The Quality Guru

Feb 28, 2010

Contributed by Joanne Ma from the People’s Republic of China. This year the Festival of Lantern falls on February 28, 2010, the full moon night. Incidentally, this full moon night is celebrated in India as ‘Holi’, the festival of colors….Ribhu Nath Lavania

“The Lantern Festival or Yuanxiao Festival is a traditional Chinese festival, which is on the 15th of the first month of the new year in Chinese Lunar Calendar. Feb. 28th is the Lantern Festival of Chinese Tiger Year of 2010.

Chinese started to celebrate the Lantern Festival from the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 221 AD). A rumor said the festival is originated from Taoism.

On the night of the festival, people usually go to streets with a variety of lanterns under the full moon, watching lions or dragon dancing, playing Chinese riddles and lighting up firecrackers. Having Yuanxiao is an important symbol of this festival.

Yuanxiao or Tangyuan(sticky rice ball) is a special food for the Lantern Festival. It’s named after a palace maid – Yuanxiao, from the Empire Wu Di of Han Dynasty, according to the folklore. Yuanxiao is made with sticky rice flour filled with sweet stuffing. It looks round and white from the outside, with sweet stuffing sitting inside. Foreign people usually are curious about how to stuff the sweet into the ball. Nixon – the president of United States asked the same question when he visited China in 1972. The trick to make a nice Yuanxiao includes four steps:

1. blend the flour with water to be a big dough;
2. take a small piece to make it in the shape of cake and flat;
3. put the stuffing in the centre of the cake and pull all the edges together to make it a ball with stuffing all covered;
4. put the ball on one palm, rubbing it with the other palm, clockwise or counter-clockwise, till it’s completely round without any crack.

Yuanxiao is sticky, sweet and round in shape, symbolizing family’s unity, happiness and completeness. People make Yuanxiao themselves before 1990s at home, but now it’s sold as quick-frozen food in most stores.

After have nice Yuanxiao with the whole family together and enjoy the lattern and other games on this special day, the long celebration of the Chinese New Year officially ends. People go back hard work and life for a happy, prosperous new year with most hopes”.

The link for the “holi” festival is http://www.holifestival.org/ plus an interesting site to visit can be found here http://article.yeeyan.org/view/44480/87846

China- The Festival of Lantern

“Project Management is the only way” is a popular saying in project management circles. One can’t successfully manage projects without following the basics concepts of project and quality management. Let us make a start with Deming’s PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act) cycle. It is not only quality models and standards which invariably follow Deming’s PDCA but also all successful projects. By definition, projects are temporary in nature as they have a date of start and end. Project Managers always remain under pressure. The only way they enhance the chances of their success are by following the PDCA cycle. How?

1. Unless planned well, there is no guarantee that the project will be able to satisfy its customer and other stakeholder needs.
2. Once the PM and others implement the provisions of planned arrangements in their projects, invariably there would be variations between the planned and actual parameters like time lines, effort deployed, cost and problems/ defects e.t.c.
3. One has to measure such parameters and compare them with planned ones.
4.  In case there are significant variations, the project manager has to initiate appropriate preventive and/ or corrective actions to bring the project back on track. This completes the PDCA cycle and it always remains in a spiral of continual improvement and change.
5. Members are invited to express their views and comments on this topic. We shall not only encourage comments on project management methodologies but also those on domain/ technology specific areas

Further details regarding project management courses can be found on the ACI Global Website http://www.aciglobal.com.au/Project_Management.html

The Managing Director of ACI Global together with all staff would like wish all Chinese and Korean citizens a happy and prosperous year of the Tiger!

Check out http://www.aciglobal.com.au for further news.

Reykjavik, Iceland – Mr. Ian Erskine, Managing Director and CEO of the  ACI Global Group of Companies, announced today that next week Monday the 22nd February ACI Global will launch the first course in a serires of on-line courses on Developing and Auditing GMP Systems in the Pharmaceutical Industry. These courses will be part of ACI Global‘s Personnel Certification Scheme which will be developed under ISO 17024 guidlenes and registered by an Indepenent Third Party.

Mr Erskine has also announced that Mr. Jon Bergsson (Certified Lead Auditor) will be course administrator and facilitator. Jon has extensive experience in the Pharmaceutical Industry in developing and auditing GMP systems in various fields within the industry.

Mr. Bergsson said that on-line courses based on Prior Learning and Current Competencies would benefit a lot of persons seeking to advance their professional competencies within the GMP industry. The group of GMP courses will start with a Basic GMP Auditing course and move on to more specific fields like QC Laboratories, Production and Packaging, Sterile Products, etc.

stay tuned to this Blog and also ensure you visit our website http://www.aciglobal.com.au to catch the latest developments.

ACI Global with the release of its Aviation White Paper has signaled its intention to seek the aviations leading players input into future training needs for Aviation. The main author of the ACI Global White Paper on Aviation Mr. Ivan Pearson himself a senior aviation auditor has expressed his desire to seek a change to “Competency Based” Training with the help of the main players in World Aviation.

Ian Erskine Managing Director and CEO has congratulated Ivan on his efforts in putting this paper together and has called on all major aviation bodies to contribute to the proposed new direction indicated by the White Paper.

Further details can be found on the ACI Global Website http://www.aciglobal.com.au/Aviation.html where the white paper can be downloaded.

Mr Erskine has invited comments to this Aviation White Paper form all interested parties.

Organizations develop unity of purpose towards successful assessment of ISO or other certifications. The team motivation is high before the certification takes place. People get full management support and work overtime to ensure success during the assessment. This is one of the occasions when best of team spirit and motivation is visible at all levels in the organization.

Unfortunately, not all the organisations are able to sustain the motivation and team spirit once the certification is achieved. Usually, there is a sense of achievement once the certification is recommended, people congratulate each other, some of them may get appreciations/recognition and all this is followed by a formal or informal celebration: parties, press releases or ads campaign e.t.c. In all this, what is usually forgotten is the fact that real business benefits start coming in after the assessment is over. This is the most unfortunate part of organizational journey towards process improvement. In a majority of cases, the process improvement almost stops after the assessment.

I would request the members to express their views on how to maintain process improvement momentum after the assessment is over.

Thanks!

I feel one of the most compelling reasons is it enables an organisations workforce “Competency” based workplace outcomes to be evaluated by an Independent Body. It is also vital that this body is certified and international recognised to ISO 17024

Ian Erskine

Managing Director and CEO

ACI Global Pty Ltd

Considering purchasing carbon credits to offset your wasteful way? Some things to consider if your thinking this will clear your conscience.

All carbon credits are not created equal, and you should take a real close look at just what the REAL impact of your actions are. Tree-planting offsets, are a good example of a little more than meets the eye at first glance.

Having read this statement tell us do you agree with this statement

What are the benefits for an Organisation of Independant Third party Personnel Certification.