Welcome to Bruce Hamilton’s (aka The Toast Guy from Toast Kaizen DVD fame) Blog, an on-going reflection on Lean philosophy and practices with an emphasis on keeping good jobs close to home. That’s the mission of my organization, GBMP, a Boston-based not-for-profit organization with the parochial objective of shipping products overseas rather than jobs. The… [Read more…]
September 27, 2011
Before Shigeo Shingo’s chicken there was another well-known fowl by the name of “Chicken Little.” Do you remember the story? Struck on the head by a falling acorn, Chicken Little concludes that the sky is falling and so decides to warn the king as well as everyone else he meets on his way to the… [Read more…]
September 26, 2011
A thoughtful comment to my last post reminded me of one my favorite Shigeo Shingo stories. The writer, who will be at our upcoming conference, expressed concern that only persons who have already bought into continuous improvement tools and philosophy will be at the conference. If you haven’t already read my response to him, you… [Read more…]
September 21, 2011
Gross numbers reflecting American productivity can be misleading. When American companies outsource production, the labor “expense” is replaced with the “asset” of inventories purchased elsewhere. While this results in a gross statistical improvement to labor productivity, its overall impact on economic strength is insidious. Consider, for example, these two graphics in particular for the period… [Read more…]
September 16, 2011
In 1985, when I transferred to an operations role I inherited a production-only suggestion program. I recall that we received sixteen ideas that year of which one was awarded $1,600 calculated as a percentage of one year’s savings. The remaining ideas did not make the cut. So I asked employees for feedback. To my surprise… [Read more…]
September 14, 2011
America’s form of government, borne out of an ideal of freedom and equality, has, for all of our short-term criticisms, been the object of continuous improvement since its founding. Adapting to social and economic changes, population shifts and growth, technological, environmental and natural resource challenges, what seems to be an immovable inertial monument is actually… [Read more…]
September 12, 2011
Okay, I admit, some days I get a little upset when I think about the exodus of jobs from our shores. This clip from the movie Network sums up my emotional state at those times. Take a look if you have two minutes. It’s very relevant today. Being involved with many organizations that are prospering in… [Read more…]
September 8, 2011
My introduction to corrective action, about forty years ago, was a four-part form called an Internal Discrepancy Report, or “IDR” as it was affectionately known. If material was defective we called it “discrepant.” Maybe I’m mincing words here, but I think discrepancy implies a disagreement or inconsistency, for example, a discrepancy between your bank statement… [Read more…]
November 19, 2010
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