5S
Interview With 5S and Six Sigma Expert Brion Hurley
Creative Safety Supply was honored to have the opportunity to interview a Lean manufacturing expert. In this interview, Andrew McCall of Creative Safety Supply talks to Brion Hurley of Business Performance Improvement about the concept of 5S and its implementation in businesses. Brian discusses the eight wastes of Lean, emphasizing inventory as a commonly overlooked…
CSS Editorial Staff | June 5, 2023 | 5S, Lean, Training | 5S, Facility Efficiency, Lean, Lean Culture, Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma
Whiteboards: The Solution for the Disorganized
Creative Safety Supply has recently revealed a new product line all about whiteboards! Dry erase boards are an excellent tool for encouraging collaboration between departments and employees. However, one of the best attributes whiteboards hold is the fact that they are most often used as an organizational tool. When we say organization, it isn’t just…
Mackenzie Busby | September 8, 2021 | Company Updates | 5S, Continuous Improvement, Facility Efficiency, Healthcare, Kaizen, Kanban, Lean Manufacturing
Top Tool Organization Strategies for the Workplace
You may not know it, but your facility could be losing hundreds of dollars every year in missing, misplaced, or stolen tools. By implementing a tool organization system in your facility, work is done more efficiently, a number of costs are saved, and you can be sure workers can easily find the tools they’re looking…
Jesse Allred | January 16, 2020 | Lean, Safety Solutions | 5S, Facility Efficiency, Lean Manufacturing, Organized Workplace, Tool Organization
How is Gemba Lean?
Gemba walks are a Lean management tool that fits in with many other Lean manufacturing concepts. The focus of a Lean manufacturing system in general is on identifying waste in work processes and eliminating it. That way only things that add value for the customer are performed or included. While a gemba walk can focus on…
CSS Editorial Staff | June 4, 2019 | Gemba, Lean | 5S, Facility Efficiency, Facility Marking, Gemba, Kaizen, Lean, Lean Manufacturing
Could You be Losing $500 in Tools Each Year?
For many businesses, it is not uncommon to spend thousands of dollars per year on the tools that are needed to get work done. Whether you run a mechanics garage, a construction company, a plumbing service, or any number of other things, the right tools are an absolutely essential part of doing business. Most people…
Tony Ferraro | April 24, 2017 | Product Spotlight | 5S, Facility Efficiency, Organized Workplace, Tool Organization
New Floor Tape Finder Helps You Choose Floor Tape
Wondering which floor tape would work best in your facility? Do you need a basic vinyl tape, a heavy-duty tape, or something that can even withstand the pivoting wheels of forklifts? Not sure what tape to buy? Use our new Floor Tape Finder to quickly get the answers. Our web-based Floor Tape Finder will…
CSS Editorial Staff | March 16, 2017 | Company Updates | 5S, Facility Marking, Floor Marking, Forklift Safety, Safety, Workplace Safety
A Conversation on How to be an Effective Safety Professional
An interesting post was recently made by Doug Thompson in the EHSQ Elite Safety Group on LinkedIn, which prompted quite a thought provoking discussion. Mr. Thompson is a student at Columbia Southern University, and he titled his post, “Advice on how to be an effective safety professional.” He then wrote just one simple sentence, which…
Tony Ferraro | January 18, 2017 | Safety Solutions | 5S, Safety, Six Sigma
The 5th S | Sustaining Your Improvements
When learning the 5S methodology, the vast majority of the time spent will be on the first four S’s. The last S, which stands for Shitsuke, or Sustain, however, is almost certainly going to be the most important one. Without this S, all the others would quickly fall out of use, and the progress that…
Tony Ferraro | January 16, 2017 | 5S | 5S, Sustain
What is Yokoten & Why Don’t Most Companies Use it?
When it comes to safe and efficient operation of a workplace, most people are used to reading Japanese terms like Kaizen, Gemba, Gembutsu, Kanban, and more. Many companies, however, overlook the term Yokoten, and the many benefits it can bring. Barry Jeffrey posted an interesting article to the LinkedIn Group, “Gemba Academy,” where it generated…
Tony Ferraro | December 22, 2016 | Lean | 5S, Gemba, Kaizen, Kanban, Yokoten
Improving Safety Through Broad Knowledge
Conventional wisdom suggests that the safety manager at a facility needs to be an expert on things like applicable OSHA regulations, incident rates, and safety patterns at the facility itself. While all of this may be true, Dr. Judith A. Erickson argues that their knowledge must be much broader than that in order to truly…
Tony Ferraro | December 19, 2016 | Safety Solutions | 5S, OSHA, Safety, Workplace Safety
5S Program – Sort
When learning about the 5S program most people can quickly see how it can be helpful and improve efficiency in the facility. The whole strategy is quite easy when looking at it at a high level. If you’re not careful, however, it can get confusing with the actual implementation. This is because some of the…
Tony Ferraro | August 10, 2016 | 5S | 5S
Finding the Root Cause With the Five Whys
The “Five Why’s” is a technique that is often used within the Six Sigma methodology to help learn more about a situation and gain valuable information about what is going on. While the strategy is called the Five Why’s, it doesn’t actually have to be exactly five. In some situations, fewer are needed and in…
Tony Ferraro | May 12, 2016 | Lean | 5S, Five whys, Safety, Six Sigma
5 Workplace Safety Tips
Safety Tips to Improve Employees Well Being There is a common saying that you’ll hear at safety conferences and industrial meetings, “A safe workplace is an efficient workplace.” It is sometimes changed around to say profitable workplace at the end, but in either case the fact remains that while the primary reason to focus on…
Tony Ferraro | April 29, 2016 | Safety Solutions | 5S, Electrical Safety, Emergency Evacuation, Facility Marking, Floor Marking, Labeling, Organized Workplace, Safety, Safety Signs, Workplace Safety
The Difference Between 5S and Kaizen
When looking to help a facility run more efficiently you will find that there are many ideas and methodologies out there that can help. Two of the most popular (and most effective, when done properly) are 5S and Kaizen. Both of these concepts are quite similar, but there are important distinctions that one should be…
Tony Ferraro | April 22, 2016 | 5S | 5S, Kaizen
5 Tips to Improve the Elimination of Waste
Elimination of Waste Whether you are implementing a specific program like Lean or 5S to help improve efficiency or you are just looking for a way to eliminate waste in your facility, it is a good idea to look at what has worked for other companies in the past. Fortunately, there is a lot of…
Tony Ferraro | March 2, 2016 | 5S | 5S, Facility Efficiency, Facility Marking, Floor Marking, Forklift Safety, Lean Manufacturing, Organized Workplace, Regulations & Compliance, Safety Signs, Six Sigma, Valve Tag