Frequently Asked Questions

Section I (FAQ) – Section II (Questions About Services)

Section I

1) What’s the difference between 2 days and 3 days for Internal Auditor Training?

Many companies offer both a 2 day and a 3 day training class for Internal Auditors; ISO 9001:2015, ISO 14001:2015, IATF 16949:2016 and other standards. It has always been the practice at MBC, Inc. to offer the three (3) day course as the primary training venue.

The approach of MBC, Inc., and many other companies in training auditors is to review the appropriate standard on day one. Then on days two and three to work on audit tools, techniques, methods, reporting, and working on case studies. This approach gives the person that is not familiar with auditing the best start. This gives the attendees the basic skills to begin an audit function with minimal additional support once they return to their facilities.

MBC, Inc., is always open to a two (2) day audit class as a refresher to experienced auditors, to upgrade current auditors from one standard to another or, as a refresher course to enhance the audit skills or knowledge of the organization’s current auditors.

2) What is the best and fastest way to contact Martin Business Consulting, Inc.?

There are several ways. You may go to the “Contact Us” page (menu at the top) and use the available form to send an E-mail.

or Call;

931-637-1446

Or Write to;

Martin Business Cosulting, Inc.
PO Box 1812
Lewisburg, Tn. 37091

But by far phone or E-mail are the fastest!

3) Does my company really get a good return on investment for monies spent on training?

While most consulting and training companies will tell you straight out “Yes” I believe the answer is slightly more complicated. Training only gives an organization the opportunity to get a good return on their investment. To actually get a return on your investment for training dollars the training must be effectively implemented. This is especially true of training in quality skills. Sending engineers or quality technicians to training in Statistical Process Control (SPC) will provide a good return on investment. Upon returning from training if the attendees utilize their new skills or knowledge to improve manufacturing process efficiency, then a return on investment is realized. This could be the utilization of SPC to reduce scrap or rework, improve cycle time thus increasing throughput. There should always be a follow-up with attendees to training to ensure they are utilizing the training they receive. Actually a report to management as to how they intend to implement the training then a follow-up to ensure they did implement the training is always a good idea. You should always receive an adequate return for your training dollars.

4) How do I know what training my people need?

This is a very complex question. The answer is driven by many factors depending on how you are currently performing in areas such as customer satisfaction, delivery, through-put, efficient process control, effective handling of customer request-for-quote, and many other business needs.

You may start with such items as customer complaints. If these are recurring complaints, i.e. multiple complaints for the same cause, this may indicate some inherent deficiency in your quality system or the application and effectiveness of your quality system. If this is the case you may need to enhance your “Problem Solving” capability with 8D training or other problem solving tools.

The same approach can be taken by looking at other measures, scrap rates higher than the target, excessive rework, etc.

If any of these conditions apply, you should call or e-mail and let Martin Business Consulting, Inc., help you examine your options for improvement. We will tell you honestly if we can help, and we will tell you if we can’t help. Further if we know of other resources that would be of more value for your particular situation we will enthusiastically recommend them to you.

5) How does auditor training add value to my organization?

This can be a complex question to validate. Should the training of internal auditors add value to organizations? Yes. For this to actually occur the training must impart a thorough knowledge of the standard they are auditing and the criteria that is acceptable. But the real value added is giving the audit staff the ability to identify weakness in the Quality Management System; writing the audit findings in such a way as to bring about corrective action that actually causes improvement in effectiveness and efficiency to occur. When the audit staff can accomplish this later step, then the training of the audit staff actually adds value to the organization and a good return on investment is realized. Albeit the time it takes to realize the return on investment is lengthier.

6) What do you mean by “Comprehensive FMEA”?

Many training and consulting companies provide overview training of both design and process failure mode effects analysis (FMEA). Comprehensive FMEA is our term for a two day workshop at your manufacturing facility. During these two days the instructor and the class participants work on the manufacturing floor identifying sources of variation for a portion of your manufacturing process. Once these risk factors are identified and documented the Process FMEA is utilized to assess the risk and prioritize corrective action.

With the risk factors understood the second day is dedicated to the development of an efficient use of operations resources (technology and manpower), to best control the process and minimizes risk to the organization and the customer. The core group of trained personnel is then able to expand this work to the entire manufacturing process. This comprehensive application of FMEA fully implemented is a very powerful tool to maximize control, minimize risk, reducing cost and improve customer satisfaction.

7) Which is the most cost effective; public seminar or on-sight training?

This is just a function of working-the-numbers. E-mail or call and we can give you a cost comparison between on-sight and public, based on how many employees you intend to train.

For public seminars you generally have to pay travel and perhaps lodging for each person that attends plus the cost of the seminar. This can sometimes exceed the cost of scheduling an on-sight training session. For on-sight, Martin Business Consulting, Inc. charges a “flat” rate per day plus mileage (based on MapQuest estimated distance) and materials (Books, Standards, etc). Since MBC, Inc., does not charge daily expense (lodging, meals, etc) we are able to give, up-front, an exact cost for each on-sight.

This enables your company to make a dollar for dollar comparison between public and on-sight training. Generally speaking for on-sight training the more students you place in class the lower the cost-per-student.

Section II

Tell us about your Internal Audit training;
1. Whether you are talking about ISO 9001, IATF 16949 or ISO 14001 the internal auditor training at Martin Business Consulting is a comprehensive course. Content includes detailed review of the appropriate standard as well as training in audit preparation. By audit preparation, I mean things such as; check-sheet development and use, audit planning and scheduling, opening and closing meeting, writing of the audit report and any identified CARs. Furthermore, the numerous class exercises are designed in such a manner as to enhance the learning experience. Such as; breaking the class up into small teams of 3-5 students and having them develop their own check-sheet from an assigned procedure then the ‘role-play of conducting an audit’ with the instructor being the auditee. This activity brings about a great enlightenment to the participants as they get ‘real’ exposure as an experienced consultant guides them through the activity.
What do you mean when you talk about Comprehensive Process FMEA (Fee-Muh)?
1. Comprehensive Process FMEA or Failure Modes Effect Analysis, more specifically the Process FMEA also known as PFMEA. This training package is truly a workshop and is only offered as an on-sight activity.
2. So much of the work or activity of Quality Control is viewed by some as strictly “Burden” or “Overhead”; the comprehensive PFMEA workshop is probably one of those efforts that potentially yields a very good return on investment.
3. In this on-sight workshop we spend the first day in the development of a detailed “Process-Flow-Chart” covering a portion of the clients manufacturing process, this activity identifies, at the task-level, ever job function for a particular process step. On day two, we use that very information to conduct a Process FMEA for the process steps “Flow-Charted” on day one. This produces a detailed analysis of the “RISK” inherent in the work identified. Now the organization has the information needed to develop an effective Process-Control-Plan that best utilizes their resources, time and equipment to control the manufacturing processes in an efficient manner.
4. This core group of trained personnel is then able to expand this work to the entire manufacturing process. This comprehensive application of FMEA fully implemented is a very powerful tool to maximize control, minimize risk, reducing cost and improve customer satisfaction.

How does MBC approach Leadership Development training?
1. What can I say; leadership development is the most important activity any organization can undertake. Everyone talks about and wants continuous improvement for their products or services. So why not seek continuous improvement for the leadership team. At Martin Business Consulting, we are not about making great leaders of the incompetent or the ineffective leader. We are about making good leaders into great leaders and about making great leaders into excellent leaders.
2. We approach this task with a system so incredibly unique in its simplicity it leaves many attendees nearly speechless. We have built our program on the book “The Leadership Secrets of Colin Powell” written by Oren Harari. We have the attendees build their own approach. We teach each of the sixteen attributes identified by the General, and then break the class up into small teams of three to five people we have each team document in their personal journal their team’s interpretation and approach to each attribute.
3. We further enhance the information by having the individual document their personal understanding of each attribute in the same journal.
4. This has the feel of “You Built It You Own It” approach. You may go to our web-site mbcincorp.com/leadership/ for additional information and you can download a 17 min. audio report about our approach to leadership development. Just scroll to the bottom of the leadership page to see how to get this valuable report.
What is your approach to Advanced Product Quality Planning (APQP)?
1. APQP is really about “Project Management”, another way of thinking about this topic is to view APQP as the umbrella under which many activities occur. The major aspects of the APQP process are the use of the AIAG core tools such as; PPAP, FMEA, MSA, and SPC. The important training is in the proper use or implementation of the core tools. Once these core tools are understood and effectively utilized by the organization then APQP becomes a simple process of managing the five phases of the APQP process. Identifying the critical steps of each phase and managing the overall project to assure success.
2. Many consulting and training companies make APQP a two-day training event and fill the time with exercises that are generally unhelpful to the student. It is as if they are fitting one day of training into two days. Unnecessary cost and time, APQP is the project; the core tools are the methods.
3. The five phases of APQP contain 43 items that need to be considered as part of the overall project. Actually, there will never be an APQP project that requires all 43 items from any one organization. At MBC we, encourage comprehensive training in the core tools and training in APQP as an overview to familiarize the necessary resources with the general requirements of the, tracking methods, performance expectations, management involvement and time-line planning. APQP is actually very simple when it is placed in the correct context.

PPAP, MSA & SPC are all important, how do you efficiently train in these areas?
1. These methods mean different things for different organizations. Production Part Approval Process (PPAP) is a customer driven process and compliance to customer requirements is of primary importance. Our one-day training addresses the 18 elements of PPAP and the appropriate content for each item. We also address the correct and efficient method of completing your PPAP requirements. Additional there is discussion about efficiency and planning as part of the PPAP process.
2. Measurement Systems Analysis (MSA) and Statistical Process Control (SPC) are technical in nature and we address them in that context. MSA is not only the training as to proper calculation of GR&R, Gauge Bias, Stability, and Linearity, but we also address the procedural requirements for conducting these studies as well as organizational benefits of MSA.
3. SPC we are capable of addressing at the level your organization needs.

i. The full three-day course is excellent for your engineering staff as well as other resources specifically in the Quality Arena. This class is comprehensive and addresses procedural requirements, calculations and most importantly the interpretation methods and impact. Both variable and attribute charting techniques are part of this training as well as comprehensive Sub-Grouping strategies.
ii. SPC can also be presented as a two-day class with focus on use, interpretation, analysis and capability studies. This is better for Operations Personnel or as a refresher for previously trained technicians and engineers.
iii. SPC as a one day course covers the basics of Variable charting, implementation, use and interpretation for operators, supervisors and operations leaders.

Problem Solving is important to many organizations, how does MBC effectively present this training?
1. MBC presents the Problem Solving or, as some say, Root Cause Analysis training by utilizing an 8D model such as the model created by AIAG.
2. MBC only provides Problem Solving as an on-sight class. This two-day event has the participants work on chronic problems from their own facility. We accomplish this by having the members in “round-robin” format name chronic problems; these problems are listed on a flip chart. With this complete the class is broken up into teams of 3 to 5 members, each team has a leader and they pick a problem from the list for their team to work on during the class.
3. The material is then presented using the 8D format spoken of earlier. As each step of the 8D is presented, (there are eight steps) the team then has time to work on that particular step with the guidance of the instructor. Working through each step of the 8D not only gives a thorough understanding of structure problem solving but progress is usually made on the problem the team is addressing.
4. As part of the training there are many tools presented to assist with each step in an orderly and productive fashion. Tools such as; 3×5 whys, is/is not analysis, fish-bone diagram, pareto analysis, SPC, interrelationship diagraph, Pugh analysis, and many other tools to enhance the root cause investigation and the resolution implementation decision matrix.

What is MBC’s approach to “Automotive Core Tools for Internal Auditors” training classes?
1. Auto Core Tools for Auditors is a required training for certain companies. If you are a supplier for certain Automotive OEMs, you are required to have this training. This training generally applies to companies registered to IATF 16949:2016 and a significant amount of their business is Automotive related. The Core Tools in question are APQP (Advanced Product Quality Planning), PPAP (Production Part Approval Process), FMEA (Failure Mode Effects Analysis), MSA (Measurement Systems Analysis) and SPC (Statistical Process Control) and the course objective is NOT how to exercise or implement these tools. The course requirement expected by the various OEMs is to learn how to AUDIT these tools.
2. Some consulting and training companies approach this as a “how-to-do” course and try to teach application of the tools. At Martin Business Consulting, we teach the attendees, how to audit the APQP, PPAP, FMEA, MSA and SPC applications of their organization. There is strong emphasis on what documents the auditor needs to review and what to look for on those documents. We do spend time with what is a “Correct method of doing FMEA, MSA, SPC PPAP and APQP. This gives the attendees knowledge as to the ‘Correct Approach” the organization should be taking when using these tools.
Does Martin Business Consulting assist clients with Quality Management Systems (QMS) or Environmental Management Systems (EMS) Development?
1. The simple answer is YES. The benefit is our guiding approach to the client’s needs. With both the EMS (Environmental Management System) and the QMS (Quality Management System) we us an “eight-step” approach.
2. There are other consulting companies that also use a ‘step’ approach to assist clients with the registration to either ISO14001 (Environment) or ISO/TS 16949 or ISO 9001 (Quality) Management Systems.
3. One of the differences with MBC is we contract with the client for up to a certain number of days to complete the project. However, we allow the client to guide how the days are used. Once the client understands the steps, the requirements and the path, they are best able to determine how to utilize the days. Of course, we are always available to offer guidance in this process, but the decision is up to the client.

i. With this approach, the client is only paying for the support they actually need and request.

In Addition MBC allows the client to make the determination if they are capable of completing some steps without the assistance of the consultant. As a result, many projects are completed under-budget, with the client only paying for services they decide they need.

What are some of the other services provided by MBC?
1. With the large selection of consultants available to Martin Business Consulting, we are able to provide a variety of services. If you need training in Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing (GD&T), Design of Experiment (DoE), Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), or Statistical Methods for Quality Engineers (SMQE), we have support persons that can not only teach these techniques, but also can get involved in your organization and lead in the use of these powerful tools.
2. MBC can also assist with you safety needs, whether its OSHA training, compliance, accident investigation or other safety needs we can help.
3. Of course we have already talked about Leadership Development, but do not overlook this most important need.