Continuous Improvement
Continuous improvement refers to the ongoing effort to enhance products, services, or processes incrementally. In technology and engineering, it involves regularly evaluating and refining systems, designs, and methodologies to achieve greater efficiency, quality, and innovation. This iterative approach fosters adaptability and responsiveness to changing demands and advancements in the field.
7 Key excerpts on "Continuous Improvement"
eBook - ePubHoshin Kanri
The Strategic Approach to Continuous Improvement
- David Hutchins(Author)
- 2016(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...16 The Principles of Continuous Improvement Figure 16.1 Continuous Improvement The process of Continuous or project-by-project Improvement is at the core of all successful business improvement programmes. The tools included here are fundamental to all problem-solving and improvement activities whether it be Six Sigma, Quality Circles or any other disciplined approach. When combined with Process Analysis and Process Re-engineering and the higher-level tools such as Designed Experiments in Six Sigma Black Belt training there are very few problems that cannot be tackled and solved. Quality Improvement is a never-ending process. Man has always been able to find better ways of doing things and the likelihood is that this will always be the case. The simple truth is that if we do not continue to improve our competitors certainly will and we will be left behind. Improvement, of course, happens to some extent whether it is planned or not. In many cases it happens because a supplier has improved their products and forced improvement on us. For example, a new computer will have the latest operating system. This is not the sort of improvement that is considered here. This is evolutionary improvement and happens to all organisations alike. This chapter is concerned with revolutionary improvement that has been deliberately introduced and encouraged throughout the organisation as a discipline for all to use as a means of continually improving the position of the organisation in its marketplace in comparison with its competitors. The fact that the organisation is improving at all is important, but it is the comparative rate of improvement which matters. Otherwise competitors may improve at a faster rate. If they are behind now it is fortunate but there is no guarantee that they will not catch up...
eBook - ePub- John S Oakland(Author)
- 2007(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...Chapter 13 Continuous Improvement ___________________ Key points Continuous Improvement involves planning and operating processes, providing inputs, evaluating outputs, examining performance, and modifying processes and their inputs to achieve better performance. This chapter explains the three basic principles of Continuous Improvements: focus on the customer, understand the process and involve the people. In Oakland's model for total quality management, the customer–supplier chains form the core which is surrounded by the hard management necessities of a good quality system, tools and teamwork. These need to work together to manage, measure and improve processes continually. Continuous Improvement methods may be used to ‘check’ progress, in terms of commitment, strategies, teamwork, problems and results, and development towards excellence. A structured approach to making improvements is provided by the drive model: • d efine the problem, • r eview the information, • i nvestigate the problem, • v erify the solution, and • e xecute the change. People working in a process must know whether it is capable of meeting the requirements, know whether it is actually doing so at any time, and make corrections when it is not. Simple SPC techniques are used, not only as a tool kit, but as a strategy for reducing variability, part of the Continuous Improvement approach. The basic principles of Continuous Improvement Continuous Improvement is probably the most powerful concept to guide management. It is a term not well understood in many organizations, although that must begin to change if those organizations are to survive...
eBook - ePubManaging Human Capital in Today's Globalization
A Management Information System Perspective
- Heru Susanto, Fang-Yie Leu, Chin Kang Chen, Fadzliwati Mohiddin, Heru Susanto, Fang-Yie Leu, Chin Kang Chen, Fadzliwati Mohiddin(Authors)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- Apple Academic Press(Publisher)
...CHAPTER 14 Continuous Improvement PROGRAMS: THE DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY ERA OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT ABSTRACT Organizations face new opportunities and challenges as the use of technology in organizations to increase their productivity through supporting an IT emerging technology in the era of digital ecosystem, when management information tool to support organizations called by management information system (MIS) is applied. Most organizations are fundamentally supported by MIS to be able to handle various information and business processes smoothly. Here, Continuous Improvement (CI) is a process that involves strategies and goals to improve operation and production processes efficiently and effectively that eventually satisfy customer needs. CI allows people to share their knowledge and experience of learning systematically. Some of the vital elements of CI are all of the people in the organization must be involved from planning until evaluation, it should be a step-by-step approach to achieve goals, and it should be a cycle where the process continues to maintain their quality and productivity. In other hand, Six Sigma also have the concept of focusing on customer satisfaction and eliminating waste to improve efficiency systematically but both practices have a different cycle to achieve their goals...
eBook - ePubA First Course in Quality Engineering
Integrating Statistical and Management Methods of Quality, Third Edition
- K.S. Krishnamoorthi, Arunkumar Pennathur, V. Ram Krishnamoorthi(Authors)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- CRC Press(Publisher)
...8 Continuous Improvement of Quality This chapter is about the problem-solving methodology and the tools used for analyzing problems, discovering the root causes and then devising solutions to eliminate those problems. Elimination of the problems lead to improvement of the quality of the process and quality of the products produced by them. Discovering problems or improvement opportunities in processes and making process improvements to achieve improved product quality and customer satisfaction is a non-ending, continuous process. 8.1 The Need for Continuous Improvement As has already been pointed out in previous chapters, improving product and service quality on a continuous basis is the key to improving customer satisfaction, increasing productivity, and remaining competitive in the marketplace. Opportunities always exist in productive enterprises for making improvements to the quality of products and services by using the resources already available. We have come across many people in the corporate world who tend to believe that problems relating to quality can be resolved only by investing more capital to buy newer equipment, with all possible automation and the latest bells and whistles. Dr. Deming used to decry this tendency toward launching into extensive capital investments in the name of quality improvement. He cited several examples in his writings where improvements in quality and productivity were accomplished using the same machinery and resources that had been condemned earlier as being incapable of meeting quality needs. We have seen this happen in our own experiences as well. Poor quality, waste, and customer dissatisfaction all result largely from a lack of understanding of how processes behave and a lack of knowledge regarding how process variables and their interactions contribute to the quality of the final product or service...
- Tom Seubert, Grant Vokey(Authors)
- 2020(Publication Date)
- International Society of Automation(Publisher)
...7 Continuous Improvement: Details and Benefits 7.1 Introduction to Continuous Improvement There are those who would use the often-stated cliché that Continuous Improvement (CI) is about the journey, not the destination, and to some extent, this is true. A line of thought that goes along with the journey concept is that the level of improvement obtained by each step must always be worth the expense to achieve that step. This is where Quality and Operations management frequently collide. Those who are Deming purists will state that the benefit will always outweigh the input because of nonmeasurable customer satisfaction characteristics. From an Operations management viewpoint, if you cannot measure it, how do you know you have improved it? The bottom line is that the cost of improvement for a product/process combination must be recoverable within the life of the product, or it will result in a net loss for the company. It can be argued that changes in product characteristics can improve the desirability of the product from the customer perspective, but these issues are under the control of Product Design and Marketing. Therefore, these aspects are outside the scope of this book. From a manufacturing perspective, the only aspects of improvement controlled by operations are the efficiency and the ease with which the product can be made. The ease of making the product is the primary driver for the initiatives of design for manufacturing (DFM) and is a collaboration between manufacturing and product engineering. There will be more on this later in the chapter. In the aspect of process efficiency, you must standardize, standardize, standardize. In the context of the value gained by any improvement, you must know your costs. In a cost/benefit analysis, as previously mentioned, if the cost of improvement is greater than the benefit, then the improvement should probably be avoided and a mitigation strategy should be used instead...
eBook - ePub- Ralph R. Young(Author)
- 2006(Publication Date)
- Berrett-Koehler Publishers(Publisher)
...CHAPTER 9 Continuous Improvement Continuous Improvement can be an important factor in contributing to the success of your project. An attitude of Continuous Improvement on your project will help create a positive project environment. WHAT IS Continuous Improvement? Continuous Improvement can be defined as an ongoing effort to get even better. The idea is to strive continually to improve the way we do business. When management creates an environment that encourages Continuous Improvement, it can be a valuable strategic component of the project and the organization. Many think that improvement occurs only by fixing errors, mistakes, and problems. In fact, an important notion is identifying root causes—major reasons for undesired conditions. Identifying root causes provides a long-run strategy to save money, shorten schedules, and enhance customer satisfaction. Although often overlooked, one of the most powerful resources available to PMs to enable Continuous Improvement is their own staff. These are the people who are closest to the project work and who are most knowledgeable about it. The challenge is to create a project environment that people want to support. A foolproof solution is not available, but guiding principles to create a positive environment based on experience are available. WHY PURSUE Continuous Improvement? Most people like to be part of an effort that is getting better. It’s human nature to want to be associated with projects that are respected and valued by others...
eBook - ePubThe Ever Changing Organization
Creating the Capacity for Continuous Change, Learning, and Improvement
- Gerald R Pieters(Author)
- 2017(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...5 Continuous Improvement I. Introduction The focus of this chapter will be on features of Continuous Improvement (CI) efforts and their relationship to the process of becoming an Ever-Changing Organization. Our intention in not to prescribe a Continuous Improvement process or to evaluate and compare processes that are available. Instead, we highlight ten characteristics of Continuous Improvement methodologies that influence the organization’s capacity as an ECO. Where little has been done to establish these features, the organization has failed to create a viable Continuous Improvement process and unable to address needed growth in ECO capability. As the features become an integral part of Continuous Improvement processes, ECO capability is increased and the organization becomes more change friendly or change seeking in nature. A key premise of this chapter is that no organization with intentions to increase ECO capacity can hope to do so without a well-designed and managed Continuous Improvement process. And, the process must be organization-wide and actively managed from the top. It cannot be simply an annual approach to setting targets for lower costs or more inventory turns. Nor can it be a limited set of projects that involve a small percentage of the people of the organization and still be considered a Continuous Improvement effort we associate with becoming an ECO. Charles Harwood, when he was president of Signetics Corporation, initiated a very successful, organization-wide quality and Continuous Improvement effort that produced savings equal to the organization’s pre-tax earnings in its first four years. He later became a founder of The Quality Improvement Company and recently authored the book Kick Down the Door of Complacency 24 relating to his experiences. His decision to drive such an effort came after he recognized that doing so was his obligation as the CEO of the organization...
