A Few Tools for Continuous Improvement

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A-Few-Tools-for-Continuous-ImprovementIn this day and age, it seems like everybody has a problem designed for continuous improvement. Most companies look to pick one approach while others create programs that use their best ideas and the best of various other programs. Regardless of what kind of program you want to use, there always seems to be another problem to try and tackle, for which the basics can be necessary.

Enhancing the protocols and processes of your business with various tools can help with all kinds of continuous improvement. Continuous improvement refers to the process that, on a regular basis, increases the consistency of your services. Using a variety of methods on a regular basis can help with the success of your business.

SWOT Analysis

Short for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, a SWOT analysis is a fundamental tool to use that will efficiently match your goals and abilities with the current environment in which you operate. Though it’s more of a model rather than a true analysis, SWOT is a useful guide to determine issues with the operations as a part of continuous improvement. It can also help figure out how you’re spending money or how you can improve the efforts of your marketing department. Creating a clear statement is just the first step to developing your SWOT focus.

Analytics

True analytics are relatively simple; the first step is always to obtain data and then continuously having access to this information. Analytics goes further by providing tools to examine what this data really means and to help analyze large volumes of it, mining the information to get what you really need to know and how you can understand it.

Of course, this can be more than just developing a report from your information. Analytics serves to open up the data, examine the contents for trends that you would not have noticed before piecing it all back together, providing a more thorough understanding of the world to improve your business.

Pareto Charts

Pareto charts can offer a majorly eye-opening perspective when seeking to continuously improve your business. Part of this improvement involves looking at the causes and the proportion that will yield the biggest amount of results. This view is known as the Pareto concept, and the Pareto charts put a graphical spin on this as it highlights important causes that result as a part of your processes.

Statistics

There are general analytics, but then there is statistical analysis as a specialized part thereof. In manufacturing, this typically takes on the form of statistical process control or statistical quality control. Both forms of control refer to applying statistical methods to control the quality or the process of the manufacturing.

It is rather helpful to use because of the many different analyses that you can learn to help determine problem areas to clean them up before they become larger issues. In addition, you can view trends in real time and stop problems while they are small.

5s-factory-makeoverDon’t Forget Training

Proper training for continuous improvement is essential to the success of your projects. Training DVD’s are always a great tool to use when you are training your staff or stakeholders properly regarding current continuous improvement projects. There are wide variety of DVD’s available that can help to benefit any facility engaging in the practices of continuous improvement.

 

Additional Resources

Related posts:

  1. Going Beyond Lean Manufacturing
  2. Five Steps to Lean Improvement
  3. Heijunka Overview
  4. 5 Continuous Improvement Traps
  5. Make Small Changes – One at a Time
  6. Streamlining E-Mail Communication
  7. 5th Lean Continuous Impovement Series for Manufacturers
  8. Lean’s Endless Pursuit of Perfection
  9. Theory of Constraints: Part 3