By Kim Niles
Exponential Requirements / Exponential Gain
Exponential increases of context needed and gains expected mathematically correspond with increased sigma levels for the following reasons:
- In accordance with the Pareto principle (80/20 rule), controlling confounding effects most always becomes increasingly more important as our process sigma improves. First order process problems usually are main effects and require no more than the most basic data to solve while higher order / confounded problems often require every bit of information available in order to weed out the confounding factors.
- Improving context to reduce the number of communication based mistakes also enables us to learn more about our processes. Context aids collective understanding, which in turn aids further individual understanding, and so on, continuously building.
- Increased process complexity and process technology to improve sigma levels also require increased and or improved context.
- Many studies indicate that average American employee turnover rates are increasing. This means that either training efforts need to increase or the longevity of documentation and communication (via context) needs to increase.
- Six Sigma guru Mikel J. Harry outlined the exponential path toward Six Sigma in terms of parts per million (PPM) relative to statistical confidence.
Bogged Down In Context Is Not Good Either
While it's obvious that increased and or improved long-term context will assist us on our paths toward Six Sigma, one can envision situations where too much use of context could bog us down in paperwork. Fortunately, with today's technology we can use modern search technology (i.e. keyword-in-context, context-sensitive help, etc.) and hypertext links to not only negate this possibility but improve our use of context even more. For example, instead of taking an hour to criticize the next context poor document you run across, just send the author the link to this article and you're done.
Conclusion
One often-overlooked crucial element to any successful path toward Six Sigma is the need for increasingly descriptive and available context surrounding all CTQ related documentation at a minimum. This need grows exponentially as we improve but the gains also increase exponentially.
By increasing the quality, quantity, and accessibility of pertinent context used in our documentation, we will not only improve individually but collectively which is a requirement for enabling Six Sigma Quality levels to be reached.
References
The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations. Columbia University Press. 1995.
Deming, Edwards, W. 'Out of the Crisis'. MIT Press. 1986
Harry, Mikel J. 'The Nature of Six Sigma Quality.' Motorola Publishing. AZ. Pg.2.
Pyzdek, Thomas. 'The Six Sigma Handbook: A Complete Guide For Greenbelts, Blackbelts, & Managers at all Levels.' McGraw-Hill Quality Publishing. New York. 2000.
Shewhart, W.A. 'Economic Control of Quality of Manufactured Product'. Van Nostrand Co. Inc. New York. 1931. Pp.8-24.
Various. 'ASQ News: Honors, Awards Presented at AQC'. QUALITY PROGRESS. July 2001. pg. 16.
Woodall, William H. 'Controversies and Contradictions in Statistical Process Control'. Journal of Quality Technology. Vol.32, No.4. October, 2000. pg.342.
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