David Marshall
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How to Maintain the Right Inventory Levels
- August 15, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Business, Management, Measurement, Productivity
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A serious problem facing many manufacturers is tying up cash reserves by keeping too much inventory or too many raw materials on hand. Finished products don’t move as quickly as you thought, or you made more than you needed “just in case,” or you bought a lot of raw materials because you got a bigger
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Should Manufacturers Pay for Education to Shore Up Skilled Labor Shortage?
- August 8, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Innovation, Management, Manufacturing
There’s a skilled labor shortage in this country, but not the kind that you might think. While there are still plenty of people to fill regular manufacturing jobs, there are high-paying, skilled labor jobs that are going unfilled because the companies can’t find enough people with the degrees or training to actually do the work.
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How Can a Department Like HR Measure Itself?
- July 25, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Management, Measurement
Plenty of people understand how relatively easy it is for a manufacturing operation to perform objective measurements on its output. Each machine is capable of performing X number of actions per hour, and each associate is also capable of producing X number of units in that hour. You can measure units produced, downtime, and even
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How Can You Reduce Your Transaction Costs?
- July 18, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Business, Manufacturing, Productivity
In the non-manufacturing world, a transaction is an easy process. When you buy a shirt, you give money to the store, and they give you a shirt. That’s a transaction. In the manufacturing world, a transaction is a more involved process. A customer sends a purchase order that orders 1,000 shirts (normally, economists like to
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How Do You Measure the Cost Benefits of Safety?
- July 11, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Management, Manufacturing, Measurement
You often hear about the costs of accidents and injuries to a company, and those are usually based on a specific incident or accident. For example, if an associate injures herself on the job and has to seek medical attention for $10,000, then the cost of that accident was $10,000. You also hear about cost
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Why You Should Measure Your Scrap Output?
- July 3, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Manufacturing, Productivity
In the past I’ve talked about the importance of measuring every part of a manufacturing company, from machine output to associate productivity. I’ve even said the back office people should be quantifiably measured too, including departments like HR and Purchasing, and even the executives. That also means measuring your scrap output. While it may seem
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3D Printing Set to Disrupt the Construction Industry
- June 27, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Manufacturing
I always thought there were a few industries that were disruption-proof. I mean, nothing is disruption-proof, and nothing is too big to fail, but there were a couple that, before it happened, seemed like it was too big and entrenched to have anything happen to it. At one point, we thought the news industry was
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Tom Hodges: The Importance of Discipline and Going Big or Going Home
- June 20, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Business, Leadership
I recently had a chance to ask some of my old friends and distributors to contribute a guest article to my blog. “What do you want us to write about?” they asked. “How about something you’ve learned in our years working together?” I said. This week’s article is from my friend, Tom Hodges. I’ve always
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Brian Chase: Invest Back in the Company
- June 13, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Business, Leadership
I recently had a chance to ask some of my old friends and reps to contribute a guest article to my blog. “What do you want us to write about?” they asked. “How about something you’ve learned in our years working together?” I said. This week’s article is from my friend, Brian Chase. While I’ve
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Jack Floyd: How I Saw Leadership and Commitment Modeled
- June 6, 2018
- Posted by: David Marshall
- Category: Business, Leadership, Management
I recently had a chance to ask some of my old friends and reps to contribute a guest article to my blog. “What do you want us to write about?” they asked. “How about something you’ve learned in our years working together?” I said. In all my years working with David, I learned the importance