Articles Tagged with ''continuous improvement''

Data isn’t everything. But it’s perhaps the main thing standing between you and a successful project. Continuous improvement takes effort, but more than anything, it takes solid information and analysis. In other words, wouldn’t it be more helpful to use statistical process control to find out where your process is going wrong, rather than just a hunch?

Over a career that spans 40 years, Steve Gruler has struggled with the fact that quality seems to be a soft term. “Companies often say, ‘We’ve got great quality. We’ve got the best quality,’ and they’re looking at customer complaints and certification systems as their primary metrics,” he attests. 

Whether you’re training employees, tracking defects, or conducting audits, a good quality management system should make life easier.

If you ever get a chance to watch an aircraft being built, take it. Walking through the aircraft hangar at Northrop Grumman’s Palmdale, CA, facility, you will see two unmanned aircraft, each with a 130-foot wingspan, parked behind yellow tape. The scale of the aircraft and the desert setting make it feel like a movie set.

If you subscribe to Quality, it seems safe to assume that quality is a priority for you. But even when it is a priority, achieving high levels of quality is an ongoing challenge that requires effort from every member of the organization every day.