Listening to the Voice of the Customer is critical in any process improvement method. You are the Customer and we’d love to hear from you. Are there any special topics you’d like addressed in the e-zine? General or technical issues you’d like to see covered? Tools you’d like to know more about? Your feedback is greatly appreciated.

This month we are pleased to announce the release of a new book that I co-authored called Driving Operational Excellence. It launched on Amazon.com February 10^th and shot up to #69 on Amazon’s 100 Best Seller list its first day! In appreciation for those who take the time to provide feedback by March 4^th, your names will be entered into a random drawing for a free copy of the book. The winner will be announced in the March newsletter. To send your feedback, please click here.

Have an excellent month!

Best,

Jeff Cole

President

JCG Management Consulting

Driving Operational Excellence

What do you get when you bring together 24 Lean Six Sigma experts and ask them to reveal their tips, tricks, secrets, and best practices? Answer: The new book Driving Operational Excellence. The book debuted on Amazon.com and select bookstores nationally this month. JCG president Jeff Cole is one of the featured authors. In the book, he reveals nine tips for Street Smart Change Management – handling the human side of any project.

(Click here to learn more about Driving Operational Excellence)

As a bonus for subscribers of this newsletter, you can visit an unlisted page on the JCG website and download a complimentary e-workbook. This workbook is a companion to the new book and helps you operationalize Jeff’s nine tips. It is full of tools and templates to help you on your next project and best of all – it’s free! Download your free e-workbook here.

What is Your BHAG for 2011?

You have heard of goals and stretch goals. But, have you ever heard of BHAGS? BHAGS are Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals. Goals so big you have no idea how they will be accomplished. Goals that require you to do things differently. In Kennedy’s famous 1961 speech,

the President challenged America to send a man to the moon and return him safely to the earth by the end of the decade – a classic BHAG. This month, we look into the BHAG phenomenon and explore how they can help you reach higher levels of success on your projects. Read the full article here.

Pick a Number . . . Any Number

	Study Operational Excellence for more than ten minutes and you’ll realize that there are many different improvement methods! Each one has great success stories and raving fans. How many steps would you like to follow? Below is a partial, short list of methods ranging from three to eight steps:
D-P-I	Diagnosis, Prescription, Improvement – a general improvement method based on the medical model.
P-D-C-A	Plan, Do, Check, Act – the Continual Improvement cycle invented by Walter Shewhart in 1925.
5S	A 5-step Lean technique for workplace organization, safety, and cleanliness. In Japanese the steps are Seiri, Seiton, Seiso, Seiketsu, and Shitsuke which roughly translate into: Sort, Set in place, Sustain, Simplify, and Standardize.
Six Sigma	The popular process improvement method created at Motorola in 1986. Originally following the “6 Steps to Six Sigma,” it evolved to use the 5-step DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) and DMADV (Define, Measure, Analyze, Design, Verify) models.
Joiner 7-Step Method	Developed in the 1970’s by famous statistician Brian Joiner, this is a 7-step process improvement model that some still swear by today.
8D	8D (the D stands for “Disciplines”) is an eight phase problem solving approach sometimes referred to as Ford 8D or Global 8D.

Link of the Month

This month’s link is to Quality Digest. QD covers a wide variety of topics about quality across multiple industries. The free Quality Digest Magazine went to a web-only format in 2009. However, their website has all editorial

content from the magazine back to 1995, buyers guides sorted by product and service categories, user forums, state quality award information, an event calendar, and links back to affiliated companies and organizations. To view past issues or subscribe to daily quality updates, visit www.qualitydigest.com

Why Not 99.9% Quality?

What was a grade of an “A” where you went to school? For many people that answer is 90 – 100%. Since childhood, we’ve been conditioned to believe that 90% or above is quality work. You report for duty at your first job and think “if I do 90% on this, my boss will

certainly track me down and give me an A”. Unfortunately, while 90% quality is excellent in some areas (You may wish 90% of your flights arrived on time) it’s unacceptable in other areas (your dentist says there’s a 90% chance he’s about to drill in the correct tooth). Some processes and products require screaming-high quality levels. The next time you think about quality, consider this. If 99.9% quality were good enough, then:

· 400 words in Webster’s Dictionary would be misspelled

· Doctors would give 12 babies to the wrong parents each day

· There would be 730 unsafe landings at O’Hare airport annually

· 500 incorrect surgical procedures would be performed each day

· 2,488,200 magazines would be published with the wrong covers

· 2,000,000 documents would be lost by the IRS this year

(source: industryweek.com)

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