a manufacturing services division which can draw upon its internal network of international business expertise to provide a ‘hands-on' project managed service to companies in the electro-mechanical sector for design, development and manufacture. 
In addition, live resource in areas such as the analysis of market potential, detailed commercial aspects and logistics can be provided or woven into any project requirement.
Based in Woking, Vision Engineering's Manufacturing Service division (VEMS) has a major resource to benefit customers as it can call upon and specifically tailor the international expertise of the parent company to support projects involving design, development, manufacture and marketing.

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Automating Manufacturing Programme which looks to address barriers that UK manufacturers face.

Automating Manufacturing Programme to drive increased UK competitiveness

Recommendations made in a recent industry study, Application of Automation in UK Manufacturing 27 Sept 2010, resulted in BIS funding of £600,000K and a two year BARA

The study, which polled a broad spectrum of manufacturers of engineered products and food in Spain, Germany, Sweden and the UK, not only aimed to find out why the UK lags behind the rest of the world in the adoption of automation, but looked to address the issues with an action plan of initiatives to stimulate growth. International Federation of Robotics figures on robot density (number of robots in use per 10,000 persons employed) for all manufacturing sectors excluding automotive, illustrated the poor position of the UK which was at 19% of Germany and only 62% of Spain in 2009. Martin Walder, Chairman of the Engineering and Machinery Alliance (EAMA), commented: "By comparing UK companies with similar businesses in Germany, Spain and Sweden this study highlights our weakness in automation. If UK manufacturing is to remain competitive we have to act now." 

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Productivity: More than Just Speed

An insurance firm discovers through value stream mapping that it must fix its broken processes before it can increase its productivity sustainably.

By Amy Tan and Uwe H. Kaufmann

The goal of any financial services company seeking continuous improvement is to increase productivity. But how should this be done? One way seems obvious: Work faster so that more products get made or services get offered in the same time period. Although this request might have seemed correct 30 years ago, it is highly inappropriate today and would lead to even more frustration among an already overworked staff.

The key to increasing productivity is not about how fast we work. It is about how we get work done; it is about the process, rather than the people.

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Carle Foundation Hospital Accelerates Lean with Rapid Action Teams

Leading Regional Hospital chosen to share findings and results on innovative approach to engaging employees in Lean improvement at American College of Healthcare Executives Annual Congress in Chicago.

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Chicago, Illinois (March 21, 2011) – John Snyder, COO, and Beth Edrington, Director of Internal Consulting and Performance Improvement, will present how Carle Foundation Hospital has employed an innovative method for engaging nurses, technicians and other hospital employees to capture operating cost savings in just 60 days while building leadership skills and employee morale at the same time. The key to success: An innovative small team improvement process, developed by Leap Technologies, that gets hospital employees productively engaged in eliminating waste, implementing best practices and solving problems without the need for extensive upfront training, expert support or time off-the-floor.

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Vehicle Parts Supplier WABCO Opens Lean Six Sigma Plant in China

WABCO, a supplier of components for the commercial vehicle industry, has opened a new production facility in Jinan, China, showcasing the company's Lean Six Sigma program.

The 11,000-square-meter Jinan factory employs 350 people and was designed to combine Lean qualty control methods with Six Sigma process efficiency, starting with suppliers and connecting through to customers. The plant will provide advanced commercial vehicle control systems such as air compressors, air processing units and transmission systems to a wide assortment of Chinese and global vehicle makers.

The Jinan factory is WABCO's second production facility in China; the first manufacturing site is located in Qingdao, a coastal city in Shandong Province. Currently, the company has eight production facilities in Asia.

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Theories of Power - A Survey Towards the Development of a Theory of Power

Before beginning the discussion of empowerment and the development of a theory connected with it, I want to deal with a concept that is prior to empowerment—power. Power is a key concept for an understanding of processes of empowerment.The theory of empowerment that will be developed further on will draw its inspiration from an integration of two domains: from an understanding of theories of power and the use of
insights drawn from these for the purposes of developing a theory of empowerment, and from an analysis of processes of empowerment. Hence, this deeper study of it will also make possible a better understanding of states of powerlessness, practices of disempowerment, and processes by which people and communities struggle for control over their lives and environments.

Read more>> http://www.mpow.org/elisheva_sadan_empowerment_spreads