Category Archives: Tips&Tools@Risk™

#139 – OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE IS NOT SOMETHING NEW! – JOSEPH PARIS

Featured

Posted on by
Reply

Paris_Aug2012There is a lot of content created around Operational Excellence and its companion disciplines – including; Leadership, Lean, Six-Sigma, Theory of Constraints, Project Management, and so on – which together comprise Operational Excellence (including the content produced by myself).  But are all of these concepts as “new” as some would have you believe?  Have they never been embraced or implemented in the past?  Continue reading →

#137 – RESOLVING TEAM CONFLICT MINIMIZES LOW MORALE RISK – JOHN AYERS

Featured

Posted on by
Reply

John Ayers pixAs we know, team conflict is not good and needs to be resolved quickly to maintain a high level of team moral and performance. This notion is true in sports as well in the work place. There are a number of approaches to resolve conflicts. For example: ignore them and hope they work themselves out; fire the main instigator as president Truman did with General MacArthur; confront them and resolve them. I offer an example herein of two approaches to resolve conflict, one of which I feel is a bad approach and one a good approach that I favor. Continue reading →

#133 – PROJECT DASHBOARDS: ARE WE MISSING THE PICTURE? – MALCOLM PEART

Featured

Posted on by
Reply

Malcom Peart pixI was once asked by a non-English speaker; “What is a dashboard?” Our Client wanted a ‘dashboard’ summary of the monthly status as part of Project Controls for a ‘health check’.

I explained that cars have dashboards. Analogously, I told her that my first car (a Spitfire) had a ‘dashboard’ with a speedometer (marginally functional) to measure speed, temperature gauge (working) to warn of impending overheating, fuel gauge (temperamental) to let me know when I needed to top-up the tank, an odometer (erratic) to let me know how far I had travelled, plus a rev-counter that didn’t work. Continue reading →

#132 – 5 LESSONS I LEARNED FROM A SUCCESSFUL ISO 9001:2015 CERTIFICATON AUDIT – LILLIAN ERICKSON

Featured

Posted on by
Reply

2016-nl-bl-author-lily-ericksonThe publication of ISO 9001:2015 in September generated much anxiety among companies fearing a bumpy transition to the new and significantly changed international standard. Admittedly, we at MasterControl were not immune to those worries.

Despite having quality experts involved with the ISO changes since they were proposed some years ago, even we did not know how our ISO assessors would apply the new requirements, what evidence they would expect to see, and how to pre-emptively satisfy their expectations. Continue reading →

#130 – WHO IS REALLY MANAGING YOUR PROJECT? – MALCOLM PEART

Featured

Posted on by
Reply

Malcom Peart pixAs a client have you chosen to manage the project yourself or leave it to your Contractor or have you decided to utilise a consultant? If it’s too much to do it by yourself and Contractors are, well they’re contractors aren’t they… you have little choice but to engage a Consultant. Continue reading →