Project Aisha addressed the critical maternal mortality crisis in Nigeria where approximately 1 in 5 global maternal deaths occur by targeting clinical complications like postpartum hemorrhage and systemic delays in care. To tackle these bottlenecks, the initiative empowered healthcare workers with improvement science tools such as fishbone diagrams, process maps, and 5 Whys to identify […]
The City of San Diego committed to continuous learning of its employees, and launched a new workforce-training partnership with UC San Diego Division of Extended Studies and Rady School of Management in early 2024. This collaboration between university and public sector government agencies also supports UC San Diego’s mission to help make learning accessible and […]
Written by Brion
On the Lean Six Sigma for Good podcast, Brion interviews Mike Wrathall, an Agile and Sustainability consultant about his extensive work background helping organizations in the private and public sector improve. Projects included social housing, homelessness, domestic violence victims, public education and regenerative agriculture. You can view the notes and transcript at https://leansixsigmaenvironment.org/index.php/e131-agile-and-sustainability-in-the-uk-with-mike-wrathall/, or watch […]
Written by Brion
Joy Mason is a Certified Six Sigma Black Belt with over 25 years of experience in pharmaceutical manufacturing, laboratory operations, and risk assessment. She learned that she could be successful at work, even when she didn’t have the support systems in place. After retirement from Eli Lilly, she couldn’t stop improving and thinking about her […]
Written by Brion
In healthcare, words are used to describe colors like “a sort of dark yellow” and “probably amber” which creates inaccurate communication and less optimal clinical decisions. There was a lack of standardization in the colors, and efforts were made to resolve this problem, which is at the heart of any lean improvement. A website called […]
Written by Brion
The dominance of Randomized Controlled Trials (RCTs) as the “gold standard” for evaluating social programs presents significant challenges for nonprofit organizations. While a well-implemented RCT can demonstrate that a program causes a specific, measurable outcome, this singular focus often comes at the cost of continuous learning and organizational strength. In the Fall 2025 issue of […]
Written by Brion
Lean management was successfully implemented by the humanitarian organization Medair Somalia despite the highly challenging context of a conflict-ridden nation, Somalia. Abdinoor Hassan and Andrew Parris conducted training and kaizen event facilitation to lead the teams in four impact areas. A one-day Lean training was conducted in the capital Mogadishu, with 22 Medair staff and leaders, and […]
Written by Brion
Dr. Jean Kaseya, the director-general of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) stated that 60% of traditional foreign health aid to Africa was essentially wasted. The waste was due to fragmentation, inefficiencies, and cases where foreign aid didn’t align with specific government priorities. This assertion, which suggests African countries need significantly […]
Written by Brion
A recent initiative by Washington State University (WSU) has demonstrated significant success in improving patient safety and reducing hospitalizations by tackling a pervasive issue in home health care: medication list discrepancies. It is estimated that 90% of patients receiving care at home have at least one difference between their official medication list and what they […]
Written by Brion
Using data from a project conducted with the University of California San Francisco and funded by the San Francisco Department of the Environment last year, Zabble (AI waste management app) sought to answer questions about the minimum required sample size for reliably estimating waste contamination. The study was based on a 6-month experiment conducted at […]
Written by Brion