The latest blogs from Catalyst’s experienced team of Trainers and Consultants. Themes include Lean Six Sigma Training and Consulting, Continuous Improvement and Operational Excellence
Watching the Euros reminded me of a blog that Jo Dowdell wrote in 2018 about Gareth Southgate. As Lean Six Sigma devotees know, we talk a lot about cause and effect, Xs and Ys. The output of a process (Y measure) is caused by many different variables (the Xs). Thinking about Football…. clearly the output…
In his 1984 book ‘Quality Without Tears’, Philip Crosby introduced the concept of a Quality Vaccine – a super serum that could be injected into an organisation to drive improvement and prevent hassle. With vaccines at the very forefront of our minds and a new year just around the corner, it’s apt to think about…
Lean Six Sigma requires a broad skill set – along with technical skills, influencing, project management and managing change, practitioners are also required to be good story tellers. Storyboards are used in Lean Six Sigma to support communication and information sharing. They tell the story of an improvement project from the beginning to the end,…
It’s thanks to the Education Act of 1880 that each new academic year starts in September. By this time of year the harvest had been collected so the children could be spared from their work on the land for a few hours a day to attend school. This has endured – even in 2020! – …
The Customer Is King. Putting customers at the heart of everything we do. I’ll tell you what I want, what I really want. We’ve all heard these phrases, mantras and songs (!) about being customer-centric. But what does this actually mean? Who are our customers and what do they want? There is so much that…
I was reading this week* that Apple’s newly anticipated handsets will probably not feature the cutting edge, “delighter” led, technology features we have come to love in their iPhone products over the years. This got me thinking about Kano Thinking and it’s relevance in 2019. When Noriaki Kano published “Attractive quality and must-be quality” in…
When was the last time you saw something that wasn’t as it should be and just fixed it? Maybe your fix worked, or maybe it didn’t and you thought, ‘well at least I tried’. This sort of thing happens all the time and I guess it always will. In many cases it is not wrong,…
We can probably all think about being more efficient ourselves. What do you want to save? The answer that’s likely to come to mind first is saving time. According to the adage, ‘time means money’ – so perhaps it could ultimately come down to money. But what exactly is involved in becoming more efficient and what does…
“To measure is to know”, stated physicist, mathematician and problem solver Lord Kelvin. “If you can not measure it, you can not improve it”. This clearly applies to measuring operational efficiency – without appropriate measures in place, how much can we really know about performance and efficiency, and how do we know if continuous improvement activities,…
Image produced by Sophie Smiles. Click here to find out more. Becoming a Transformation Maestro with Agile Once upon a time you could build a 5-year strategic plan and deliver it. Now for many organisations, even the idea of planning an annual budget would require a crystal ball – such is the pace of change.…