Quality Function Deployment and Lean Six Sigma Applications in Public Health

Grace L. Duffy, MBA, CLSSMBB, provides services in organizational and process improvement, leadership, quality, customer service, and teamwork. She designs and implements effective systems for business and management success. Her clients include government, healthcare, public health, education, manufacturing, services, and not-for-profi t organizations. She is coauthor of The Quality Improvement Handbook, The Executive Guide to Improvement and Change, Executive Focus: Your Life and Career, and The Public Health Quality Improvement Handbook. Grace holds a master's degree in business administration from Georgia State University and a bachelor's degree in archaeology and anthropology from Brigham Young University. She is an ASQ certified manager of quality/organizational excellence, certified quality improvement associate, and certified quality auditor. Grace is a certified Lean-Six Sigma Master Black Belt and manager of process improvement. She is an ASQ fellow and past vice president of ASQ. During her 20 years with IBM, Grace held a series of positions in technical design, services, management, and process improvement. She helped design and deliver IBM's executive quality training in the late 1980s. Grace retired from IBM in 1993 as head of corporate technical education. Grace served with Trident Technical College in Charleston, South Carolina, for 10 years as department head for business, curriculum owner, and instructor for Trident's Quality and Corporate Management programs and as a dean for management and performance consulting to private industry. Grace is a member of ASTD, ISPI, and ASQ. Grace can be reached at grace683@embarqmail.com.