Jim L. Smith

If you’re old enough to remember The Lone Ranger, Tonto and Silver (the Lone Ranger’s trusty horse) you’ll also remember the famous silver bullets. Unfortunately, silver bullets only exist in Hollywood, not in the real world. I’ve had several conversations with people whose companies are using lean transformations to pursue the magical silver bullet.

Without a doubt, quality professionals are expected to be well versed in technical skills. Proficiency with the various quality tools and techniques is paramount for the quality professional to lead their organization to performance excellence. In the current environment, that’s just not enough to be truly successful.

No matter your position at your company, have you ever asked yourself, “What are the key elements that drive outstanding performance?” Certainly, having good products and processes are among those important elements but that’s only two legs of a three-legged stool and without that third leg the stool will topple.

There’s a lot of attention given to the explosion of automation, specifically to the potential impact on the economy and the workforce.

What are the characteristics of a quality leader? For many, leadership comes down to each of us identifying and searching for the characteristics that are most appealing to us. For instance, I spent a career with a company that was mostly Juran-centered but also had a significant Deming slant.

This may sound familiar. Manufacturer’s efforts to do more for less have resulted in the purchasing department sourcing products to the cheapest provider. Such cost-cutting certainly makes purchasing groups look like heroes to management, but the effect on manufacturing and quality may be just the opposite.

We’ve all heard about or experienced the blame game. The customer is upset because a product doesn’t meet expectations. Once notified, the manufacturer apologizes, makes restoration, but blames a supplier for poor workmanship. Soon the blame game between manufacturer and supplier restricts the flow of meaningful information.

Real-life quality problems are conundrums. Dorian Shainin realized that recognizing the distinctive characteristics of a problem was critical. He also knew that applying the right tactics was the key to the solution; however, many of the analysis tools of his time were not effective.

I recently attended a lecture by an industrial statistician. Part of the lecture included a summary of Dorian Shainin’s body of work. I had to smile as the lecturer spoke about Shainin’s “exaggerated claims” of the results attributed to his methods and his infamous “pre-control.” 

Throughout years of mentoring and teaching aspiring quality professionals, I still review the Shainin techniques.