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Many businesses need and even require the use of safety signs to warn employees and customers of potentially hazardous areas. However, the task of finding the right signs to portray the right message, along with finding a reputable company to provide the signs may be more difficult than originally intended. We are here to ease some of that burden with 10 helpful tips for finding the right safety signs to satisfy your business needs. 1. Identify Areas that May Need Safety Signs Before even beginning a search for a safety sign supplier, the first step in the process should be to accurately identify any areas within your facility that may be in need of safety signage. Think of all areas used by employees and/or customers such as aisles, walkways, fork lift zones, hazardous waste areas, potential slippery surface areas, etc. The key here is to identify all the locations that could pose hazardous conditions so proper signage can be created. 2. Pinpoint Potential Safety Hazards. Once certain areas have been designated as potentially hazardous, the next step would be to determine the actual safety hazards in the area that pose risks. An example of this could include an area where liquids are routinely transported. In this case, a spill may be likely which could endanger employees or customers due to the enhanced risk of a slip or fall. 3. Determine the Message to be Conveyed by the Signage Signs are posted everywhere, from "Watch Your Step" signs to "Employees Only" signs. However, for a sign to be truly effective it must convey a clean and clear message that can be understood easily by nearly anyone. For instance, in a work environment that includes welding, safety signs warning of potential arc flashes may be needed. In this case, a sign should be posted instructing anyone who enters to wear proper protective gear, this sign could read "Warning: Arc Flash Zone Proper Protection Required." 4. Consider the Conditions where the Signs will be Located Now

These days you may be hearing a lot talk regarding "going lean" and "implementing lean practices," what does this truly mean? When a company implements lean practices they are essentially looking at all areas within the company, evaluating processes, searching for new ways to streamline and improve current processes, all while striving to create a better and more efficient product or service. Even though the implementation of lean practices is a significant undertaking it is well worth the effort with added benefits in production, efficiency, and cost savings.

Introduction to Operational Excellence For most of us, Lean is a common concept by now. By extension, we're also familiar with the idea of continuous improvement; the way we run our business should ultimately be reflective of a chain of efforts to change for the better and reach more perfect efficiency. That's all well and good, but we've seen more and more businesses shying away from simply relying on "continuous improvement" in recent years and instead throwing around the term "operational excellence." While the two terms do ultimately work in tandem, and even though there's some overlap, it's important to understand where the two differ. A good way to think about operational excellence is as the answer or endgame to your continuous improvement actions, it's a state you want to attain through your workplace improvement endeavors. Unlike continuous improvement, however, where you're simply trying to 'always get better', operational excellence has a more clearly defined point where it can be said you've reached your goals. One of the biggest criteria for operational excellence is a horizontal and vertical (so throughout all levels and teams of a company) understanding of how workflow should look and how to correct problems when something isn't flowing correctly. This creates operational excellence because employees are now able to solve their own problems without relying on specialists or management, drastically decreasing downtime and putting them into a preventative rather than a reactive mode when solving problems. Furthermore, operational excellence then frees up your management and executives to focus on advertising and brand/market expansion planning and projects. In short, operational excellence allows a company to achieve continual improvement while still having the resources to put an emphasis on bottom line and market share growth. Operational Excellence Question Posed Sounds pretty awesome, right?! We think so, but you

"Green Machine" (photo courtesyof Gulfcoastgreenenergy.com) I read a really neat article today on the Gulf Cost Green Energy website, titled "Going Green: The Practical Payoffs of Geothermal Energy," that reported about a guy in Texas named Loy Sneary who has a machine that can convert wasted energy from steam stacks, boilers, and oil wells. According to Mr. Sneary, we waste almost 60% of the energy we use to create heat or electricity. His machine is kind of like a fancy heat pump/steam generator, and just maximizes energy through heat induction between heated air or water and a refrigerant that converts to pressurized steam inside a coil that is then used to generate electricity-all without any emissions. Frankly, I'm not a scientist or even an alternative energy expert, but it sounds reasonably logical. They rigged it up at Texas A&M apparently, and it all just worked out peachy. I'm all for greener alternative forms of energy, and this certainly seems to take the cake for that. I will certainly follow this guy's development of this technology. My only concern is that this article doesn't have too much written up on it-maybe it's hokey, or maybe it's because it's being repressed. Or, it just hasn't had anything written up on it, yet. (conspiracy theories anybody?)

When shopping for industrial label printers, it is important to find one that is reliable, produces high quality labels and signs, and can keep up with the demand of the facility. Bepop printers excel in all three of these categories, and many others. When evaluated in real working conditions, it is easy to see that these printers will meet or exceed the requirements of even the most demanding situations. There are multiple models created by Bepop, such as the CPM-100G3U and the CPM-200GU. Each one is designed to print, and cut labels for use in virtually any situation. Reliable Printing Bepop printing and cutting machines are manufactured by MAX®. This is a company with a lot of experience building printers that can stand up to the toughest conditions, and their Bepop line is certainly no exception. While it is always best to keep printers as clean and safe as possible, Bepop printers have been tested extensively in dirty and difficult conditions. They can continuously print out great labels and signs in almost any type of environment.

The process of pipe labeling is essential to minimize hazards within an industrial work environment. Pipes may contain a variety of different substances such flammable liquids, pressurized liquids, acids, wastes, water, etc. Pipes can extend for miles within industrial work settings and even though some pipes may not contain hazardous substances, it is still imperative to identify the contents within the pipes as well as the directional flow and pressure within the pipes. What is ANSI Color Coding? ANSI or American National Standards Institute is a privately owned, non-profit organization that is involved with creating consensus standards regarding workplace safety. In order to help ensure safety and the proper labeling of pipes, ANSI along with ASME (American Society of Testing and Materials) have developed a color coding system so the contents of pipes can be quickly and easily identified. The newest version of the ANSI Color Coding guide from 2007 features the use of six colors, versus the old version which focused primarily upon the use of four colors. The related hazards and colors are as follows: Hazard Colors Fire Quenching Fluids Red Background with White Lettering Corrosive & Toxic Fluids Orange Background with Black Lettering Flammable Liquids Yellow Background with Black Lettering Combustible Liquids Brown Background with White Lettering Potable, Cooling, Boiler, Water Green Background with White Lettering Compressed Air Blue Background with White Lettering In addition to the above six color codes, ANSI has also identified four other colors that may be utilized at the discretion of the user for other fluids that do not meet the specifications of the above content colors. The other colors are as follows: User Discretion Purple Background with White Lettering User Discretion White Background with Black Lettering User Discretion Gray Background with White Lettering User Discretion Black Background with White Lettering Pipe Label Placement In addition

The GHS and You - 5 Big Changes April 10, 2014 by Tony Ferraro If your workplace handles chemicals, particularly as the initial producer or as a distributor to clients, it's time to familiarize yourself with the global harmonization system (GHS) of classification and labeling chemicals, or the GHS, for short. What is the GHS? The GHS, first proposed to the United Nations in 1992, is an attempt at bringing some uniformity to the chemical labeling procedures of the developed world. Member nations, based upon their own time-frames, signed on to promise to convert to the GHS method of labeling chemical substances by a certain date. The idea was and still remains to make international business and production easier by having chemical labeling procedures that wouldn't slow down import and export, and would be easy for everyone involved to understand. This also greatly reduces transport costs as materials aren't having to be re-labeled or re-inspected as they cross borders. Last, but certainly not least, the GHS protects workers by ensuring the risks of handling any given material are clearly stated in an easy to understand manner from the beginning. According the UN's publishing of a GHS guide, the following are succinct statements of the GHS' most important goals: Defining health, physical and environmental hazards of chemicals: Creating classification processes that use available data on chemicals for comparison with the defined hazard criteria; and Communicating hazard information, as well as protective measures, on labels and Safety Data Sheets (SDS). OSHA.gov - GHS What does this mean for me? In the United States, the time-frame for adoption is staggered over several stages. On March 2012, the final rule for how workplaces should adopt their policies was published, and employees were required to be trained on these new procedures by December 1, 2013. Interestingly enough, the adoption of the standard by product manufacturers is not required until Ju

The cutting edge platforms for today will be the commoditized platforms of tomorrow. As the technology matures and evolves, the previous generation of technology becomes easier to build and deploy enabling a rush of vendors to capitalize on it by making it accessible to the largest possible customer base. This puts enterprises in the nontechnology sectors in an awkward position. Often not ready to consume the latest and greatest technology due to parts of their stack unable to leverage new technology and requiring upgrade to and deployment of the stepping stone technology, these enterprises have to choose between vendor lock-in in a multi-year software and service contract or risk building and implementing a version of the older technology in-house. Business Drivers of Infrastructure-as-a-Service The biggest risk in building technology platforms in-house is the risk of commoditization. The argument played out with the debate over internal vs. public clouds. Initially, enterprises were hesitant to leverage public clouds with several of them opting to build internal, private clouds. Building a cloud is hard. Operating and maintaining a cloud is even harder. Ensuring that the cloud is running on and leveraging the best in class technology requires dedication to the cause. This is often missing in non-technology enterprises by design given they are driven by different and separate business drivers and considerations. A cloud service provider is motivated to ensure the best in class service and technology because that drives revenue for them. An enterprise whose main business is not offering cloud or software services will not be motivated by the same drivers and thus there will be an inherent difference in their approach and success with building and delivering an internal cloud. Business Drivers for Platform-as-a-Service The same argument (public vs private clouds) applies to platforms. Building the best in class platforms that offer the ability to develop cuttin

Sentiment, Sentiment Analysis, Sentiment Tracking have become a hot topic with multiple 'AI' startups focussing on providing sentiment driven insights to enterprises. The number of such startups points to the potential that enterprises see in Sentiment analysis and the impact it has on how the enterprise plans, operates, executes and delivers value. Sentiment Analysis is process of extracting sentiment (emotion or feelings) captured in signals that are embedded in various types of media such as print, text, audio, video, images etc. For example, if a reporter submits a report on a particular enterprise, the sentiment embedded in the article can point to how excited, worried, upbeat or impassive they might are about the enterprise. This sentiment can be then used by the enterprise to understand the perception about the enterprise that the external market carries and whether that perception is improving, degrading or staying unchanged. This insight can be used by the enterprise to improve their go to market plans, change their PR strategy or even go deeper and change their product strategy. Sentiment Analysis Is Not New The tracking, measurement and use of Sentiment is not a new scenario. Enterprises have been leveraging the output of sentiment analysis for a long time. User surveys, focus groups, market research, customer interviews etc. are all examples of generating data to perform and track sentiment. Similarly, influencer marketing through association with influencers or events or organizations with a certain perception or sentiment associated with them is a common technique to improve the enterprise's own sentiment. Sentiment Analysis and strategizing based on the analysis is a common and required function for any enterprise. Sentiment Analysis Using Artificial Intelligence With the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI), enterprises now have another technique in their kitty to understand how they are perceived in the market and how that perception i

Are you searching for the perfect email marketing service for your online business? If yes, This article gives great working list premium and free email marketing tools and their services. The successful email campaign depends on choosing a perfect and best email marketing service providers for your online business. This is more helpful for every online marketer to improve their business. email marketing service providers listYou can create good email campaigns effectively. The regular free email service providers are agreeing to send emails to more people's every day. It can be tedious if you do it for more than 1000 contacts.

Complete your workplace labeling projects fast with a LabelTac® 4 Starter Bundle. You'll get all the tools you'll need to start printing labels right away: a LabelTac® 4 printer, multiple colors of label supply, two colors of print ribbon, and label creation software. With this bundle, you can create indoor/outdoor labels and signs up to 4" tall and 40" long that are resistant to UV rays, water, chemicals, and other wear and tear. This bundle will simplify any labeling project and produce labels that will last 5+ years.

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3-D printers, the article explains, can make prototyping and customizing easier, which creates a less wasteful manufacturing environment. Additional benefits of 3-D printers are they can increase the consistency of products and ultimately lead to lower prices.

Construction sites are filled with tools. Workers use hand tools like hammers, screwdrivers and wrenches all the time. They use power tools like drills and chainsaws on a regular basis, too. Tools may seem pretty straightforward, but you shouldn't assume that everyone understands how to use tools properly and safely. (A recent survey even found many millennial workers don't possess as much knowledge of tools as older workers.) When used improperly, tools can pose obvious hazards like cuts and lacerations. They also create conditions that can lead to slow-developing problems like carpal tunnel syndrome and other ergonomic injuries.

According to the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB), hot work accidents are among the most frequently reported accidents to that agency. Between 1990 and 2010, fires and explosions near flammable storage tanks caused by hot work accounted for more than 60 fatalities. Unfortunately, these accidents continue to take place. This past July, an explosion occurred during hot work near a storage tank at Omega Protein in Mississippi, killing one worker and injuring another. The tank contained eight inches of water and fish matter, which unknown to workers created flammable gases that led to the accident. When incidents like this happen, oftentimes the people and companies involved haven't sufficiently assessed hazards and properly isolated everything in the vicinity that could be flammable. These types of hot work accidents may not seem as obvious as other hazards associated with hot work such as UV light or welding fumes, but they can be even more deadly. The oil and gas industry often faces these hot work hazards, but so do the food production, paper and wastewater treatment industries, according to a video about the dangers of hot work made by the CSB. WHAT IS HOT WORK? OSHA defines hot work as "any work that involves burning, welding, using fire- or spark-producing tools, or that produces a source of ignition." Welding and cutting occur frequently at many industrial worksites, so it's important for workers involved in these operations to understand the potential unseen dangers associated with these tasks. Flammable gases and vapors can be present near storage tanks, fuel tanks and other confined spaces. PREVENT HOT WORK FIRES AND EXPLOSIONS In 2010, the CSB published a bulletin offering advice for how employers can prevent these types of hot work accidents. In the wake of recent accidents involving hot work and storage tanks filled with organic matter that might not seem hazardous (as was the case at Omega Protein), the organization has reemphasized the im

Lean Six Sigma for Non Profits We always like to hear about people applying business methodologies and mechanics in arguably unorthodox ways or markets, and today I stumbled across a LinkedIn discussion that happens to exemplify exactly that sentiment. User William Falquero seemed to be onto something interesting as he posed a question for other professionals: Could non-profit organizations benefit from Lean Six Sigma thinking? If so, how would they be implemented, what would the challenges of this sort of endeavor be? Only a few users jumped in right off the bat, but, lucky for our purposes today, they were some critical thinkers with some useful insight and examples to offer up. Today, we're going to take an in-depth look at the use of Lean and Six Sigma thinking and tools within non-profit and charity organizations. Are Charities Good Candidates for Lean? One of the first and most important things to establish when considering implementation of Lean in any company or organization is to figure out how they could benefit from the systems. In the case of charities, one user points out that room for improvement from Lean is readily apparent simply in the mindsets of the people who work at them: "The sweat and tears the non-profit workers and volunteers shed and the effort they put forward is focused on those they serve, with less thought on HOW they are served" This is what Richard Petty had to say of an organization he actually had the experience of implementing Six Sigma with. One thing he goes on to highlight and elaborate on is the fact that many volunteers and non-profit workers are so focused on those they want to help that they may get blinded as to the mechanisms that can take them there (and these are the places opportunities for improvement present themselves). Even in other more traditional workplaces, we see this sort of "tunnel vision" as fairly common: It can be hard to get workers to take a step back from the endgame results they're

The pertinent use of safety stickers and labels is a must within any industrial work environment. Safety stickers and labels serve many functions, first and foremost, they help to warn or inform employees and visitors of any specific safety concerns. Additionally, they also serve as handy informational reminders from identifying the contents within certain pipes, to showing where recycling may be located, all the way to highlighting the location of a safety eye wash station. Since the need for safety stickers is so important, yet so diverse depending upon the type of business, it may be difficult to locate all the specific stickers and labels needed. One way to easily combat the rising costs of utilizing outside retailers for safety stickers is to simply make your own. Believe it or not, printing your own safety stickers is generally faster, easier, and more cost efficient. Printing Safety Stickers If you've never considered the option of printing your own safety stickers, right now is the time to start. With advances in technology, some label printers are able to efficiently print bright and colorful, commercial grade stickers and labels. One label printing product currently on the market that rivals most others in price, quality, and ease of use is the LabelTac 4 PRO. This printer has proven time and time again to produce high-quality, dependable, colorfast labels that outperform most other safety stickers available on the market, and the best part is they can be printed in-house right from your own office. The LabelTac 4 PRO is capable of creating indoor and outdoor labels that are both weather and fade resistant. Furthermore, the ease of use with the LabelTac 4 PRO is simply impressive to say the least. It is compatible with nearly any Windows-based programs including well-known products such as Microsoft Office, OpenOffice, and Excel. However, even if you don't utilize Windows-based software the LabelTac 4 PRO comes equipped with its own easy-to-use Barte