Shanin for Mimi

Dear Mike,
I cannot thank you enough for your kindness.
You always provide us a lot of ideas of  Six Sigma and other related methodologies, management concepts and how we should use, combine, think about them. I feel your comments are including many, many precious management view points.
I could have realized that we have to crate one’s way  to use and adapt those tools and concepts for each company or business.
In my case, there are a lot of things I must learn and study, I’d like to make my best efforts to do so, it’ll be great my pleasure to get you advices,  your further cooperation on this site must be much appreciated.
Mimi 

All,
The Shainin group has a web-site and also offers training in what they call Red X, Green Y, etc.  Various levels of certification are offered (I believe they go by Apprentice, Journeyman, and Master).  I don’t know if the training seminars are totally open to the public or if you have to come from a client company.  Perhaps somebody else has insight on this
As far as the statistical validity of Shainin tools, I should mention that some of his more powerful techniques are based on statistical tools but were slightly transformed into more understandable and practical applications.  An example of this may be B vs. C and its relationship to Tukey’s End Count.  I’m not sure, but Bhote’s book may be able to clarify.
I’ve seen both Shanin/Red X and Six Sigma in action, and if I may so, depending on the application or type of problem, Shainin may be a much more efficent and effective methodology.

Mike,
Thanks for your feedback.  However, just to clarify, I would like to say that I didn’t mean Shainin was better than Six Sigma in all respects, but that it may be better suited for certain applications.  I think that for a well-defined, very technical problem especially in an assembly environment, Shainin, with its Component Search and other related tools may be a better choice.  Also, proper use of multi-vari charts can uncover important information, yet this is not that well-covered, at least in my opinion, in a lot of the Six Sigma training available.
If someone is working on a transactional project or is trying to build profound process knowledge on a manufacturing operation, then I believe Six Sigma is the better approach.  In fact, I don’t think Shainin is even meant to be applied to transactional…
I am by no means an expert, but the above is my personal opinion.  As they say, “If the only tool you have is a hammer, everything starts looking like a nail.”  I wonder if the overwhelming poplularity of Six Sigma will obscure other effective problem solving strategies like Shainin Red X…

Mike – No need to apologize to me (as long as your more pointed comments were not directed right at me :)
I definitely agree with you…some people have a propensity for playing “buzzword bingo” and follow the latest craze as if it were a newly-formed religion.  On top of that, some people will have you believe that some of these “new” tools are groundbreaking, yet they are actually based on other tools that date back to the first half of the 20th century!
I firmly believe that commitment to any new management strategy / technique is key to its success, but also think that this needs to be tempered with some common sense and an open mind.  To mindlessly follow a new methodology because it is popular is silly, to put it mildly.  I am a firm believer in Six Sigma DMAIC/DMADV, but also realize that there are other tools and methods out there.
I hope that in some small way our discussion over the past few days has encouraged a few of our colleagues to explore those other tools and strategies, regardless of their popularity.