Manufacturing and retail are two closely related industries that depend on each other to succeed. Retail decides which products to buy from manufacturers, while manufacturers need to produce goods that retailers can sell to customers. If there is a holdup from one party, it can affect the productivity and profitability of the other. With both
Continue reading »Boyd Coatings Research, a company that applies high-performance coatings to specialized medical, industrial and aerospace products, recently received a Workforce Training Fund Grant from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The grant gives companies funding to launch in-depth training programs that will help them improve operations. The coatings application business has decided to use the grant to
Continue reading »There are three different learning types: visual, auditory and kinesthetic. Most people are some combination of the three, although they may prefer one type over the other two. According to Prime Infographics, the majority of workers (65 percent) are visual learners, meaning they associate concepts and knowledge with visuals they saw when they first learned
Continue reading »Much of the most time-consuming work conducted in operating rooms occurs not during the actual procedure, but in the turnover period from one surgical case to the next. This problem is even more evident in smaller clinics, where the number of available rooms is limited and thus the changeover is necessary between cases. Fortunately, turnover
Continue reading »At big companies, it's often hard to pinpoint the root cause of problems. Systems of complex policies and processes obfuscate what is actually happening – for example, when a manufacturer is shipping and storing a ton of inventory, it can be difficult to track everything and really discover where things are going wrong because of everything
Continue reading »The term “sustainability” has a variety of meanings. For some companies, it refers to the ability to stay in business and maintain prosperity. For others, it could mean ecological preservation through the minimization of waste and pollution. When discussing Lean manufacturing, however, it takes on a different definition altogether – it's a balance between the
Continue reading »Continuous improvement is a core concept of Kaizen, with Lean businesses always looking to reduce waste and generally improve operations. But how can companies improve when they are already best-in-class? This is a question that Harmen Dubbelaar, general manager of Hotel Okura Macau, frequently asks himself. According to China Daily, the hotel has a high
Continue reading »Deborah Edwards, a logistics management specialist in the Army Aviation and Missile Life Cycle Management Command (AMCOM) Competition Management Office (CMO), recently undertook a Lean training course through the Department of the Army. With this knowledge in hand, she hopes to be able to cut through much of the red tape that bogs down the execution
Continue reading »There are a lot of commonly held beliefs about what leaders should be. In the minds of many people, the ideal business owners and managers are smart, innovative, well-spoken, compassionate, driven and level-headed. They work together with their employees and motivate and empower them to achieve great things with their work. For inexperienced leaders, it
Continue reading »Financial institutions are often characterized by their perceived inefficiency and red tape. Customers are frequently frustrated by having to wait in long lines to take care of the seemingly easiest of tasks, whether it's opening an account or making a deposit. Great Western Bank heard its customers' complaints and is in the process of applying
Continue reading »
