One group of people that can greatly benefit from Lean Six Sigma training is military veterans who struggle in their transition to civilian life even though they have valuable skills. Employers and former service members aren’t “connecting the dots” on how the military mindset of continuous improvement translates to the Lean Six Sigma concepts that […]
Ron Pereira from Gemba Academy interviews a new hire to his organization, Alen Ganic, former Lean improvement specialist with the City of Grand Rapids, Michigan. They discuss his previous experience working 14 years in Grand Rapids in various departments implementing process improvement. He talks about focusing Lean efforts from the customer’s perspective, the importance of […]
Written by Brion
Pennie Saum is a Process Improvement Program Manager at the Port of Seattle with over 20 years of experience in lean and is a certified Six Sigma Black Belt. She focuses on combining process improvement and people development to meet people where they are at. This helps them pull process improvement instead of pushing it […]
Written by Brion
A board retreat is a great way to get alignment of the key leadership positions within a nonprofit organization. Typically, nonprofits hold board meetings monthly or quarterly, while a board retreat is typically conducted once (maybe twice) a year. These retreats allow an organization to step away from the day-to-day management, and instead think more […]
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Sally worked many years in the hospitality industry applying Lean Six Sigma, and she shares her experiences to improve the guest experience. She also shares an example of a project that determined the optimal reward points to get customers to agree to reduced or no housekeeping, which was good for the environment, resulting in less […]
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Lynne Smith, former Director of Business Design at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, discusses the potential and difficulties of applying Lean Thinking to NGOs, and how it can be used to scale impact. She reflects back on the lean transformation at the Gates Foundation with an interview with Steve Bell and Roberto Priolo, and […]
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The panel discussion, hosted by Rod Morgan of RPM-Academy, offers insights and real-world experiences as three seasoned municipal continuous improvement leaders – Brenda Stonehouse (City of Kawartha Lakes), Michael Norman (City of London), and Kenneth Leung (City of Mississauga)– share their journey in deploying Lean methodologies in the Canadian municipal sector. From discussing the evolution […]
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Jeff Trageser and Mike Vazquez from Lifesharing were interviewed on the JIT Cafe podcast by Elisabeth Swan and Tracy O’Rourke to discuss how process improvement has been used to help procure and facilitate organ and tissue donations from donors to local transplant centers. They discuss metrics used to track the success of organ transplant, dealing […]
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This is an excerpt from the audiobook version of “Lean Six Sigma for Good: Lessons from the Gemba (Volume 2)“ Elisabeth Swan shares the story of volunteering with the Cape Cod Childcare Development nonprofit organization. She discusses getting a call from the CEO to help the organization utilize more Lean Six Sigma Green Belt skills and […]
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Does your Lean Six Sigma training structure help the organization sustain improvement gains? Do you struggle with the “one-and-done” trend where Green Belts complete a project, get a certificate, and then fade from the problem-solving culture? The State of Vermont has experimented with a different path for their Lean and Six Sigma training program. They […]
Written by Brion