Consulting

I offer collaborative consulting and teaching in the general area of quality engineering and manufacturing process improvement, with emphasis on Failure Mode Avoidance through mistake prevention and robustness improvement. My skills portfolio include all aspects of quality management, including integrating failure mode avoidance into business operations. In particular I specialize in solving problems that lie at the interface between engineering and statistical science.

Based on my 30 years of international experience in manufacturing industry, together with my chartered professional grade in both statistical science (with the Royal Statistical Society) and mechanical engineering (with the Institution of Mechanical Engineers), and as a Senior Member of the American Society of Quality, I have useful expertise in the following areas:

• Project Management and Project Planning

  • within the New Product Development Process, and

  • for Emergency Problem Solving (including product recalls).

• Crisis Control and Management

• Development of Quality Operating Systems

• Systems Engineering

  • • target setting

    • system reliability

  • Failure Mode Avoidance in New Product Development

  • Failure Mode and Effect Analysis* (FMEA) and Fault Tree Analysis (FTA)

• Engineering Standards, Compliance, & Deviation protocols for Mistake Prevention

  • Robust Engineering Design , including

    • concept selection,

    • parameter design,

    • tolerance analysis, and

    • noise factor management

  • Design of Experiments, Empirical Model Building, and Transfer Function Development

  • Design Verification Test Planning, and Sign-Off reporting

  • Problem-solving and Root Cause Analysis (with particular emphasis on IS/IS NOT analysis & the 5 why's, and deployment of Prevent Recurrence Actions and feedback to the FMEA)

  • Statistical Process Control approached from the perspective of Shewhart & Deming.

* I prefer to think of the FMEA as Failure Mode and Effect Avoidance (i.e. not just analysis), and teach it as such - please refer to the Ford Motor Company FMEA handbook available for download here

Note that for items in bold, I have prepared short "primers" as pdf documents that explain the concepts involved. If you would like to see these prior to engaging me in a project, please let me know.

See my Publications, Conference presentations, and biography for some technical details and downloads of what I have to offer. A list of some of my recent clients (with onward links) is provided opposite.

If you think that I might be able to help you or your organization in any of the areas listed above, please get in touch via e-mail or telephone.