Lean Human Performance Improvement

As companies continue their efforts to improve work performance, they must ensure that their ongoing Lean activities include a healthy appreciation for, and recognition of, human performance. Ignoring the human component of work performance can be a recipe for unnecessary waste, inefficiency, and decreased productivity. Lean Human Performance Improvement presents a broad overview of human performance in the workplace. The author discusses his findings from a broad spectrum of human performance-related fields and diverse industrial sectors (gained by working in the field for over 30 years).

Organized in three sections, this book covers understanding human performance, analyzing and improving work productivity, and analyzing and improving quality and safety. The author first develops a fundamental and basic understanding of human performance, then couples that understanding with learning how to analyze and improve human-related work productivity and quality and safety. He also discusses how knowledge and skills transfer from one work setting to another.

Intended for Lean Six Sigma team members and human performance improvement practitioners, the book contains multiple examples from diverse work settings to explain key points. It also includes several major case studies. The goal of all examples and case studies is to develop a generic understanding that, in turn, can be successfully applied to any work setting.

Chapter 1 : A Work System Perspective : People, Tools, and Tasks

Part I : Understanding Human Performance
Chapter 2 : A Macro Model : Nature, Nurture, and Operational Setting
Chapter 3 : A Micro Model : Perception, Cognition, and Action
Chapter 4 : Human Error (Or Is It Really?)

Part II : Analyzing and Improving Human-Related Work Productivity
Chapter 5 : Human Motion Analysis
Chapter 6 : Human Productivity Improvement

Part III : Analyzing and Improving Human-Related Quality and Safety
Chapter 7 : Human Error Analysis
Chapter 8 : Human Quality and Safety Improvement
Chapter 9 : And That’s It!

Glossary
References
Index
About the Author