2010 Minnesota Quality Conference

When/Where

March 8 & 9 2010: Earle Brown Heritage Center; 6155 Earle Brown Drive; Minneapolis, MN 55430

Keynote Speaker:
Paula R. Palmi, VP Supply Chain Quality at Ecolab Inc.

In today's economy, cost management is high on everyone's priority list. What does this mean to a quality professional? Does it mean that we "take what we get", or does it mean that we go back to what we do best, continuous quality improvement? My experience is that there is no better time to focus on the critical things that need to be done to assure that our customers get what they expect and the company's processes operate in such a way that we have predictable variation in our products and services. If we do this, we gain higher assurance that our product and quality costs will be well-managed.

Putting in place a strong foundation and then building to meet specific customer or business requirements is what I have found to be most successful. Quality tools, quality systems, Lean Six Sigma, 5S all play a critical role in defining the foundation. Let's talk about how they work together.