Ambiguous Visual Controls Archives

What are Lagging & Leading Indicators? How are they related? Why are they important?

By Steve Kane - January 22nd, 2021

David Barber is CFO of Omni Industries in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. David and the rest of the senior executive team at Omni are leading a lean transformation. He wrote this article for Omni’s company newsletter to help people at

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Caution! Possible Scalding

By Jon Miller - October 10th, 2014

Labeling and signage alone are about as effective in preventing accidents as fences are in preventing birds from flying over them. Warning labels can come across as a mere attempt to minimize a business’s liability, rather than a

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Prehistoric Shark Attack Evacuation Plan

By Jon Miller - April 14th, 2012

This may be the most unhelpful emergency evacuation visual control in the United States of America. The evacuation plan resembles a journey through a shark’s intestines. Should one need to actually consult it, the ability to read

Lean Retail Exercise: “Not My Job” Edition

By Jon Miller - March 1st, 2012

The retail industry has a poor image when it comes to the motivation level of its employees. They are often portrayed in popular culture as neither well-trained nor well-paid, not always inspired to deliver a great customer experience.

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Ignage

By Jon Miller - October 26th, 2011

Imagine my disappointment, upon hauling my gardening implements across town after a long and difficult season of tilling the soil, to be informed by the store proprietor that they could not in fact help with the repair of my hoes. It&#

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Airport Hotel Edition

By Jon Miller - September 30th, 2011

Airports are full of signs. Standing in queue gives ample time to reflect on their meaning and appreciate their ambiguity. This visual control at the check-in counter made me wonder why it was necessary to abandon the better part of va

Ambiguous Visual Controls in the Park

By Jon Miller - July 29th, 2011

Walking through a park near Frankfurt, Germany I saw this sign. Checking first to make sure I had not slipped back in time to the 1880s, I snapped this photo. What does it mean? Not reading German, the only way this visual control coul

Something to Lighten Your Day

By Jon Miller - May 12th, 2011

Many advertising images are designed to make people subconsciously want to consume a product. How effective do you think this vending machine is towards that end? There is an implied lesson here about visual controls and lean thinking

The Ambiguity Deepens…

By Jon Miller - May 1st, 2011

This was found in Frankfurt airport, hanging every 100m or so in the hallway of the terminal. It’s a long narrow hallway. These signs are positioned such that if you are walking down the hall, the visual control indicates to go r

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Too Much Information

By Jon Miller - April 27th, 2011

Among the side benefits of international travel are meeting interesting new people, learning about the local culture and running into ambiguous visual controls. Jet lag slows the brain and renders it unable to quickly find meaning in a

Ambiguous Visual Controls: KEEP RED OFF LINE

By Jon Miller - January 5th, 2011

Who is Red and why is it important to keep him off line? This Monday I realized that for the past 13 years I have been stepping on or over these letters on the floor in SeaTac International Airport without taking any action regarding R

Effective Visual Controls and the Minimum Noticeable Difference

By Jon Miller - November 2nd, 2010

On a recent trip to a market in southern China it occurred to me that there must be a thriving industry producing red ink in this country. By red ink I mean not financial losses but the literal wet and sanguine stuff that so much of th

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Lost in the Supermarket

By Jon Miller - October 16th, 2010

Visual controls must at the very minimum be unambiguous, and either indicate normal versus abnormal or to positively specify a problem condition in order to be useful. Ambiguous visual controls are a waste of print and only good as exa

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Donut Shop Edition

By Jon Miller - June 30th, 2010

Always on the lookout for ambiguous visual controls, I spotted one today at the donut shop by our office during a stop for my morning coffee. These pastries which were clearly a tray of vintage 1970s Orange Shag Carpet donuts were misl

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Waste Please

By Jon Miller - April 7th, 2010

There is something sinister about a place that calls itself “the happiest place on earth”. How did they arrive at that superlative conclusion? Did they benchmark GNH (Gross National Happiness) against other locations on ear

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Invisible Inventory Management

By Jon Miller - December 28th, 2009

It appears that our local Hello Kitty store is low on stock of invisible pens. I only see one invisible pen in this display (or rather, don’t see it). I would hate to have the job of the invisible pen warehouseman on cycle counti

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Come Closer. No, stay Away!

By Jon Miller - August 20th, 2009

Peter Köves shared an amusing example of this ambiguous or perhaps downright dangerous visual control. When hiking in the countryside of South Limburg near the Dutch city of Maastricht, I stumbled upon this sign on the side of the pat

Ambiguous Visual Controls… this one’s pretty clear actually

By Jon Miller - August 13th, 2009

I waited and waited but didn’t catch sight of any humped zebras making a run for it. I bet their crossing frequency plots out as a histograms with a bimodal distribution.

Ambiguous Visual Controls: This is Elite Access

By Jon Miller - May 22nd, 2009

Thanks go out to Bill Sampson, a lean six sigma consultant and friend of mine for snapping this photo of an ambiguous visual control in an airport boarding area. This attempt at visual management raises more questions than it answers.

Visual Management Resource for Lean Hospitals

By Jon Miller - April 13th, 2009

Here is another recent find on visual management: the website of MediFilm “the leaders in healthcare visual management systems”. Who knew there was such a thing to be leaders of? Well done in any case, making a product out

Ambiguous Visual Controls: When Words Aren’t Necessary

By Jon Miller - March 8th, 2009

Visual controls must by definition be clear indicators of normal versus abnormal, go versus no go, okay versus not okay. The sign above isn’t at all bad compared to other ambiguous visual controls we’ve featured here, here

Ambiguous Visual Controls: This Way is Up

By Jon Miller - November 12th, 2008

This makes it three for three on scoring photos of ambiguous visual controls during visits to this European country. What could this sign possible mean? A reminder to vertigo sufferers of which way is up? A public service campaign in a

Ambiguous Visual Controls: Stop on Green

By Jon Miller - July 24th, 2008

One of the small remaining delights in foreign travel after 15 years of it is the discovery of yet another laughably ambiguous visual control. Something about them tickles the sense of humor that has been punished by jet lag and questi

Ambiguous Visual Controls: No Running in the Airplane

By Jon Miller - June 29th, 2008

The more you look the more you see ambiguous visual controls. Some are well-intentioned, while others appear to be half-hearted attempts to comply with some bureaucratic requirements. Others hint at hidden efficiencies or inefficiencie

Ambiguous Visual Controls

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