The Quality Revolution And Tqm

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

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.

4.1 Project Selection

Project which is an integral component of six sigma can be known as a key element of quality and process improvement. A project must be clearly identified and must also be well aligned with corporate business objectives. At the corporate level which is the top management are more focus on the growth of the corporation and whether it is able to achieve as the business leader in the future. While at the operation level, managers are more emphasize on the work flow of the corporation in order to meet customer needs and to be more efficiency in every aspect. By linking the projects with business unit goal helps to ensure that the best project are been selected. Projects that companies usually undertake are designed to demonstrate the potential success of an overall improvement effort. These projects focus on the areas of the business that are full of opportunities and are easy to success but are not suitable for long term basis. Another widely used approach is creating project based on the strategic business objectives. Projects that focus on the key business metrics and strategic objectives are likely to have significant value to the company but there is also disadvantage which the project may be very large but only focusing on some narrow aspect of the business. Project selection is probably the most important part of any business improvement process. Project that a company had planned should be given a reasonable time to accomplish.

4.2 The Define Step

The purpose of the Define step of DMAIC is to identify the project opportunity and to verify that it represent legitimate breakthrough potential. One of the main items that must be achieved in the Define step is a project charter. A project charter is a document that contains a description of the project and its scope, information of the project such as the start and the anticipated completion dates, potential benefits to the customer, the potential financialbenefits to the organization, milestones that should be accomplished during the project, the team members and their roles and the initial description of both primary and secondary metrics that will be used to measure success and how those metrics align with business unit. Basically, a project charter must be complete in 2 to 4 working days and must try to avoid to widen the scope of the project. Customer’s Critical-to-quality characteristics (CTQs) which will impact by the project must also be identify. One of the useful step to define is by using graphical aids which is process map and flow chart value stream maps and SIPOC diagrams. Lastly, teams must prepare for a review whether it has achieved the particular aspect of the company.

4.3 The Measure Step

To develop a list of all of the key process input variables (KPIV) and the key process output variables (KPOV), it involved of collecting data on measures of quality, cost, and throughput/cycle time. The time spent to perform various work activities and the time that work spends waiting for additional processing may be the important factors. The data collected during the measure step may be displayed in various ways such as: histograms, stem-and-leaf diagrams, run charts, scatter diagrams, and Pareto charts. In transactional and service businesses, it may be necessary to develop appropriate measurements and a measurement system for recording the information that are specific to the organization. Manufacturing and services have a major difference. Measurement systems and data on system performance often already exist in manufacturing. The data that are collected are used as the basis for determining the current state or baseline performance of the process. Moreover, the capability of the measurement system should beevaluated to make sure the team is not trying to solve an imaginary problem in which the processperformance is fine, but the measurement system is flawed.The measurement system analysis may be done using a formal gauge capability study. Last but not least, in the end of the Measure step the team should update the project charter, re-examine the project goals and scope, and re-evaluate team makeup. The team may consider to include members of downstream or upstream business units if the measure activities indicate that these individuals will be valuable in subsequent DMAIC steps.

4.4 The Analyze Step

The objective of Analyze step is to determine the potential causes of the defects, quality problems, customer issues, cycle time and throughput problems, or waste and inefficiency that motivated the project. It is important to separate the sources of variability into common causes and assignable causes. Common cause of variability might be inadequate training of personnel processing insurance claims, while an assignable cause might be a tool failure on a machine. There are some statistical tools that useful in Analyze step such as: graphical data displays, control charts, hypothesis testing and confidence interval estimation, regression analysis, designed experiments, and failure modes and effects analysis. Besides that, Discrete-event computer simulation is anothertool that useful in the Analyze step. It is useful in service and transactional businesses. The Analyze tools are used with historical data or data that was collected in the Measure step. The purpose of the Analyze step is to explore and understand tentative relationships between and among process variables and to develop insight about potential process improvements.

4.5 The Improve Step

To analyze the steps, an organization or a team must learn to determine what data to look for and how to display these data. This is a basic step in conducting the analysis steps. After performing the steps above, this team should be able to identify potential sources of variability and to determine how to interpret the data that has been obtained. In step increase, a team must have creative thinking about specific changes of the data that has been processed before. If a team performed these steps well, we could see the results of process performance. In the improve step, a team can use several tools to facilitate the process of performance. To redesign the process in improving workflow and reducing congestion using flow charts or value stream maps. Flow charts can also be used to evaluate the performance results were conducted by the team. By using the flow chart can be known specific statistical data and can also determine the optimal combination of factor settings.

If these basic steps done well, you will see a result that shaped the development of solutions and we can test the solution as the next stage. The test solution is a step that leads to evaluation of the solution, documentation of solution and confirming that the solution achieves project goals. This activity should be done repeatedly to get good results.

4.6 The Control Step

Control step aims to ensure that the benefits are aid in the process, and if there may be improvements will be implemented in other similar processes in the business. The purpose of the control measures is to complete all remaining work on the project and to deliver process improvements to the owner of the process along with the control plan and other procedures necessary to ensure that the benefits of the project will be instituted.

This step is also important to ensure that the results of the original is still in place and remains stable so that the positive financial impact will be maintained and can benefit the company. The ability to respond quickly and unexpected failure is a major factor in this stage. if a team have the ability to respond quickly and to identify failures of the members and instantly find a solution, it would be very good impact on the results of a project. This step should also be accompanied by data from before and after the process. The financial benefits of the project should be measured. Process control plan should be no system to monitor the solutions that have been implemented, including methods and metrics for periodic audits. Statistical control chart is an important tool used in control measures. The test solution must be accompanied by a monitoring system to control the testing process.

5.0 Other Element Of Six Sigma

In recent years, DFSS and lean system has become the tool to identified with six sigma. There is many organizations regularly use one or both these approaches as an integral part of their Six Sigma implementation.

5.1 Design for Six Sigma

There is many manufacturing use DFSS as a approach for taking the variability reduction and process improvement philosophy of six sigma upstream their production design, where there is new product or services process are design and develop. Besides that DFSS also a structured and disciplined methodology for the efficient commercialization of technology that show result in new product, services, or process. DFSS spans the entire development process from the identification of customer needs to the final launch or implement of the new product or service. Through VOC activities design to obtain customer input which is to determine what customer want, to set priorities based on actual customer wants, and to determine if the business can full fill customer need and wantat a competitive price that will enable it to make profit. By obtained customer interviews, which a direct interaction with and observation of the customer, through focus group, surveys, and by analysis of customer satisfaction data to form a VOC data. The purpose is to develop a set of critical to quality requirements for the product or services.

As traditional , DMAIC is used to achieve operation excellent, while DFSS is focus on improving business result by increasing the sale revenue generated from new products and service and opportunity to finding new application for existing ones. There is many case about the important gain from DFSS is reduction of development lead time; that is the cycle time to design or develop new technology and get the resulting new product t market. DFSS focus on increasing value in the organization. There are many statistical tool are use in operation six sigma are also use in DFSS. The experimental with prototypes and computer models is an area where statisticians can make useful contributions to DFSS.

There is a group of organization practitioners use a variation of DMAIC, DMADV(Define, Measure, Analyze, Design, and Verify), for DFSS. DFSS have make specific the recognition to every decision which is business decision, and that the cost, manufacturability, and performance of the product are determined during design. That is impossible for the manufacturing to make it better when product is design. By focusing in operation six sigma is not enough to improve or achieve any goal in manufacturing, and there is required using DFSS to focus customer requirements while simultaneously keeping process capability in mind. Specifically matching the capability of the production system and the requirements at each stage or level of the design process is essential. When mismatches between process capabilities and designrequirements are discovered, either design changes or different production alternatives are

considered to resolve the conflicts.

5.2 Lean Manufacturing

Lean manufacturing systems are designed to eliminate waste (see Womack & Jones, 1996.)By waste, we mean unnecessarily long cycle times, or waiting times between value-added workactivities. Waste can also include rework, scrap, and excess inventory.Rework and scrap areoften the result of excess variability, so there is an obvious connection between Six Sigma and lean. George (2002) provided a good introduction to how lean and Six Sigma work together. Cycle efficiency, process cycle time, work-in-process, and throughput rate, all is the important metrics in lean.Lean also makes use of many tools of industrial engineering and operationsresearch. One of the most important of these is discrete-event simulation.We also find Six Sigma combined with lean principles and DFSS to be entirely consistentwith Deming’s system of profound knowledge. Six Sigma clearly adopts a systems perspective as it reaches into all aspects of a business. Knowledge about variation, what causes it, andhow to reduce it by identifying cause and effect relationships is at the heart of almost all Six Sigma thinking.

6.1 Combining Six Sigma with Other Initiatives

Six Sigma has becoming a generally and common used implementation strategy for business quality improvement. In future prediction, Six Sigma can become the management key of success in terms of fixing crucial operational problem. There are several types of tools that simultaneously help management to achieve high level of process performance and significant business improvement in an ideal implementation. The first tool will be Six Sigma obviously as the most common tool used for problem solving. Besides, there are also other tool like DMAIC, DFSS, and lean tools that help to ensure an effective and efficient flow of operation.

The combination of Six Sigma with other tools like DFSS and Lean actually resulted in a better outcome than its predecessors which we can see the best example from the TQM. The project-by-project approach is a key factor, and the focuson obtaining improvement in bottom-line business results has been instrumental in obtainingmanagement commitment to Six Sigma. Besides, manipulating a proper deployment of statistical methods into the right position in the organization is also considered as a key success of management. DMAIC problem-solving framework plays an important role in manage the operations. It will be combined with Lean principle as well as DFSS to perform an end to end fully integrated approach. This approach has unique characteristics as below.

(i) Broad based,

(ii) Reaches all parts of the organization,

(iii) Achieves management involvement/commitment,

(iv) High business impact,

(v) Does not necessarily focus on just the "visible numbers", and

(vi) A "systemic" approach, consistent with Deming’s philosophy.

6.2 Effect on Statisticians

Six Sigma can be used to practice statisticians in terms of what kinds of way should be used to train them in a correct and well manner. Statistician play a role as a collaborators on projects, MBB trainers and they opposed to more passive consulting. Most of the statisticians are methodologist; however, most of them solve and judge a problem in a mathematical view. They opposed to more pragmatic approaches taught in many engineering disciplines. The combinations and collaboration of tools and methods apply to a system in a same time is relatively important for the statisticians to solve problems.Most engineering departments in US universities require a design course taken in the senior year that requires students to apply the principles and techniques that they have learned in several years of coursework to solve a comprehensive design problem. DMAIC process is taught and deployed to facilitate preparing statisticians for professional practice in business and industry.

6.3 Other Trends

We expect Six Sigma to become somewhat less outwardly visible, while remaining an important initiative within companies. Some companies, such as General Electric, gave heavy emphasis to Six Sigma some years ago. While they talk less about Six Sigma now, it has been retained as an important part of their operations. We agree with Hoerl (2004), who expects further globalization of Six Sigma, more standardization of the DFSS process, and greater integration of the Six Sigma ideas and methods into the normal operations of companies. It is expected that healthcare applications will grow in importance. It has been documented that improvements in healthcare have the potential to saveprivacy issues, and, at least in the United States, a management structure where many of the keyplayers act as independent contractors.For continued success of Six Sigma, it is necessary to incorporate a broader array of statistical methods, particularly those that are more appropriate for the increasing amount of data available in applications. Nair et al. (2000), for example, pointed out the need for methods that allow the effective analysis of functional data and spatiotemporal data. The analysis of functional data in process monitoring was recently reviewed by Woodall et al. (2004). There are an increasing number of applications where somewhat more sophisticated statistical methods, such as these, are required in Six Sigma applications.thousands of lives and billions of dollars. Some of the statistical tools used in Six Sigma needsome modification before being applicable in healthcare. As reviewed by Woodall (2006), for example, control charts often have to be risk-adjusted to account for the variation in the health of patients. Improving healthcare may be more challenging than obtaining improvements in industry or financial services for a number of reasons, including the lack of electronic records.

7.0 Conclusion

In a nut shell, Lean Six Sigma was established out necessity as a very demanding and disciplined approach for companies to improve goods and services based on their customer’s expectation and satisfaction. Besides, Lean Six Sigma can improve profits and cut costs, but more importantly, it can keep customers loyal as well as improve a company’s competitive advantage. Lean Six Sigma uses a variety of tools and techniques to achieve superior process performance, such as customer surveying, data based decision making, lean process flow, risk assessment, implementation management and change management.

Lean Six Sigma is a framework to improve performance but not the solution for everything. Besides, it is a better way to work and applicable to every functions and business. It is about business performance but not just about statisticsalthough the use of statistical methods is a key component of this metric-drivenapproach. Big company such as Motorola, Toshiba, Kodak, Nokia, Honda, and Sony are deploying lean six sigma in current era. The process design and improvement principles of Six Sigma are been used to achieve a fantastic performance in improving quality and productivity in applicationsaround the world.