How Can Six Sigma Contribute to Sustainability?

Hello Anand,

That is true. One of our first sustainability was a campaign called “Green vs. Green-Washing”. So far this line of thinking has produced new technologies in:

- Waste to energy
- Waste to fuel
- Vehicle design (we now have an electric 225mph Indy car – that was a cool project)
- Battery technology
- Solar technology
- Smart grid
- Recycling systems (solid, liquid and gray-sand)
- DNA testing
- Building systems and processes
- Building materials
- Organizational sustainability

Basically, the list goes on forever. The CPI framework is well suited for any type of problem solving. The key is (1) getting the folks in the room to work together, (2) focusing on a common problem statement and (3) anchoring the results somewhere for reuse. Most of the projects I see and case studies read indicate common failures in the control phase, the projects become victim to the “Mine” syndrome and/or the projects fall victim to organizational ADD.

Thanks, Anand. Much of the success experienced by our nonprofit community of practice (CoP) was due to the continuous focus on safe collaboration. Two of the harder elements to keep contained are the aforementioned “Mine syndrome” and “Organizational ADD”.

Mine Syndrome – Many consultant-led research teams in the past produced proprietary models that are far too complex and restrictive to use in mass. Also, if a consultant did not like what you were doing with their model, they would pack up and leave (the “Mine” part). Due to restrictive boundaries and the high cost of entry, many of these models (and their deployments) often failed to become institutionalized in the long run. Open models (like Linux, Drupal, Moodle and etc.) have become powerful CoPs due to the ability find and fix shortcomings collaboratively. iSixSigma is another great example of an open community for which to share information.

Organizational ADD – Organizational psychologists have found that the many leaders today exhibit the same learning patterns as observed in children with Attention Deficit and/or Hyperactivity Disorder (ADD/ADHD). This “synthetic ADD” is believed to be a symptom of many factors, including: the increased workloads and ever increasing requirements of “the speed for business”. This behavior often becomes adopted throughout the organization leading to planning and/or an organizational memory which only supports the current year’s and/or leader’s thinking. Kathy Kolbe (http://www.linkedin.com/pub/kathy-kolbe/11/97b/b3 ) is one of the many folks conducting research along these lines.

I also agree with your statement on the use of LSS in strategy development for sustainability. There is an abundance of great data, research and case studies resulting from the failures and successes for past 20+ years of LSS deployment. It would be wise to form a community of practice to better understand the epistemology of sustainability before we all launching off to repeat the mistakes of others.

Thanks a ton, Rob. Your information was of extreme value and a delight to read. I liked both of the terms you used.

Though I am not closely working on sustainability, I am personally very keen in making contribution in this area and using my knowledge and skills of six sigma. We can create frameworks, case studies, applications or even create Green Six Sigma training modules and help our wider community.

I think we can certainly start a CoP and share our knowledge and experience.

Would appeal other members also to share their thoughts.

let’s pledge for our future generations.

regards …… anand

Hello all – I think a sterling example of how Six Sigma can contribute to sustainability is the Drive to Zero initiative done by DuPont’s Building Innovations division. Here’s this:
http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2012/04/12/how-dupont-getting-zero-waste

• This reply was modified 355 days ago by  Katie Barry.