Supervisors are the people directly responsible for coordinating how work gets done, how a company’s goals and strategies are achieved through daily actions, and how routine improvements are accomplished. For most employees, their supervisor is the primary representative of their company – he or she is the most immediate human manifestation of their employer. Consequently,  Are they being supported and  »  Read More

A couple of weeks ago, I came across an interesting idea. It’s a simple tactic that can be particularly helpful in newly launched idea programs, or programs that are struggling to get support from supervisors and managers. The tactic comes from Mary Jo Caldwell, the director of the continuous improvement (CI) effort for the State of Minnesota. The state’s CI program is relatively new, and vastly underfunded  »  Read More

Several weeks ago I had the opportunity to spend some time with Mark Dolsen, the president of TRQSS. TRQSS is a Windsor, Ontario-based tier one supplier to Toyota and other car makers. The company is a division of Tokia Rika out of Japan, and makes seat-belt assemblies and various automobile switches. Over the past few years, Mark has led an ambitious program to consolidate work being done in several separate  »  Read More