Category Archives: Lean Six Sigma

Six Sigma posts

Six Sigma Success and Honesty

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Not all business problems lend themselves to the Six Sigma process improvement methodologies, especially those that have short time lines. There are many problems that business leadership understand and should just fix. A Six Sigma improvement project typically requires one to six months for a team to complete, depending upon the complexity and scope of the problem. This is longer than acceptable for some problems. In addition, many of the tools used in Six Sigma do not apply well to problems that are not process based. Examples of these would be emergencies and relationship issues. Process improvement tools apply better to up-front planning for these situations, than to the situations themselves.

Two other important considerations are the impact of variation and the truth. Not all variation is bad. Without variation, there would be no improvement. Six Sigma projects use variation to find both problems and solutions. This is because the awareness of a better way to do something manifests itself as variation. Consider, for example, that there are two processes producing an identical output. The operator of one process makes a change and introduces variation between the two processes. This new process produces fewer defects than the former process. Thus, by way of introducing variation, the operator discovers a better way to produce the output. Conversely, by eliminating all variation, we eliminate all experimentation, and as a result, we eliminate process improvement. The key is to plan and control variation. By planning and experimenting, a process owner can discover new and better ways to produce the product or service.

The truth is the basis of any effort to improve processes and eliminate defects. Sacred cows, sub-optimization, and parochialism are enemies of the truth and place limits upon how much improvement is achievable. To optimize improvement, we must embrace the truth, even if it hurts. The truth will literally set us free.

Cultural Aspects of Six Sigma Process Improvement

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Cultural Aspects of Six Sigma Process Improvement

Whatever the process improvement methodology used, when properly applied, it produces a change in the business’s culture. Outlined below are some of the behavioral changes necessary to sustain a customer focused process improvement effort.

View the business as an organization of processes:
• If you view the business as an organization of processes, then managing the business becomes managing processes.
• Processes are interrelated and, as a result, they interact with each other. Changing one affects the others.
• If the appropriate processes are in place, managing those processes is managing people. Not the other way around.

Data driven business decisions:
• Business acumen without data is ineffective.
• Data without business acumen is ineffective.
• Measuring the right things.
• If you are not measuring it, you are not managing it.
• If you are not managing it, you are at the mercy of chance.

Voice of the Customer:
• Customer focused: Recognize that business success depends on customer satisfaction.
• There is a line of site from the customer to each business process.
• Customers see our outputs differently than we do.
• What we value should be in alignment with what our customer’s value.

Continuous Improvement:
• If a business is not continuously trying to improve, other businesses are either closing the gap or passing them.
• Using data to see where improvements are needed and taking action to make the appropriate changes.
• Avoiding change for change sake. Change is good when data indicates a need for it.
• Changes are in alignment with corporate values.
• Change requires empowerment. Both require trust.
• Improvement strategy is focused upon changing the processes. Changing people is a leadership issue.

Employee Culture:
• People change as a result of leadership.
• Employees are the most valuable asset in the business.
• Employee empowerment is the engine that drives process improvement.
• Employees must “buy-in” to the cultural vision.
• Employees need to see leadership “buy in” to the cultural vision.

What is a Successful Six Sigma Process improvement Initiative

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A successful Six Sigma process improvement initiative is not a program or a set of tools. It is a cultural shift. In other words, Six Sigma changes the way a business manages itself. This is a shift away from decisions based solely upon “tribal knowledge” (gut feeling, we have always done it this way, etc.), to decisions based on data and business acumen. When the data is customer focused, improvement projects align corporate strategies with customer expectations in a way that produces a positive financial impact. It is important to understand that data, “tribal knowledge”, and business acumen are all required for high quality decision making.

Statistics and Lean Six Sigma Process Improvement

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Process improvement strategies use two applications of statistics. These are descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics describe the basic characteristics of a data set. It uses the data’s mean, median, mode, and standard deviation to create a picture of the behavior of the data.

Inferential statistics uses descriptive statistics to infer qualities on a population, based on a sample from that population. This involves making predictions. Examples of this are voter exit poling, sporting odds, and predicting customer behavior.

Statistics are an important part of process improvement. Even so, statistical calculations do not solve problems. Business acumen and non-statistical tools are partners with statistical calculations in establishing root causes and in developing solutions. As important as some sources tend to make statistical tools, improvement projects rarely fail because of math problems. Instead, they fail due to a lack of honesty, management support, or a lack of business acumen. The best screwdriver in the world will still make a poor pry bar.