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The quality industry offers a number of terrific events during the course of the year, but none is more informative, entertaining, and intimate than the Coordinate Metrology Systems Conference. This year’s CMSC occurs in Charlotte, North Carolina, July 21 through July 25. As always, the event is packed with activity, including a bustling exhibition hall, unique off-site events (a tour of Richard Childress Racing is included this year), and white paper presentations demonstrating the latest advances in portable coordinate metrology.
A few years ago, we had a mysterious scratching sound in our attic. My 5-year-old daughter was terrified, and everybody’s sleep was being interrupted on a nightly basis.
“We need to do something about the noise in our attic,” I told my daughter.
“No!” she cried. “Don’t go into the attic. It’s too scary.”
I talked to my daughter, and it was obvious that the vagueness and seeming enormity of the problem terrified her. She didn’t understand the problem; thus it was overwhelming. In my daughter’s mind, the sound in the attic could be bats, snakes, ghosts, vampires, or big hairy monsters. I took my daughter’s hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze.
“I’m a little scared, too,” I told her. “But if we can learn more about the problem, I bet we can solve it.”
My daughter seemed dubious, but she agreed to help me investigate the situation. We went into the attic with a flashlight, stabbing the beam of light into the dark and dusky corners. It didn’t take long for us to figure out the nature of our problem. We saw tiny eyes and furry little faces staring at us.
“They’re just squirrels,” my daughter giggled. “They snuck into the attic.”
By Lorri Hunt, Denise Robitaille, and Craig Williams
Editors note: The following is an excerpt of The Insiders’ Guide to ISO 9001:2008 , which was published November 1 by Paton Professional.
As users get their first glimpse of ISO 9001:2008, the question on everyone’s mind is, “What, if anything, will our organization need to do differently?” ISO 9001:2008 focuses on changes that organizations might make to better comply with the spirit of the standard without adding, deleting, or altering its requirements. It should not result in an extensive change to existing quality management systems (QMS). The changes are minor in nature and address such issues as the need for clarification, greater consistency, resolution of perceived ambiguities, and improved compatibility with ISO 14001, which relates to environmental management systems ( EMS).
What does this mean for users? Requirements in the standard are frequently referred to as “shalls.” For the purpose of this amendment, ISO 9001:2008 provides improvements for users without adding to or removing any of the “shalls.”
Test and measurement equipment and service providers are the lifeblood of the quality profession. Without them, quality professionals wouldn’t have the tools they need to accurately measure, test, or inspect vital parts, components, and direct-to-consumer products. Gauge manufacturers and nondestructive testing equipment providers provide the industry with thousands of general-use and specialized tools, including micrometers, thread, height, plug and depth gauges, and digital indicators, to name a very few. Calibration service providers, on the other hand, make certain that the devices used to measure quality in your shop are accurate and working properly.
The three directories in this section are the Gauge Manufacturers buyers guide, the Nondestructive Testing buyers guide, and the Calibration
Services and Software buyers guide.
Welcome to Quality Digest’s 2009 3-D Measurement Equipment and Software Buyers Guide.
This directory includes the contact information. for 91 companies that offer 3-D measurement and analysis products. Further information, including detailed descriptions of these companies’ products and services, is available online at www.qualitydigest.com/content/buyers-guides.
Only those companies that responded to our requests for updated information have been included in this buyers guide. We don’t intend this directory as an endorsement of any organization; it’s merely a starting point in your data-gathering process. We encourage you to contact these companies directly for further information.
Outside of their jobs, employees make important decisions every day. They
vote on community issues. They help teach their children new skills. They
purchase homes and cars and life insurance. But on the job, how many people are
allowed to make important decisions about their work? How many people have input
into how they do their own jobs, lead a team, find out what their customers need
or make decisions about what will work better for their customers?
What are self-directed work teams?
Minnesota-based 3M is among an increasing number of companies that involve
employees in the daily management of their business through work teams. These
teams are empowered to take corrective actions to resolve day-to-day problems.
They also have direct access to information that allows them to plan, control
and improve their operations. In short, employees that comprise work teams
manage themselves.
In its optimum form, Six Sigma is anything but simple or practical. Given its considerable upfront cost and ongoing complexity, it’s best viewed as a results-driven expedition of Homeric scope, one where the final destination is 3.4 defects per million opportunities. It’s not a journey for the faint-hearted. You must be seriously committed to pursuing it for the long term, or you’ll never recoup your sizable upfront investment, let alone enjoy a net return.
In the field of medical products, devices, and components, regulatory requirements and customer expectations are demanding. Throughout the world, manufacturers and their suppliers are expected to comply with the highest standards and regulations.
ISO 13485--”Medical devices--Quality management systems--Requirements for regulatory purposes” is the standard for organizations engaged in the manufacture of medical devices. According to the most recent survey by the International Organization for Standardization ( www.iso.org/iso/survey2006.pdf ), there were a total of 8,175 current ISO 13485 registrations across 82 countries in 2006. Approximately 30 percent of all ISO 13485 registrations were issued in the United States, compared to only 6 to 7 percent of all ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 registrations. According to the survey, the 2006 total represents an increase of 3,110 (61%) compared to 2005, when there were 5,065 registrations across 67 countries and economies. Other major markets include Europe, Japan, Canada, Sweden, and Israel.
Welcome to Quality Digest’s 2008 Flowchart/Process Simulation Software Directory. The companies in this buyers guide create or distribute software whose primary function is to aid in analyzing a company’s existing designs or operations to create important process-improvements and cost-savings opportunities. Functions include the flowchart, as in a schematic representation of a process used to help the user visualize the content or to find the flaws in the process; and process simulation, such as viewing a computer simulation that mimics a company’s operations to determine optimal conditions, bottlenecks, or sensitivity to process changes.
Included in this buyers guide are company names, addresses, telephone and fax numbers, and web addresses. Further information that has been provided to us, such as descriptions of the software modules/suites, is available online at www.qualitydigest.com/content/buyers-guides.
Quality improvement is a tough undertaking for even the savviest organization. There’s no need to go it alone, however. Quality system consultants and trainers can help keep you and your organization on the right path, and ensure that you’re current in your knowledge of best practices.
On the following pages, you’ll find our Consulting and Training buyers guide. This guide include hundreds of companies that employ experts in the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award program, statistical process control, Six Sigma, leadership training, quality system development, and certification, among others.
These directories are not meant to endorse or exclude any particular organization. Rather, they should be used as the starting point in the data-gathering process. Readers are encouraged to contact the companies directly for more information and to ask for—and check—references. Further information, including company descriptions (if provided to us) can be found on our web site at www.qualitydigest.com/content/buyers-guides.
