Tag: Black Belt

A Black Belt used Six Sigma to improve a transactional bank deposit process, resulting in yearly savings of $4 million.

With more than 1,000 trained Black Belts, the U.S. Army continues marching forward in its Lean Six Sigma efforts. Trained Black Belts who complete projects and obtain certification are essential to building a robust cadre of practitioners. To this end, the Army formalized the use of Belt course portfolios (BCPs), the collection of projects assigned […]

A survey by iSixSigma Magazine of more than 1,300 business professionals whose companies are using Six Sigma revealed that leadership development programs which involve Six Sigma training are six times more likely to be called “highly successful” than those without. Many of these leadership development programs involve a Black Belt track for future leaders. Thus, […]

Every Lean Six Sigma deployment leader must eventually confront the critical decision of how the various Belt roles should be allocated and deployed throughout the organization. Lean Six Sigma has existed for more than 10 years now in a variety of manufacturing, service and distribution environments, and through trial and error fairly standard niches have […]

How does a company measure the effectiveness of a Six Sigma program? Common metrics include: time to the break-even point for the program, project completion rate, total and average financial value of completed Six Sigma projects, and average project completion time. The common element in all these metrics is that they rely on the effectiveness […]

Steve Wittig, vice president-Six Sigma at Masco Builder Cabinet Group, offers his views on Six Sigma certification. He discusses his company’s policies on certification criteria, third-party certification and recertification for all levels of Belts.

Jackie Cazar, vice president of Pershing LLC, a member of BNY Securities Group, offers her perspective on the hiring and training of Black Belt leaders – including what a Black Belt needs in the way of skills, background and experience.

After a rocky start developing the project’s primary metric, a Six Sigma team was able to increase the accuracy rate of dispenser maintenance calls, resulting in potential savings for the company of more than a million dollars.

It is widely recognized that a number of factors are important in achieving successful Six Sigma Black Belt projects. In particular: Leadership support Project selection Black Belt candidate selection Much has been written about leadership support and project selection, not as much on candidate selection. Many Six Sigma companies would benefit from knowing more about […]

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.

Black Belt project would end with a concise set of action items being turned over to the transition owner who would then swiftly implement them and achieve the desired results. But for many Six Sigma practitioners in transactional environments, simply handing off the project does not guarantee that the gains will be realized. Even in […]

Magda, the Master Black Belt at a manufacturing plant in the Midwest, was sitting in her office one day in April 2005, when the plant accountant and her good friend, Jeff, burst into her office crying, “They’re going to throw me in jail!” “Calm down, Jeff,” she said. “What’s going on.” Jeff blurted out, “Our […]

A predictable pattern in the life of a European Black Belt project pertains to the morale of the Black Belt as project leader. It highlights the importance of the sponsor’s role in the success of any breakthrough improvement effort. Knowing the emotional ups and downs a Black Belt will face during a typical project helps […]

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