How Single-Piece Flow Works

Single-piece flow is a foundational concept in lean manufacturing that focuses on moving one unit through each step of a process at a time, ...

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Exploring Our Industrial Heritage: Deadwood Goldrush

My wife Kelly, my dog Nala and I set out to explore our industrial heritage in Deadwood, South Dakota. There we found a rich deep history of...

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Rolling-5 Action Plan Methodology

When you are working on lean, six-sigma and a variety of continuous improvement activities, the quantity of action items can get overwhelmin...

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Total Productive Maintenance

Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) is a holistic approach to equipment maintenance that aims to achieve perfect production—no breakdowns, no...

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Plant Metrics (Part I)

Measuring What Matters Most

Running an efficient and profitable manufacturing plant relies heavily on the ability to measure performance ac...

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Experiencing Lean Culture

Lean, from a worker’s perspective, is all about working smarter, not harder, with a focus on eliminating waste and improving efficiency. At ...

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How to Use 5 Whys as a Problem Solving Tool

The 5 Whys technique involves asking "Why?" repeatedly—typically five times—to identify the root cause of a problem. The number five isn’t r...

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