Introduction Of Lean Six Sigma

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Lean Six Sigma is a process developmentplatform that chains two ideas: Lean and Six Sigma. In lean, we are talking about theassembly of methodsto reduce the time required to provide products or services. It searched for all kinds of waste in the functions the organization performs. These wastes areusuallyrecognized as non-value-add tasks, process steps, review cycles would probably take away from the essential tasksthat the organization must accomplish. Afterclassifying and eliminatingthese non-value-add activities, the organization decreases costs and shortens the time needed to deliver products and services to its customers.

On the other hand, that is six sigma, we are talking abouttheassembly of methods for refining the quality of goods and services, significantly contributing to meet or more than customer satisfaction. After several experiments from researcher, LSS wasverified that it is a business management strategy that gave efficient helps in organizations operation. Any improvement of organization would be the only survive way in current competitive markets. Therefore, improvement quality of goods or services has become an important business strategy no matter in any industry.Therefore, quality is a competitive device that can show us substantial advantage to organizations. By improving and monitoring quality, the organization is able to dominate their competitors.

In this studied, we would like to deliberate the growth of Lean Six Sigma and explain its major components, and also howLean Six Sigma is frequentlyapplied in business organizations, and the role of statistics and calculationin the process.

2.1 The Quality Revolution and TQM

A comprehensive view of Six Sigma within the historical context of the industry development and the associated effect on the quality of the process and product was provided by Folaron (2003). During 1970s, many US companies had suffered a huge loss of business. This had motivated the use of statistical methods for quality and business improvement in US and throughout the world. There were various management systems emerged as frameworks to implementquality improvement. Total quality management was one of the strategies that use to implement and manage quality improvement activities within an organization. TQM was began to be used in 1980s and evolved into a broader spectrum of concepts and ideas. For example organizations and work culture, customer focus, supplier quality improvement and other activities that drive organization towards the way of quality improvement. However, TQM achieved only moderate success. This is due to there was noreal effective integration of the quality system with business goals. Other than that,there was insufficienteffort devoted to widespread utilization of the technical tools of variability reduction.TQM did not bring a large success due to the lack of commitment of high level management and inadequate use of statistical methods andinsufficient recognition of variability reduction as a prime objective. Those companiesemphasized more on widespreadtraining other than focused technical education and this led to the insignificant success of TQM.

Six Sigma has been far more effective and successful than TQM was in general. Six Sigma focuses strongly on projects that bring positive impact to businessfinancial performance. When those projects result in real savings, expandedsales opportunities, or documented improvements in customer satisfaction, high level managementwill be more likely to be fully involved, to assign theresources needed to train personnel, and to make Six Sigma positions full-time.In general, the technical training in Six Sigma is more extensive compared to the typicalTQM of the 1980s

2.2 Origin of Six Sigma

Six Sigma was developed by Bill Smith, a Motorola engineer that used to response to the necessity for improving quality and reducing defects in their products. The objective for the Motorola established the Six Sigma is for the corporation and as a focal point for process and product quality improvement and it has been estimated to reduce the defects on semiconductor devices by 94% between 1973 and 1993. As a result, one of the functions of Six Sigma is to improve corporate business performance by improving quality, reducing costs and expanding markets for products and services.

2.3 The Six Sigma Metric

Six Sigma can be used to reduce the variability in key product quality characteristic which is around specified target values to the level at which failure of defects are totally different. An assumption should be made that when the process reached the quality level of Six Sigma, the processmean was still subject to disturbances which would cause it to shift by as much as 1.5 standarddeviations off target. The Six Sigmaprocess would produce up to 3.4 parts per million (ppm) non-conforming to specifications under this condition.As there are some inconsistencies, somehave argued that we can only make predictions about processperformance when the process is stable. For example, the mean and standard deviation are constant overtime. Hence, a prediction of up to 3.4 ppm non-conforming to specifications maynot be very reliable if the mean is drifting due to the shift of the mean by more than the "allowed" 1.5 standarddeviationsHowever,there are no truly stablesystems. Disturbances will occur even in the best scenario and result inthe shifting off-target of the process mean or an increase of the process standard deviation. TheSix Sigma process concept can be a useful way to think about and quantify process performance. However, the3.4-ppm metric is recognized as primarily a distraction. It focuses onreducing the target’s variability and eliminating the waste and defects which are an important element of Six Sigma

2.4 The Evolution Of Six Sigma

There are many three generations of Six Sigma implementation which are categorized in to Generation I Six Sigma, Generation II Six Sigma, and Generation III Six Sigma. Firstly, Generation I Six Sigma is focused on the defect elimination and basic variability reduction which is primarily in manufacturing. Second, Generation II Six Sigma is emphasized on the variability reduction and defect elimination remained. However, there was another strong effort that had tied these efforts to projects and activities that improved business performance through improved product design and cost reduction. Third is Generation III Six Sigma focus on the creating value throughout the organization and for its stakeholders. Generation III Six Sigma can be used to help in increasing stock prices and dividends, job retention or expansion, expanding markets for company products or services, developing new products and etc.

3.1 The Belt System

Green Belts (GBs), Black Belts (BBs) and Master Black Belts (MBBs) are a project-oriented approach that used in Six Sigma deployment. BBs have specialized training for a minimum of 4 weeks but sometimes will extend over a 4 month period and typically combined with concurrent work on a Six Sigma project. The lead teams that are focused on the projects with both quality and business (economic) impact for the organization.

GBs naturally have less training and assist on major project teams and lead teams engaged in smaller with more extremely precise projects. Besides that, MBBs are frequently engaged in training both BBs and other MBBs. Champions develop training materials which are deeply involved in project definition and selection while work closely with business. The job of Champions is to ensure that the right projects are being identified and worked on. There are such that teams are making good progress, and that the resources required for successful project completion are in place. MBBs generally recognized that it is more effective to have BB and MBB positions are full-time. Besides, it also works closely with other members of the business leadership team. The BBs and MBBs are generalized training and education on statistical methods and other quality and process improvement tools that provide them to function as team leaders, facilitators and technical problem solves.

3.2 Six Sigma Projects

Six Sigma projects are normally 4-6 months in period and try to find out their potential impact on the business. DMAIC approaches (define, measure, analyze, improve and control) are an extremely effective framework to problem-solving approach that using by Six Sigma. The DMAIC framework usually utilizes control charts, designed experiments, process capability analysis, measurement systems capability studies and other basic statistical tools.

3.3 Deployment of Six Sigma

The top-down strategy is basically the breaking down of a system to gain close into its compositional sub-systems. Top down strategy always lead to greater immediate success in long-run.Partial deployment strategy has use by some organization to start in one or more specific divisions and operating units. Besides that, theyare thinning out the deployment to other units as successes are realized. Partial deployment usually involves training one to five Black Belts and using their substantial outcome to make the case for full deployment. Partial deploymentsand a bottom-up approach run the risk of being under-supported by top management. Bottom-up processing is a type of information processing based on incoming data from the surroundings to structurea awareness.There are three keys to success such as top management commitment and involvement, use of top talent and supporting infrastructure.

Top management promise and association goes beyond just giving speeches at beginningevents. The contribution considerable personal energy of executives is a must to ensure success. Six Sigma mustbe on the personal score card of every manager. When the members of the organization notice that the people with best performance are becoming BBs and Champions,they will take the Six Sigma programme more sincerely and want to be involved when only torelate with the most talented people in the organization and the future business leaders.Supporting infrastructure basically define to financial systems integration with project activity to ensure thebenefits of completed projects can be precisely assessed.