Ron Pereira, Author at Gemba Academy

Ron Pereira

Ron has more than 20 years of experience in various manufacturing, supply chain, and senior leadership roles. Ron has held the titles of process engineer, engineering manager, master black belt, and director of manufacturing & continuous improvement. In 2002 Ron was the first American to win the Nokia Global Six Sigma and Overall Quality award in Helsinki, Finland. Ron holds a bachelor's degree in automated manufacturing and an MBA in technology management.

759 Articles

Stop Moving and Start Working

By Ron Pereira - May 28th, 2007

In Taiichi Ohno’s Workplace Management we read about the difference between animal-like-motion and human work. Simply put many people confuse moving around with working. This is to say that we can work up a sweat and look as

Robots

By Ron Pereira - May 26th, 2007

Engineers at Cornell University have designed this odd-looking machine that can rebuild itself and also could perform repairs on itself.

Free TPS Video

By Ron Pereira - May 26th, 2007

Click here to watch a free video of Dr. Shankar Basu, president and CEO of Toyota Material Handling, USA. This is NOT a sales pitch so don’t worry. Dr. Basu even speaks about reducing transportation, which he half jokes will

DOE use in the health care industry

By Ron Pereira - May 25th, 2007

We hear a lot about Lean in the health care world but not so much about Six Sigma. This fact made this story about how Design of Experiments is being used to make things better all the more intriguing to me. We read in a May 2007 S

I Plead Guilty

By Ron Pereira - May 25th, 2007

My friend Mark Graban of Lean Blog fame nailed me today… and I deserved it. Mark commented on my recent post about Lowes missing their numbers. I was actually as guilty as the folks at Qualpro in how I was trying to assign caus

Lowes Misses the Mark

By Ron Pereira - May 23rd, 2007

A few months ago I blogged about how a company called Qualpro was (and is) claiming its MVT methodology was far superior to Six Sigma. One of their success stories was Lowes. Their angle was that since Home Depot is a “Six

Does Toyota need Six Sigma?

By Ron Pereira - May 23rd, 2007

I bet the title of this post caught some of my Lean friends off guard. Fear not I am not going to talk about how Lean is about eliminating waste and Six Sigma is about reducing variation. I have said this before and regret it. T

Boeing starts assembly of 787 Dreamliner

By Ron Pereira - May 22nd, 2007

I read today that Boeing started production of the much anticipated 787 Dreamliner. Many of my fellow blogging friends have previously commented on the method by which Boeing is manufacturing this monster of an airplane. With this s

Winning Rocks!

By Ron Pereira - May 21st, 2007

I learned tonight that I, yes little old me, am a winner. I don’t mean a winner like the way your mom always says, “Oh son, you are always a winner to me.” No, I mean a winner in the truest sense of the word. Check ou

Lean and Tissue Donation

By Ron Pereira - May 21st, 2007

I came across an interesting article from the Dayton Daily News where they discussed how leaders of the Community Blood Center/Community Tissue Services teamed up with Lean practitioners from Sinclair Community College. The article e

Fire at Will!

By Ron Pereira - May 18th, 2007

(I came across this link over at Evolving Excellence and just had to comment) Move over Dilbert. KT Cat, eat your heart out. Check out this piece of work from a Six Sigma basher extraordinaire! I always say to be nice to KT Cat a

Finance 101 by Taiichi

By Ron Pereira - May 18th, 2007

In Chapter Six of Taiichi Ohno’s Workplace Management we read about the Profit formulas. I must confess I thought I completely understood this concept when in fact I was only partly correct. Let’s explore it tonight. When we

Welcome to the New LSSA

By Ron Pereira - May 17th, 2007

Welcome to the new Lean Six Sigma Academy (LSSA). After lots of “blogging research” I have decided to move to WordPress. Blogger is great and very easy to use and I will miss some of their user friendly features. Bu

Riding a Bike

By Ron Pereira - May 14th, 2007

This weekend my 4 year old daughter learned to ride her bike without training wheels. She has been after me for quite awhile to let her have a shot but I have been hesitant. I just didn’t think she was ready. But after she saw her 5

Misconceptions

By Ron Pereira - May 13th, 2007

The first several chapters of Taiichi Ohno’s Workplace Management spend a lot of time discussing misconceptions. Ohno said: “Very often after we try we find that the results are completely opposite of what we expected, and this is

Waiting in US Immigrations Line

By Ron Pereira - May 12th, 2007

I have really enjoyed learning more about the Queuing Theory from our friend, Peter Abilla, over at the excellent shmula blog. Peter’s most recent post is about the Queuing Psychology at the Gus Pump. Yesterday I traveled home from E

Taguchi L18 DOE

By Ron Pereira - May 9th, 2007

Design of Experiments (DOE) are perhaps the single most powerful tool I have found to screen, characterize, and optimize a process. For an introduction to what DOE’s are please read this post. Taguchi L18 Tonight I want to focus in a

Repetitions versus Replications

By Ron Pereira - May 8th, 2007

Many Lean & Six Sigma practitioners struggle to differentiate between a repetition and replication. Normally this confusion arises when dealing with Design of Experiments (DOE). Let’s use an example to explain the difference. Pai

Could Work Kill You?

By Ron Pereira - May 8th, 2007

I am a frequent flier and thus read lots of airplane magazines. One of the better mags of the sky is American Way from American Airlines. The May issue is about all things Asia. There are several good articles but the one that really c

First Impression of Workplace Management

By Ron Pereira - May 7th, 2007

I have now read Taiichi Ohno’s Workplace Management which was recently translated by Gemba Press. I have already started reading it a second time as I know I will gain an enormous amount reading it again (and maybe a third time). I w

Hangin’ with Taiichi – Update

By Ron Pereira - May 6th, 2007

As I explained a few nights ago I received my copy of “Workplace Management” by Taiichi Ohno. When I first looked at the book I was a bit surprised at how small the book looked. Normally when I see a 100 something page book

Outsourcing versus Offshoring

By Ron Pereira - May 6th, 2007

It seems like every time I turn around there is a new survey. One says Lean rocks, one says almost everyone that tries Lean fails, and one says Dilbert ruined Six Sigma. OK, this last one is stretching it a bit. Maybe. Well just today

Saudi Arabia meets Six Sigma

By Ron Pereira - May 5th, 2007

A series of ‘Six Sigma Foundation Courses’ are going to take place during May 2007 in different cities of Saudi Arabia. Link to article.

Hangin’ with Taiichi

By Ron Pereira - May 3rd, 2007

Let me set the scene of this momentous moment.My wife had already left for her Bible study. I had two kids in the tub (2 year old and 8 month) and my 4 year old was doing something bad… I am sure of it but can’t prove it si

Wanna Be Lean? Buy Some Carousels.

By Ron Pereira - May 3rd, 2007

I recently came across an article that irritated me. The gist of its message is that once all the “easy stuff” with Lean is taken care of… you know like respecting people, improving quality, and pulling material through t

Ron Pereira

Find Ron Elsewhere

Start your improvement training today.