Process optimization comes in many different forms. Lean Six Sigma is a Manufacturing process management methodology designed to improve company performance by systematically removing waste and reducing variation. It emerged in the early 2000s as the combination of the existing Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma approaches.
Lean manufacturing is a systematic method of waste reduction within processes. At the center of the Lean approach is the highlighting of value added activities at every step of a process in order to isolate elements with less value added from a customer point of view. The methodology originated in Japan as the Toyota Production System, which helped Toyota grow from a small company to the world’s largest automaker during the 20th century. Traditionally applied to a production environment, it has, in recent years, been adapted to services and IT.
Lean is a bottom-up method, which emphasizes employee engagement in the transformation of the processes they carry out. One of the crucial steps is to draw a Value Stream Map (VSM) of the current process — the series of activities that bring the product or service from its starting point to the customer.
Six Sigma is a methodology for project management that originated at Motorola in 1986. Its objective is to improve the quality of output by identifying and removing causes of defects thereby minimizing variation of what is being produced or processed.
The aspiration of Six Sigma is to produce fewer than 3.4 errors for every 1 million operations. It uses statistical data analysis tools and methods such as scatter plots and ANOVAs to examine the variability of a given process. Once the current variability is determined, and its causes identified, the process is improved and repeated in order to further reduce the variability at the next iteration, until reaching the customers’ expectations.
This improvement cycle is formalized as the DMAIC framework, which stands for:
Six Sigma is known for using a judo-inspired belt skill-level certification (with levels White Belt, Yellow Belt, Green Belt, Black Belt and Master Black Belt).
The resulting combination of Lean and Six Sigma emerged in the early 2000s. The Lean methodology highlights the sources of waste and the Six Sigma toolbox helps precisely measure performance and thus, enable iterative improvement. Lean Six Sigma training uses the same judo-inspired belt skill-level certification used in Six Sigma.
The method has gained popularity over the last 15 years and has now been used in many industries, by countless companies, including: Sony, Citibank, Renault and Nestlé.
Many methodological guidelines exist regarding process management (ITIL, PMI, Prince2, ISO9001, Scrum…). While they do offer standards, tools and best practices, they neglect to tell you how to apply them and measure their effect on operational performance. This is where Lean Six Sigma comes in.
Where other approaches give you a one-size-fits-all recipe for process efficiency, LSS lets you:
This results in:
This tailored approach to continuous improvement makes Lean Six Sigma applicable to most industries.
Here at Exelop, our experts provide training and consulting services relating to Lean Six Sigma with a goal to promote and develop operational excellence within your company.
In the journey towards operational excellence with Exelop, you get: