The Manual Pareto Chart

The Manual Pareto Chart

When was the last time you created a Pareto chart manually?  For those of you not familiar with a “Pareto ” chart, it is simply a bar chart that organizes the categories from highest-to-lowest in frequency of occurrence.  Pareto charts are useful when “issues” outnumber the resources available to solve them; obviously, you would want to put the resources on…

Absinthe, the “Green Fairy”, and Operational Excellence

Absinthe, the “Green Fairy”, and Operational Excellence

XONITEK-US and XONITEK-UK recently hosted an Operational Excellence Summit in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.  If you have ever been to Amsterdam, you will know there are distinct cultural differences which are quite obvious if you are from New York – even from a pre-Giuliani New York. From each place I visit, I’ve always liked to acquire…

How ERP Can Help in Lean Implementation

How ERP Can Help in Lean Implementation

News reports over the last several months continue to paint a gloomy picture for today’s economy.  Rising material and labor costs, weak consumer spending, and the collapsing housing market are hammering businesses nationwide.  Many are looking for ways to re-engineer themselves in order to compensate for flattening growth.  To survive, one must do more with the resources they…