In this podcast, I read a recent article I wrote about the way Six Sigma methods can be used to address recycling contamination rates in the United States, which has halted the flow of recycling into China.

Included in the article is a video summary of a Six Sigma project I worked on at a football stadium. You can also listen to podcast episode 53 that explains that project.

Do you have some ideas about doing a Six Sigma project for the environment? If you need help, reach out and let me know how I can assist!

Links

* Original article* Episode 53: Six Sigma Project to Improve Stadium Recycling

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Promotions

* FREE online course called “Lean Six Sigma and the Environment”* 6sigma.US Training and Certification Programs* Creative Safety Supply – Free 5S Guide

Have you ordered the new book, “Lean Six Sigma for Good: Lessons from the Gemba (Volume 1)?” The book is made up of 8 chapters written about experiences from Lean and Six Sigma practitioners, to give you tips and tricks to help you work with nonprofits in your area. All proceeds donated to charity. We are also close to releasing Volume 2, so check back for the latest news.

Transcript

The original article can be here…

In this podcast, I repost an interview I had with Liz McCartney, Executive Director of St Bernard Project (SBP), a nonprofit organization she founded with her husband Zack Rosenberg to rebuild homes and help victims recover from natural disasters. They moved from DC to New Orleans to help out after Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005, and decided to stay permanently.

I’ve been involved with IISE for many years now, and they asked me to conduct the interview, since it aligned with our Sustainable Development division’s mission. I conducted this interview in August 2019, and decided to share this with the podcast audience in case they didn’t hear it.

We were planning to volunteer with SBP at our annual conference in late May this year, but the conference was postponed until Oct this year, so hopefully we will still be able to help them out.

I think you’ll enjoy the great insights from Liz.

Links

* St Bernard Project (SBP)* Liz McCartney (LinkedIn)* IISE Problem Solved Podcast* IISE Sustainable Development Division* “Getting Home” book by Liz and Zack* Articles from Zack on Lean.org

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Promotions

* FREE online course called “Lean Six Sigma and the Environment”* 6sigma.US Training and Certification Programs* Creative Safety Supply – Free 5S Guide

Have you ordered the new book, “Lean Six Sigma for Good: Lessons from the Gemba (Volume 1)?” The book is made up of 8 chapters written about experiences from Lean and Six Sigma practitioners, to give you tips and tricks to help you work with nonprofits in your area. All proceeds donated to charity. We are also close to releasing Volume 2, so check back for the latest news.

Transcript

This is Problem Solved, the IISE podcast where we talk to industrial and systems engineers about their work, ideas, and solutions.

Brion (B):  Hi, I’m Brion Hurley and welcome to another episode of Problem...

In this podcast, I read a book review I wrote recently about the book “We Don’t Make Widgets” written by Ken Miller. His book discusses the challenges and myths of process improvement in Government.

Links

* Ken Miller Bio* Examples of Lean Six Sigma in Government* Books* We Don’t Make Widgets: Overcoming the Myths That Keep Government From Radically Improving* Extreme Government Makeover: Increasing Our Capacity To Do More Good* The Change Agent’s Guide to Radical Improvement

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Promotions

* FREE online course called “Lean Six Sigma and the Environment”* 6sigma.US Training and Certification Programs* Creative Safety Supply – Free 5S Guide

Have you ordered the new book, “Lean Six Sigma for Good: Lessons from the Gemba (Volume 1)?” The book is made up of 8 chapters written about experiences from Lean and Six Sigma practitioners, to give you tips and tricks to help you work with nonprofits in your area. All proceeds donated to charity. We are also close to releasing Volume 2, so check back for the latest news.

Transcript

You can read the entire article at http://www.leansixsigmaforgood.com/book-review-we-dont-make-widgets-and-other-myths-about-improving-government/

In this podcast, I share a presentation about Lean Startup methods that I gave to students in the Masters of Fine Arts program at Pacific Northwest College of Arts (PNCA) in Portland.

Lean Startup helps you get rapid feedback from your potential customers before spending too much time, money and effort on a new product or service.

The students are working on sustainable design projects, and I thought this topic would be helpful for them. At the end, I also discuss Lean Startup methods applied to nonprofits, NGO’s and government agencies.

You can watch the full presentation with slides and embedded videos below.

Links

* What is Lean Startup?* “Experimenting Our Way to Meaningful Change” webinar video and podcast with Michel Gelobter* PNCA Collaborative Design / Design Systems* Videos* Coming Home – The Toyota Effect* The Lean Startup Animated Book Summary* 3 Awesome MVPs* Books* The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses* Lean Startups for Social Change* The Startup Way: How Modern Companies Use Entrepreneurial Management to Transform Culture and Drive Long-Term Growth

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Promotions

* FREE online course called “Lean Six Sigma and the Environment”* 6sigma.US Training and Certification Programs* Creative Safety Supply – Free 5S Guide

Have you ordered the new book, “Lean Six Sigma for Good: Lessons from the Gemba (Volume 1)?” The book is made up of 8 chapters written about experiences from Lean and Six Sigma practitioners, to give you tips and tricks to help you work with nonprofits in your area. All proceeds donated to charity. We are also close to releasing Volume 2, so check back for the latest news.

In this podcast, I read an article I wrote many years ago in response to data reported in the local paper on residential water usage. The topic is very pertinent at any time, so I thought it would be good to share with those that haven’t read it yet.

The paper published the names of the people who used the most water in the last 12 months, along with a response and/or details about why they feel they are on the list.

Pareto charts are critical tools to make improvements, as we all have limited time and resources, so we need to stay focused.

These will help us reduce energy, water, items in the landfill, homelessness, and any other problem in our community.

Links

* Original blog post from 2013* Willamette Weekly (Hydro Hogs)* Pareto chart for largest US carbon emitting power plants * Wasted Food using Lean Six Sigma workshops

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Promotion

Are you interested in learning more about Lean and Six Sigma?

Or are you looking to expand your existing skills to apply them to environmental impacts at your work or local community?

Check out our FREE online course called “Lean Six Sigma and the Environment”

We’ll teach you about the lean forms of waste and WASTE walks (which stands for Water, Air Emissions, Solid Waste, Toxins and Energy)

We’ll go over examples of reducing electricity and solid waste, teach you how to involve your facilities and ES&H personnel. We’ll provide guidance on how to green your 5S and lean kaizen events, and many other tools specific to find environmental opportunities

Have you ordered the new book, “Lean Six Sigma for Good: Lessons from the Gemba (Volume 1)?” The book is made up of 8 chapters written about experiences from Lean and Six Sigma practitioners, to give you tips and tricks to help you work with nonprofits in your area. All proceeds donated to charity. We are also close to releasing Volume 2, so check back for the latest news.

In this podcast, I interviewed Courtney Hudson, Distribution Warehouse manager with Rise Against Hunger. They were awarded the inaugural “Excellence in Sustainable Development” Award in 2019.

She shares the improvements they made to their warehouse operations to increase the number of packaged meals they send to countries in need. They are working to achieve SDG Goal #2: Zero Hunger by 2030.

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Links

* Rise Against Hunger* IISE Excellence in Sustainable Development Award* UN Sustainable Development Goals* Courtney Hudson LinkedIn Profile

Promotion

Are you interested in learning more about Lean and Six Sigma?

Or are you looking to expand your existing skills to apply them to environmental impacts at your work or local community?

Check out our FREE online course called “Lean Six Sigma and the Environment”

We’ll teach you about the lean forms of waste and WASTE walks (which stands for Water, Air Emissions, Solid Waste, Toxins and Energy)

We’ll go over examples of reducing electricity and solid waste, teach you how to involve your facilities and ES&H personnel. We’ll provide guidance on how to green your 5S and lean kaizen events, and many other tools specific to find environmental opportunities

Transcript

Brion (B):  I’m here

with Courtney Hudson, she works at Rise Against Hunger, and Rise Against Hunger

was the first award winner for our Excellence in Sustainable Development. I

wanted to have her go through and talk through the project that they submitted

and some of the work they’ve been doing to apply Lean and Six Sigma concepts to

their nonprofit work. And so, Courtney, do you want to introduce yourself and

give your most recent job title? I know you’ve had a lot of activity happening

at the organization, and then just how you got into Rise Against Hunger, and

then share a little bit of some of the improvement work you guys have done.

Courtney (C):  Yeah, absolutely. Thanks so much, Brion. My

name is Courtney Hudson. I am these Centralized Distribution Warehouse Network

Manager. And so I got started with Rise Against Hunger in 2016, and we were

running a traditional model, which I’ll get further into as the presentation

goes on, but I opened up our first ever centralized dis...

In this podcast, I share a presentation given by Joe Hnat from Collins Aerospace (formerly Rockwell Collins) at last year’s IISE Annual Conference in Orlando, Florida on May 19, 2019.

He worked with his facility using lean principles and methods to find space for an employee garden on campus and make it successful. The fruits and vegetables grown in the garden by employee volunteers are donated to a local nonprofit, who use the food to feed those in need from their kitchen.

He shares additional details about his experiences in the book, “Lean Six Sigma for Good: Lessons from the Gemba (Volume 1).”

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Links

* Collins Aerospace* Daily Bread* Lean Six Sigma for Good: Lessons from the Gemba (Volume 1) book * IISE Annual Conference

Promotion

Are you interested in learning more about Lean and Six Sigma?

Or are you looking to expand your existing skills to apply them to environmental impacts at your work or local community?

Check out our FREE online course called “Lean Six Sigma and the Environment”

We’ll teach you about the lean forms of waste and WASTE walks (which stands for Water, Air Emissions, Solid Waste, Toxins and Energy)

We’ll go over examples of reducing electricity and solid waste, teach you how to involve your facilities and ES&H personnel. We’ll provide guidance on how to green your 5S and lean kaizen events, and many other tools specific to find environmental opportunities

Transcript

Joe (J): 

Hi, everyone. My name’s Joe Hnat, I’m a program manager at Collins

Aerospace. We reside in Melbourne Florida, which is about an hour away from

here. I’m going to take you through a little bit of our Lean journey. I

partnered with a nonprofit and I’ll show you a lot of things that we were able

to do with them, give you a ton of lessons learned that can be applied. I heard,

in the last session, lots of lessons learned that you guys were sharing about

how to improve what you’re doing volunteer hours. I did bring some samples, so

these plates, this actually came right from the garden on Saturday. I harvest

these various things. If you can name every item on this plate, you can take

the plate home.

Male Speaker (MS):  Is

there weed?

J:  There is no weed. It’s

not legal in Florida yet. In Oregon,

In this podcast, I was interviewed by Vanina Howan on her podcast called The Ecopreneur Show. She asked me about my background in sustainability, how I transitioned into consulting on my own, and how I got involved with Recycling Advocates.

I’m really proud of how this interview turned out. We delve into a host of topics, including push vs. pull, Lean Startup methods, and my volunteer consulting work with sustainable businesses and nonprofits.

We get more detailed into my personal life, so if that’s not interesting to you, then feel free to skip this episode.

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Links

* The Ecopreneur Show (Zero Waste Habit)* Zero Waste PDX Facebook Group* Recycling Advocates* Business Performance Improvement* Green Banana Paper (Kosrae)* University of Iowa Sustainability Certificate* The Lean Startup book* Clackamas County Leaders in Sustainability* City of Portland* Sustainability at Work* Green Team Guide

Promotion

Are you interested in learning more about Lean and Six Sigma?

Or are you looking to expand your existing skills to apply them to environmental impacts at your work or local community?

Check out our FREE online course called “Lean Six Sigma and the Environment”

We’ll teach you about the lean forms of waste and WASTE walks (which stands for Water, Air Emissions, Solid Waste, Toxins and Energy)

We’ll go over examples of reducing electricity and solid waste,

In this podcast, I share a presentation I gave on Jan 14, 2020 with the City of Gresham employees and Gresham Green Businesses.

I was asked to teach them about Lean and Six Sigma methods by Gregg Hayward (who kicked off the event) and Shannon Martin. I’ve worked with both of them in the past at other recycling activities and past green business activities near Portland.

You can learn more about my green business work in Clackamas County on Episode 12 about Setting Up a Green Team

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In this workshop, I go over the basics of Lean and Six Sigma, and how it can be applied to your work to impact finances, community, environment and applied at home.

There is a video of the presentation, which includes the workshop PPT slides

I also discuss the following lean concepts of 8 wastes, value, systems thinking, value stream, one piece flow, and pull. There is also a simulation using note cards, that teaches batch vs one piece flow. I also discuss the Six Sigma concepts of variation, data analysis, measurement error, and process controls.

Links

* City of Gresham and Gresham Green Businesses * Download Slides from Presentation (PPT)* YouTube (includes slides and videos)* Videos from Workshop* Meals per hour* 5S at MSICU* SPC at Honda

Promotion

Are you interested in learning more about Lean and Six Sigma?

Or are you looking to expand your existing skills to apply them to environmental impacts at your work or local community?

Check out our ...

In this podcast, I re-read a recent post I made about the Earth Charter written by Toyota in 1992, which is their commitment to the environment. This is one of the early examples of corporate sustainability, and it happens to come from the company that brought us Lean, with their focus on “respect for people” and “respect for humanity.”

You’re listening to the Lean Six Sigma for Good podcast. Learn how Lean Six Sigma methods can be applied to nonprofits, NGOs, and nonprofit organizations. Visit us at leansixsigmaforgood.com.

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Promotion

Are you interested in learning more about Lean Six Sigma methods and tools? I’ve put together a Lean Six Sigma and the Environment online course, that’s available for free, to teach you how to reduce your environmental impacts using effective process improvement techniques. You can go to leansixsigmaenvironment.org and click on the banner link at the top or you can go to thinkific.com and search for “Lean Six Sigma and environment.”

Links

* 1992 Earth Charter key to driving Toyota’s environmental efforts

Transcript

In this podcast, I read off an article I wrote recently about Toyota and some of their environmental efforts. The article is called 1992 Earth Charter: Key to Driving Toyota’s Environmental Efforts. I published this on December 15, 2019 and it’s on the leansixsigmaenvironment.org website if you want to check it out or link to it.

If you study Lean methods, you know that Toyota is the

company that’s responsible for developing the infrastructure behind almost all

of the methods, but what I found very interesting is that they’re also a leader

in sustainability and corporate environmental leadership. Coincidence? I don’t

think so. Over the last decade, most major companies published a corporate

sustainability report to explain to stakeholders, such as investors, customers,

shareholders, employees, etc. How they are contributing positively to the local

communities in which they operate and reducing their impact on the environment.

However, back in 1982, Toyota was ahead of the game when they publish the Earth

Charter document. I’ve got a link to that charter you can look at in the

article.

The document was, “an effort to promote companywide

environmental conservation activities.” The charter is a short page, so I

would definitely encourage you to read the entire document. Here are some key

quotes from the document that I found really interesting.

The first one was: “Careful attention to safety and the

environment is one of the guiding principles of Toyota and the company intends

to work within the new charter to protect the env...