2025 November Austin Section Lunch and Learn

Bio: 

Matthew Barsalou is an ASQ Fellow and IAQ Academician who works in the automotive industry in Germany. He is an ASQ Statistics Division Past-Chair and is an ASQ-certified Six Sigma Black Belt, quality engineer, and quality technician; a TÜV-certified quality manager, quality management representative, and quality auditor; and a Smarter Solutions-certified lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt. He has a bachelor’s degree in industrial sciences, and master’s degrees in business administration and engineering (industrial engineering), and liberal studies with emphasis in international business. Barsalou is author of the books Root Cause Analysis, Statistics for Six Sigma Black Belts, The ASQ Pocket Guide to Statistics for Six Sigma Black Belts, The Quality Improvement Field Guide, and Practical Statistical Methods for Quality, and co-author of the book Applied Statistics Manual, as well as author of both research and practitioner journal papers.

Description: This webinar presents a simple framework for root cause analysis (RCA). An RCA is performed to identify the underlying cause of a failure, and this webinar places an emphasis on RCAs for operator error. It may not be clear that an operator error has happened at the start of an investigation and this webinar will explain the critical steps to perform during an RCA, such as forming a team, describing the problem, graphing data, listing explanatory hypotheses in an Ishikawa diagram, and prioritizing hypotheses to investigate. This webinar will also describe an alternative version of an Ishikawa diagram that has been adapted for use during RCAs once it has been determined that an operator error has occurred.