Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is insanity.
- Albert Einstein

News

Ongoing surge in demand for CI talent

As the economy continues to heal, post-recession demand for continuous improvement talent persists strongly, according to the latest study of almost 7,100 recent Internet job postings reviewed by The Avery Point Group. The executive search firm's eighth annual study found that the combined demand for Lean and Six Sigma talent has more than doubled, rising more than 103 percent over 2010 recessionary levels and 6 percent ahead of last year's strong talent demand levels.

"This year's study clearly illustrated there is strong ongoing demand for continuous improvement skills ahead of the broader economic recovery," states Tim Noble, managing principal and partner of The Avery Point Group. "However, within that ongoing surge for continuous improvement talent we are beginning to see a very clear and accelerated trend in the demand for Lean skills versus Six Sigma that may also indicate a decoupling of the two initiatives in relation to job requirements."

Based on this year's study, The Avery Point Group found that demand for Lean talent has accelerated at its fastest year-over-year pace in the eight-year history of the study as the more desired skill set over Six Sigma. This year's study showed that Lean talent demand now exceeds Six Sigma by almost 68 percent, almost doubling its lead over last year's results that only showed a 35 percent edge for Lean over Six Sigma.

Overall, the continued rise in talent demand for Lean bodes well for candidates who possess those skills, as organizations seek them out as either a hedge against current economic uncertainty or as an enabler to leverage the emerging economic recovery. Thanks to the international independent certification programme of IIBLCyou can prove your present or future company and others that you master the necessary knowledge and skills in Lean.

Lean is everything, or nothing

Everybody knows Lean, but not everyone applies it like they should. "The real challenge is to have the patience to reach fundamental improvements."

In this article from the 'Kwaliteitskrant', december 2011 edition (in dutch), both Luc Van Landeghem, president of IIBLC, and Hendrik Van Landeghem, professor at the Ghent university, give their opinion about Lean.

Factories of the Future: strategic roadmap for European productivity

In order to face the challenge of the global competition, the European manufacturing industry will increasingly be forced to concentrate on specific issues providing a large competitive advantage through long-term innovation at the factory level.

A key factor to strengthen European leadership in product and process engineering and in the development of manufacturing systems, both discrete and continuous, will be the ability to achieve cost efficiency, high performance and enhanced robustness, in a context of increasing product variability and continuously changing product volumes.

In the present scenario of global market competition, the R&D challenges to achieve a higher competitiveness of the manufacturing systems should be considered in terms of general evolution drivers, such as cost efficiency, with extensive adoption of standards in production machinery, equipment and controls and massive use of the lean approach.

The entire strategic roadmap can be found in the document "Factories of the Future ppp".

Supply chain conference by MGCM

MGCM, the French partner of IIBLC, organises a conference on resilient supply chains on October 13th in Lille. The president of IIBLC will be one of the guest speakers.

24th Flemish Quality Congress organised by VCK

Op donderdag 6 oktober vindt het 24ste Vlaams Kwaliteitscongres plaats in Het Godshuis te Sint-Laureins.

Het VCK wil de bezoekers verbinden rond het thema 'impact'. Het wordt geen klassiek congres, maar een open bijeenkomst voor ieder die op een of andere manier betrokken is bij kwaliteitszorg in organisaties en zijn invloed wil verhogen.  De formule voor dit kwaliteitscongres is eenvoudig. Het zijn de deelnemers die het programma maken en iedereen kan een bijdrage leveren. Een vastomlijnd, vooraf bekendgemaakt programma is er niet. Je kan spreken van een 'unconference', een open bijeenkomst voor geïnteresseerden uit verschillende hoeken. Het VCK zorgt ervoor dat iedere deelnemer ervaringen kan delen, verhalen kan vertellen, succesvolle aanpakken kan voorstellen of juist in dialoog kan gaan rond uitdagingen waarvoor nieuwe antwoorden nodig zijn.

Vragen die aan bod komen, zijn onder meer: hoe het impactgebied van kwaliteitszorg vergroten en welke rol speelt de kwaliteitsmanager daarin, hoe innovatieperformantie doen toenemen, wat is de impact van certificatie op een organisatie, hoe ziet een matuur ISO 9001-systeem eruit, welke rol kunnen gebruikersgroepen spelen, wat is de meerwaarde van performantiemetingen, hoe stuurkaarten levend houden op de werkvloer, hoe de impact van duurzaamheidsinitiatieven verhogen, hoe kan onderwijs zijn stempel drukken, enzovoort.

Het 24ste Kwaliteitscongres "Impact, meer invloed dan je denkt" vindt plaats op donderdag 6 oktober 2011 in het Godshuis in Sint-Laureins. Deelnameprijs: € 400 (excl. 21% BTW)
Meer info en inschrijvingen via 
http://vck.be/impact

3rd Lean breakfast session by CIM_CIL (free)

CIM_CIL organises for the 3rd time in Flanders a breakfast session on Lean on September 23rd.

Venue: Kasteel van Zwijnaarde, Joachim Schayckstraat 6 at 9052 Zwijnaarde, Belgium

Time: start at 08.00 CET with a breakfast buffet

Price: FREE

Language: Dutch

Registration mandatory: follow this link

Lean talent demand continues to outpace Six Sigma by a substantial margin

The Avery Point Group is a global executive recruiting and search firm that assists companies in identifying, assessing and recruiting midlevel management to senior executive Lean & Six Sigma talent.

"Companies are seeking Lean and Six Sigma talent as a way to help their organizations better leverage their performance during the ongoing recovery. They don't want to add back one-for-one on headcount, inventory and operating cost as the economy recovers and volume returns. Rather, they see continuous improvement talent as an enabler to help them gain and maintain significant performance leverage."

This year's study found that Lean talent demand continues to outpace Six Sigma by almost 35 percent, in-line with last year's study. Nonetheless, this is still a dramatic shift from The Avery Point Group's 2005 inaugural Lean and Six Sigma talent demand study that showed Six Sigma talent demand exceeding Lean by more than 50 percent.

"These results continue to show an overall bias for Lean skills, perhaps as an ongoing hedge against the challenges of today's economic climate, which Lean's more immediate and practical focus on waste, flow and flexibility may better serve. It may also indicate that companies are continuing to balance out their continuous improvement talent stable with Lean candidates versus slightly more ubiquitous Six Sigma talent."

http://www.averypointgroup.com/

CIM_CIL organises first Lean breakfast in Wallonia (free)

After the successes in Flanders CIM_CIL now organises for the first time a Lean breakfast session in Wallonia on May 4th 2011.

Venue: Leonardo Wavre, Rue de la Wastinne 45, at 1301 Wavre, Belgium

Time: breakfast starts at 08.00 CET

Price: FREE

Language: French

Registration mandatory: follow this link

First CBBL certificate awarded to Xavier Perrin

The first Certified Black Belt in Lean certificate is awarded to Xavier Perrin (FR). This CBBL certificate was handed over by Luc Van Landeghem, president of IIBLC, at the Lean conference in Toulouse on February 3rd. This event was organised by MGCM France.

Lean conference in Toulouse was a success!

On February 3rd MGCM France organised a Lean conference in Toulouse. One of the main speakers was Luc Van Landeghem, president of IIBLC. With 170 participants this event was a huge success! Other speakers included the VP Supply Chain of Airbus, Toulouse and people from Mars Inc.

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