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Calculating Baseline data

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Viewing 7 posts - 1 through 7 (of 7 total)
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  • August 9, 2010 at 5:15 pm #53545

    Martinez
    ★ 10 Years ★
    Participant

    I’m trying to determine the baseline of my key measure but my data is too slow and I have only 7 data points (My data is monthly). What is the best way recommended on this scenario to determine the baseline or current performance of my process? Should I follow the same process that it’s used when you have 30 or more data points?

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    August 13, 2010 at 9:34 am #190616

    chauhan
    ★ 10 Years ★
    Participant

    please do more elaborate your question

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    August 13, 2010 at 8:26 pm #190620

    Martinez
    ★ 10 Years ★
    Participant

    What I mean is that I’m just starting a project on one area. The key measure that I was assigned to improve has barely 8 points that I can use to determine the baseline of the process. My question is what is recommended to do when you have this type of scenario? My data is really slow so I get one data point every month? So what can I do to reduce my risk when I calculate my baseline data?

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    August 14, 2010 at 6:53 pm #190622

    Eric Maass
    ★ 10 Years ★
    Participant

    Some ideas:

    1) Can you switch your frequency from monthly to weekly? Almost magically,
    that could change your number of values from 7 to more than 25.

    2) If you must stay monthly, can you go back further in time – so, about 2 years?

    3) If you must stay monthly and must stay with 7 values, you can come up with a baseline number – realizing that it involves considerable uncertainty. With 7 data points, you won’t have much clarity as to the shape of the distribution (normal, lognormal, ….), but you can come up with confidence intervals for the mean and standard deviation. If you use Minitab or SigmaXL or such, just use the Graphical Summary option and it will provide those confidence intervals that you can use as your baseline.

    I hope you find this helpful.

    Best regards,
    Eric Maass, PhD
    MBB

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    August 17, 2010 at 5:36 pm #190628

    Martinez
    ★ 10 Years ★
    Participant

    Thank You,

    My only option will be to work on the seven points and confidence intervals as you suggested.

    Thanks again.

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    August 17, 2010 at 7:20 pm #190630

    MBBinWI
    ★ 10 Years ★
    Participant

    edmarti wrote:

    Thank You,

    My only option will be to work on the seven points and confidence intervals as you suggested.

    Thanks again.

    Ed: What type of data are you looking to use as your primary Y metric?

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    August 21, 2010 at 4:30 am #190658

    broderick
    ★ 10 Years ★
    Participant

    There is almost always a way to find meaningful data in sufficient quantities to be statistically significant. What are you trying to measure?

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