As I was waiting for my coffee this morning, I began to realize that there are major expectations from seemingly simple devices. We have the single-serve Keurig machines. There are some flavors to choose from, but the basic expectation is the same. This simple device is meant to deliver the same style of coffee each time. This process is repeated dozens of times every day. I would not be surprised to learn that the model in our kitchen makes 1,000 cups or more per year!
Our Operational Excellence team works with the fundamentals of a program called Six Sigma. A business process must be 99.99966% free of defects in order to be considered six sigma. That represents 3.4 defects for every million products. That is an astoundingly small number. It is also extremely difficult to achieve.
One of the ways that you achieve this excellence is through consistency and repetition. Malcolm Gladwell writes about this in his book "Outliers." He estimates that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to reach an expert level of proficiency at most tasks. We expect relentless perfection in every box we open from the first moment of operation to the last minute of its useful life.
It's interesting to work with computers. They do not get tired or bored. They can perform the same task over and over with mind-numbing precision. From a manufacturing perspective, it is generally helpful to have some level of automation that helps to ensure the consistency that consumers expect from their products.
At the same time, we also work in a field that may not always lend itself to a "one size fits all" approach. The wide range of human shapes and sizes can sometimes make it difficult to create standard solutions. This can lead to loose guidelines to help accommodate the outliers that keep medical procedures from reaching that aspirational six sigma goal.
The challenge is for our human minds to be nimble enough to understand where the application of this technology will yield the proper benefits. We have to be brave enough to redirect those efforts if they are not working the way they were intended.
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