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The pattern is so predictable as to be universal. A leadership team announces to a company that they are going to launch Lean Six Sigma. The next few months are a blur of activity with executives and their direct reports scrambling to conduct an assessment, plan the deployment and determine how to recruit and allocate […]

“Let the process flow.” “Let the customer pull.” This is what is written in manufacturing books about making processes Lean. But it is not always that simple. Consider this banking example. A customer arrives at a bank branch: He enters, is welcomed by an employee and offered a cup of coffee. He explains his interest […]

Rath & Strong Announces New Revised Edition of Best-Selling Rath & Strong’s Six Sigma Pocket Guide

The project charter is the first step and one of the most important parts of any Six Sigma project. The document provides an overview of the project and serves as an agreement between management and the Six Sigma team regarding the expected project outcome. The charter is used to set the project direction and defines […]

Lean Six Sigma is widely used in production, but it can just as easily be applied to maintenance. Here’s how to implement a measurement system using data to identify root causes, prioritize workloads and drive improvements in a maintenance operation.

GE Healthcare Group Schedules Hospital ED Seminars

Additional Consulting Talent Added by GE Healthcare

Hertzler Systems introduces new software training videos to demonstrate powerful features for adding real-time data acquisition to MINITAB®

Companies new to Six Sigma need an agreed-upon, easily communicated picture of current processes (“as is” state). Building a SIPOC diagram is a good starting point.

Lean government. The very idea sounds implausible. Even to the seasoned Lean practitioner, the idea of a Lean government sounds far fetched. Governments are traditionally seen as the epitome of bureaucracy, and the guardians of red tape, incomprehensible forms and endless queues. But there are workable Lean strategies for governments seeking to reduce waste and […]

Finding Green Belt and Black Belt candidates with the right personal and professional traits is a proven method for building a successful Six Sigma program. Use a Pugh matrix to help in the critical candidate selection process.

After embarking on a Six Sigma journey, many organizations soon realize that one of the most significant benefits is also one of the most difficult to quantify. It cannot be measured in terms of “Z” scores or analyzed using a box plot. This benefit is the “people value” (no relation to p-value). It is the […]

“As technology moves more and more into the very fabric of our existence, the real-time existence of consumers and businesses and the economy, the reliability of systems will need to reach the level of dial-tone. Consequently, the techniques used to develop systems, the quality of these systems, and the demands on the performance of these […]

Help desk organizations inevitably have waste in their processes that leads to customer complaints. Overcome those obstacles through value stream analysis – an efficient, effective process to review and improve help desk functions.

Whether it is Lean, DMAIC or DFSS, Six Sigma boils down to improving business processes. And irrespective of the methodology employed or the scientific rigor behind it, every process improvement initiative – if it is to be successful – has to be approved, understood and implemented by people. Given the body of work published about human inertia […]

A distinguished panel of healthcare executives recently shared their thoughts on the importance of leaders taking an active and visible role in their organization’s quality initiatives. They also agreed on the need for organizations to develop the right management systems and structures to adequately support their quality efforts, measure outcomes and encourage accountability. Speaking on […]

Several years ago, a company created a wristwatch pager – quite an advancement for its time – combining a wristwatch and pager in one. The developer instituted production quality at near Six Sigma level. Yet, the product never sold. While failure can occur for a number of reasons – quality, cost or being late to market […]

GOAL/QPC, Publisher of the World-Renowned Memoery Jogger Pocket Guides, Announces Merger with Member-Based Leading Quality Improvement Firm, CQM

Lean Six Sigma for Supply Chain Management

MVS Collaborates with Minitab to Bring the Voice of the Market to Strategic Six Sigma

Rath & Strong Announces the Eagerly Awaited Rath & Strong’s Lean Pocket Guide

US Fuels is responsible for the wholesale fuels operations in the United States for its parent company, BP, one of the world’s largest energy companies. US Fuels supplies branded gasoline to company-owned gas stations and branded fuel jobbers, and diesel fuel to commercial accounts such as railroads, trucking companies, transit authorities and truck stops. The […]

Since the early 1970s software and information technology (IT) has been significantly changing the way products, processes and services are designed, delivered and maintained. At an exponentially increasing rate, software and IT have become the driving force in the way people work, recreate and educate. Most experts estimate this global “industry” at about US $1 […]

When a Houston hospital found it had a 12 percent incidence of pressure ulcers – exceeding the 7 percent national average – it put a team in place and launched a project to reduce the incidence of pressure ulcers by half within a nine-month period. By Senaida (Cindy) Garza, Veronica Okere, Jackson Igbinoba, Kristi Novosad […]

Manugistics Group and StatPoint End Licensing Partnership for STATGRAPHICS Centurion XV®

How can some organizations experience so much success in implementing a Six Sigma continuous improvement program while others fail to fully achieve the desired results? The answer lies in their approach to the program.

A large-scale performance improvement initiative based on Six Sigma and change management improves the quality of patient care, raising satisfaction and increasing efficiency across the continuum of care.

The Lean event started with videotaping a press wash-up process to establish a baseline. After studying the tape, the team tried out new processes to reduce the wash-up time. After some refinements, time was cut 55% and savings was $150,000 a year.

How can a company find time for improvement if its managers are spending all their time fighting fires and managing the day-to-day responsibilities? How is it possible to improve a process when the company barely has the resources to maintain it? This all too common obstacle faces many organizations. One approach that leverages these resources […]

Six Sigma training, or any training for that matter, is of no value if it does not result in performance improvement that is quantifiable. And any learning by anyone requires support — the availability of interpersonal resources.

CEOs want to know the return on investment of Lean Six Sigma projects, and CFOs want to compare the real financial results to “PowerPoint dollars.” A rigorous approach to calculating an improvement project’s impact is important to every organization.

Sigma Calculator Dictionary Problem Solving Wizard Search

Who’s Who Prize Drawing

The process improvement journey at Jordan Hospital took a large step forward last year when the organization was introduced to Lean Six Sigma concepts as part of a departmental optimization effort for its internal pharmacy.

Information Technology and Six Sigma – Exclusive iSixSigma Magazine Research

Bankers and Marines Train Together

The theory of constraints (TOC) is relatively easy to understand. It is a philosophy of management based on the idea that to improve a system or process one must find and address the one aspect of the system that most limits the entire process from being optimum. But getting from the theory to application is not […]

Since the start of the information technology age, software quality has been an ambiguous term, meaning different things to different people. It has been defined internally from the viewpoint of software developers; and it has been defined externally from the viewpoint of end users of the software. But either way, early in the history of […]

Many consultants remember the hypothesis testing roadmap, which was a great template for deciding what type of test to perform. However, think about the type of data one gets. What if there is only summarized data? How can that data be used to make conclusions? Having the raw data is the best case scenario, but […]

Robert Pirsig’s 1974 book about the metaphysics of quality entitled Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance relates a father’s journey with his son, during which are delivered ideas of quality, philosophy and formal dialogue against the backdrop of a good old American road trip, all from the seat of a motorcycle. His allegory for […]

Breakthrough Management Group Announces Its Newest Problem Solving Skills Course: Innovation Tools for Black Belts

The Six Sigma DMAIC roadmap can provide a disciplined process for creating and executing successful business strategies.

One of the key success factors of Six Sigma is the ability to set up and run an interdisciplinary, multi-skilled and management-supported process improvement team. A Six Sigma project team – like any small team of workers asked to effect change in their organization – is expected to help promote a culture of innovation and spontaneity […]

Little more than five years after launching an ambitious, system-wide Six Sigma improvement initiative, Virtua Health in New Jersey, USA, is now considered a high-performing healthcare organization and a model for others to follow.

Most companies do a good job of selecting Black Belts candidates, however, many overlook psychological aspects of candidates. This factor is important because deployment Black Belts, in particular, have an unusual amount of stress put on them.

While Micropump, which manufactures small-volume, precision-flow, sealed pumps, has been in business for 46 years and has been owned by IDEX Corporation for 11 years, it is in the last several years that innovations in its product line have accelerated rapidly. The reason is because now there is more cash to finance research and development […]

When Berkshire Medical Center found its emergency services stretched thin and the community began feeling the impact, the hospital decided to launch a Lean Six Sigma initiative and implement a series of innovative solutions.

Online Six Sigma Training – Exclusive iSixSigma Magazine Research

Thinking of starting a Six Sigma initiative this year or next year? For any adventure, the first few steps can set the mood for the rest of the journey. The same is true for a Six Sigma deployment, in which thoughtful planning can make the difference between respectable returns or a quality quagmire. This exclusive […]

Tools and methodology will only get a person so far. Experience gained from the practical implementation of Six Sigma solutions is priceless. A list of tips, tools and suggestions for Six Sigma practitioners can help avoid many project pitfalls.