By Jose V. Alcedo, MBA, a published author

In this book, the author, Jose V. Alcedo, explains Lean Six Sigma and Continuous Improvement Philosophy and how they can be applied to churches.

If you have a story, write it. So since everyone has a story, she/he can write a book. Right?

Many years ago, writing a story was a challenge to me for some reason. Lack of trust in myself due to a perceived weakness that created a shy in writing. Lack of practice in writing created fear of failure. So, my writing evolved from weakness.

Having studied Chemical Engineering, I have confidence in my math and chemistry because I have learned these subjects by practice. CPU was my first choice in starting my college for many reasons, foremost is the Christian education they teach to students. So, I took my first two years of engineering courses [at CPU] leading to Chemical Engineering. Then transferred to Mapua Institute of Technology because at that time CPU did not have the complete course in Ch.E.

At work, I wrote standard procedures in manufacturing operations and quality control in addition to my management function and that’s it. Writing articles were not my goal; much more writing a book was beyond my dreams. Having an MBA degree later as an advancement attribute at work helped my creativity and credibility in teaching.

But reading is my beef and teaching is my dessert. So, what motivated me to write?

As a background, during my last decade of formal employment in the field of manufacturing operations, one of my tasks was to teach the concept of Continuous Improvement (CI) to employees and management. With over 40 years of experience, the necessary skill set was there for me to perform this assignment.

Nevertheless, I still had to read reference materials. With these knowledge, I wrote the outline of my training process with descriptions for a slide presentation format. It required many man-hours of my time at work and at home to accomplish this task. One of the challenges that I faced was in extracting materials of knowledge from multiple references books. So, I had to collate the topics of the subject and consolidate them in a simple format into a comprehensive and concise presentation in a layman’s language.

It took us two years to teach and apply this CI concept to the company. This is a rewarding experience that I would like to share.

Then when I retired from formal employment in 2002, I thought of putting my past projects into writing. My first book was in a technical format, entitled “Competitive Edge and Tools for Quality”. This was a smooth flowing write up to be used in training and as a day-to-day guide in applying the concept for quality. It’s a collection of knowledge from several references with over 500 words and one inch thick hard cover. This handy 1/4 inch copy of my first book has only 150 pages including diagrams.

During the first two years of worldwide publication, my publisher reported over 1,000 copies sold on a Print by Demand basis. Therefore, there was no capital outlay for me. My purpose in writing this book was not to monetize but to share as a text book for teaching. I was happy to receive a Certificate of Recognition from my publisher as a “Published Author”.

Then I continued my writing with short articles published in the Internet. Through practice, I developed confidence in writing that triggered another book. Titled “AGSAM – World War II Survivor Memoirs” narrates interesting history that is worth reading.

Over the years, I switched publisher to Amazon.com using their Self-Publishing online platform. Driven by my goal to share knowledge and experience, I continued writing articles in the Internet from which emerged short read books in motivational, inspirational, religious, relationships, family, sports, science, and engineering genre.

As of this writing, one can find 35 book titles in Amazon.com by typing Jose V Alcedo in the search bar. These are self-published books in collaboration with Kindle Direct Publishing/Amazon.com. The majority of these books are high content class. They are available as Kindle eBook and Paperback in the categories of non-fiction (business, family, career, motivational, sports, memoirs, philosophy, reflections, spiritual, and technology).

Recently, I have diversified to writing and self-publishing low content books, e.g. Journals, Coloring books for kids (young or old), Dairies, Any Year Calendar, and White Notebook, which are designed for specific niche. I’m currently in a mass production mode with turn-around rate of 10 books every two weeks. So, in a short time I was able to launch 15 low-content books on Amazon and the counting is progressing every day.

This is my unmeasurable reward – “People read books to learn from others; authors write books to learn themselves.” By my books, I acquired new life perspective – a Paradigm Shift so self-satisfying.