Continuous Improvement

Making Your 5S Project An Act of Charity – And Why You Should Do It

Capitalism has a strange relationship with charity. On the one hand, businesses are perpetually encouraged to reinvest their profits, minimize monetary leaks, and carry forth in a manner that keeps them squarely in the black. On the other side of things, nothing benefits corporate image more than a genuine act of charity, or a project with a humanitarian mission. Obviously, these two directives can seem at odds,…

Tony Ferraro | January 17, 2014 | 5S | 5S, Continuous Improvement

How Simple Visibility Improvements can Improve Efficiency & Reduce Waste

Over the years, I have learned that one of the biggest mistakes individuals and companies make is always looking for the big changes to reduce waste or improve efficiency. They keep focusing on finding the next big, innovative move that will result in dramatic improvements to the bottom line. While these are great when they do happen, the vast majority of improvements in any workplace will be…

Tony Ferraro | January 10, 2014 | Lean | Barcoding, Continuous Improvement, Facility Efficiency, Labeling, Organized Workplace, Safety Signs

Business Performance Measurement Methods & Their Effectiveness

When it comes to running a business, one has to keep a careful watch on what’s being produced, how quickly it’s happening, and whether a factory is producing goods at a speed that can keep up with demand. By extension, this means that employees must be monitored to ensure that they are working efficiently and productively throughout the day. Depending on the size and nature of your…

Tony Ferraro | January 9, 2014 | Lean | Continuous Improvement

Holacracy – An Industry of the Self-Governed?

In one of the bigger business-related news pieces of the past week, online shoe mega-retailer Zappos has announced that it will be switching up its leadership by…. not having any. Actually, what’s been announced is that the company plans to shift to a “holacracy” system by the end of 2014. A holacracy is a setup in which employees no longer have defined roles and instead of managers,…

Tony Ferraro | January 8, 2014 | Lean | Continuous Improvement

The Paperless Warehouse – How & Why

What do bank statements, purchase receipts, and (now) your own business records have in common? They can all be paperless. Not only that, but they can be improved by going paperless. Businesses have been converting their records to an electronic format for a number of years now, and it’s not too late to jump on board – in fact, it’s the perfect time! In this article, we’re…

Tony Ferraro | January 7, 2014 | Lean | Continuous Improvement

How Safety & Lean Go Hand In Hand

Over the years, factories, warehouses, and even offices have gotten safer and safer over ongoing concern for worker health and well-being. As a result, working conditions have focused increasingly on following workplace rules and keeping employees out of harm’s way for the past century. On the other side of things, businesses are constantly striving to be as productive and efficient as possible, producing as much inventory as…

Tony Ferraro | January 6, 2014 | Lean, Safety Solutions | Continuous Improvement, Workplace Safety

Helpful Tools to Make Layouts for a Production Line

Businesses are rarely setup in the most efficient configuration from the very beginning. If you happen to be one of the keen and lucky few to have the foresight to do so, congratulations. If not, you might be looking for advice on how to re-organize your production line in a more lean manner. While the basic principles of lean assembly floors are easily found and widely known,…

Tony Ferraro | December 5, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement

Re-Inventing the Wheel – Do It Just This Once

Safety incentive programs have been around for quite some time, and for most companies, they’ve changed very little since their inception. However, like everything these days, what’s considered “best practice” may change very rapidly, and safety programs have certainly seen several revisions in their time. What you’re doing right now could seem like a trusty, time-proven system with stellar results, but the safety incentive issue is usually…

Tony Ferraro | September 26, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement, Facility Efficiency, Lean Manufacturing

Shojinka: The Secret Ingredient of Highly Effective Production

Ever wonder if there was a way to produce more while using less man power? Of course you have: minimizing inputs while maximizing output is a business 101 concept that we carry with us from day one, and struggle to fully tackle throughout our entire careers. What if I told you its really possible to do more with less? Well there is, and it has a name:…

Tony Ferraro | September 20, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement, Shojinka

Improving Workplace Efficiency: One Lean Step at a Time

I like to think of a working environment as one body of movement, a system of metaphorical cells, organs, and subsystems working together to create life. In business, this “life” usually comes in the form of customer value and/or product output, depending on the industry in which you reside. Just as we think about healthy eating and exercise as ways to keep our bodies and minds active…

Tony Ferraro | September 13, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement, Facility Efficiency, Lean, Lean Manufacturing

Lean Takes Time

Have you ever heard the phrase “everything good in life takes time?” If so, you may understand that under common circumstances things do take time. It would be pretty unrealistic to develop and build a whole company from the ground up in less than a week or even month for that matter. Rome wasn’t built in a day. The plain and simple truth is that it takes…

Tony Ferraro | September 5, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement, Healthcare, Lean Manufacturing

PDCA: How Can this Tool Help You?

You may have heard of PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act), but how much do your really know and understand about it? Have you tried using this method in the past? Was it successful? If it wasn’t successful, what may have contributed towards its ineffectiveness? These are some questions you should ask yourself before making a true, valiant effort towards a newly crafted pilot program or process improvement. The PDCA cycle…

Tony Ferraro | September 3, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement, Facility Efficiency, Gemba, Kaizen, Lean Manufacturing

Employee Involvement: It can Make or Break LEAN

Those familiar with lean may know that the key objective with lean is to eliminate all types of waste. Waste can be just about anything, and there are many different types of wastes in the work environment. When thinking about waste, it is important to remember that waste in the workplace has absolutely no value. In fact, it often costs both the business and the customers’ money.…

Tony Ferraro | August 30, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement, Facility Efficiency, Lean Manufacturing

Quality Counts: The Crucial Role of Packaging in Ensuring Customer Satisfaction during Shipping

Products ship in and out of businesses each and every day; it is just simply a natural part of conducting business. However, how much thought is really put into ensuring that packages reach their destinations still in pristine condition? When so much thought is put into designing and creating a product, why would we spend so little time protecting it during delivery? Even though special packaging materials…

Tony Ferraro | August 20, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement

Packaging Waste: Large Box Use Out of Hand?

The smell of fall is beginning to radiate throughout the air. After a fun-filled summer of outdoor amusement, summer is just starting to wind down. This is also the time of year when teachers begin preparing their classrooms for a whole new group of students. I know this time of year well as my wife is a teacher. Each year right around this time, she begins receiving…

Tony Ferraro | August 19, 2013 | Lean | Continuous Improvement