Tag Archives: Track

The 4th Sigma: Is It Time to Rethink Six Sigma?

Posted on May 22, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Over the past few months, I have been using this blog to collect information from different operational managers, especially IT managers because of the wide range of services they run. The subject has been, “How are you dealing with the … Continue reading →

Posted in 4th Sigma, Best Practices, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Improvement, Continuous or Not, Unique Ideas | Tagged change, Hiring, Improve, IT, Measure, Metrics, outsource, Projects, Quality, Quantify, Reporting, Satisfaction, Six Sigma, tips, Track, transform | 5 Comments

100%, Guaranteed On-Time… Sort Of!

Posted on May 19, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

When I have discussions with my peers about the metrics they collect to run their operations, or at least measure how well their operations perform, the most confused and controversial metric is… On-Time-Delivery (OTD). Many operations feel that they have … Continue reading →

Posted in Best Practices, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Improvement, Continuous or Not | Tagged change, Improve, Measure, Metrics, On Time Delivery, Projects, Quantify, Reporting, Satisfaction, Track, transform | Leave a comment

Good News, We Have A Customer Complaint!

Posted on May 3, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

We’ve all had it hammered into us… improve services, eliminate complaints, make the customer happy. We all want to provide a service that makes our clients happy, and never receives a client complaint. If customer satisfaction has been your big … Continue reading →

Posted in Best Practices, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Improvement, Continuous or Not, Unique Ideas | Tagged complaints, corporations, Improve, Measure, Metrics, Problem Resolution, Reporting, Satisfaction, Story Telling, Track | Leave a comment

Outsourcing Analysis Part I: How Far Out Do You Outsource?

Posted on April 25, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Everyone talks about Outsourcing, but much of the time the talk seems to treat all Outsourcing as the same, with teh assumption that all projects end up with everyone working in a call center in India. Outsourcing predates India and predates “offshoring”. In fact, on of the … Continue reading →

Posted in Best Practices, Common Sense Contracting, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Uncategorized, Unique Ideas | Tagged Build vs. Buy, change, outsource, Quantify, Reporting, Track, transform | Leave a comment

Grime and Punishment: Why Best Practices Matter (Part II)

Posted on April 21, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Yesterday we looked at CLI’s (Central Line Infections), a type of infection that results from the use of a Central line, the needle and flexible tube used to insert an intravenous drip bag. CLI’s are extremely dangerous and expensive, infecting … Continue reading →

Posted in Best Practices, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Improvement, Continuous or Not, Learning and Development, Uncategorized | Tagged Best Practices, change, Healthcare, Hospitals, Improve, Measure, Metrics, Quantify, Reporting, Track | 2 Comments

S’what’s a SWOT?

Posted on April 7, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

A lot of perfectly respectable management theory has been left to marinate in too long in strange acronyms and hard to remember buzz words. Good management doesn’t need to be complicated, and it doesn’t need a special language. There’s a … Continue reading →

Posted in Best Practices, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Improvement, Continuous or Not, Unique Ideas | Tagged Analysis, change, Improve, Measure, SWOT, Track | Leave a comment

A Tsunami Of Problems

Posted on April 1, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

The problems in Japan continue, as do the truly heroic efforts to contain the disaster. Still, how did this all happen? Now that we have some information, we can put together the pieces. The first piece is simply that all … Continue reading →

Posted in Backup Plans, Best Practices, Decision Making, Delivering Services | Tagged Disaster, Earthquake, Japan, Planning, Predict, Track, Tsunami | Leave a comment

What To Expect in 2011 Outsourcing…

Posted on March 28, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Without getting too philosophical about it, what’s next depends on what’s already happened at your firm. Since every firm is in a different place, from those who are just dipping their toes for the first time to those who have … Continue reading →

Posted in Best Practices, Common Sense Contracting, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Improvement, Continuous or Not | Tagged change, Cost, Improve, Measure, Metrics, outsource, Predict, Productivity, Quantify, Reporting, Track, transform | Leave a comment

Build vs. Buy: Transparent Operations Build Better Products!

Posted on March 16, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Yesterday we looked at the old “Build vs. Buy” question, “When does it make sense to have an internal department develop a product/service, and when does it make sense to use an outside product/service?” We left off saying that a … Continue reading →

Posted in Best Practices, Common Sense Contracting, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Improvement, Continuous or Not, Unique Ideas | Tagged RFP, tips, Track, transform | Leave a comment

Build vs. Buy: How To Decide?

Posted on March 15, 2011 by Chris Niccolls

Some management issues are eternal and come up over and over again, with no real answer. The underlying issues change over time and from one situation to another. But they are important questions, so they never go away. For example, … Continue reading →

Posted in Best Practices, Common Sense Contracting, Decision Making, Delivering Services, Unique Ideas | Tagged Build vs. Buy, change, Improve, Measure, Metrics, outsource, Quantify, RFP, Track, transform | 3 Comments