I don't know if it's hot where you are, but in North Carolina, we have seen 90 degree days this week. If you're looking for a reason not to go outside, you can beat the heat by pulling up a chair and reading a few interesting articles I came across this week.
The other day at lunchtime, a discussion between one of our customer service reps and an EH&S specialist devolved into argument. The donnybrook, happening four offices down, became so loud that I could not focus my standard duties, like holding the weight of the world on my shoulders, so I rose to see about negotiating a cease-fire. Then I quickly sat back down. The squabble was about which was better – Star Wars or Star Trek. Darn. It was a Tuesday.
Do you suffer from friggatriskaidekaphobia? Or perhaps paraskevidekatriaphobia?
The ballroom, filled to capacity by suited men and high-heeled women, broke into applause as each award winner was announced. As they came forward to receive the Governor’s Award of Healthcare Excellence, Gov. Beverly Perdue read a list of their accomplishments.
We're all back to work for 2012, and I think it's going to be a great year! In fact, today I'm meeting with my senior leadership team to plan out how we're going to tackle this year's challenges. While we're doing that, I thought I'd start 2012 with a look back at last year.
How do you keep customers satisfied? First you need to understand what motivates your customer. Dr. Nuriaki Kano developed a model to help identify some basic premises of what customers want and need. The "Kano Model" is a simple two axis matrix with "satisfaction" on the vertical axis and "achievement" on the horizontal axis:
Manufacturing literally is the news this week! ABC News begins a week-long segment tonight on Made in America. They have been building up to this segment with stories and video about the state of manufacturing in the United States. The part of the site dedicated to the segment also has a really great interactive Made in America Map showing where items are made with red stars denoting companies submitted by users and blue stars denoting companies identified by ABC.
Manufacturing has been in the news quite a bit lately as it has provided some of the only good news for the American economy. Here are a few links of interest: