I may be getting in over my head, but what is lean six sigma?

Mohan covered it very well. Six sigma is a tool based approach to continuous approach, lean is a waste reduction approach, and there are others. I like systems thinking as well. As a call center manager I have picked the best of six sigma, lean, and other approaches for continually improving services. No one know your call center more than you and your agents so you can take what you learn and start improving. Quick and Easy Kaizen is one of my favorites because it helps every worker to think about improvements.

Dan

Pete:

Good question. Despite the fact that, as a process improvement and change implementation consultant, I have my Lean Six Sigma Black Belt credentials, I often steer clear of using that jargon beacuse it can be confusing - or it may come with some excess baggage.

Six Sigma evolved as a tool, then a process, then a metodology and then a management strategy that focuses on error free manufacturing. Lean is a methodology that focuses on eliominating waste from a process. As Mohan indicated, they have roots in the Toyota manufacturing process. Although both have their roots in manufacturing, both have made the transition to working as well in service industries.

For me, the two work extremely well together, and I normally use both in process improvement projects.

You can use each methodology alone, but you'll get the best bang from combining them. It does take training to understand all the tools in the Six Sigma toolbox and to master lean process engineering.

There are three approaches I normally see when a company wishes to introduce lean and Six Sigma into their organization. (1) They hire an external resource to do it. (2) They hire an external resource to come in and train a team in a hands on process improvement project. The internal team then becomes your internal resource. (3) A company undertakes to implement lean and Six Sigma on their own by sending a select group of employees to training. Each approach has its benefits and drawbacks.

One thing that needs to be clear if a company is considering implenting a contiunous process improvement environment is that the technical training is the easy part. What continuous process improvement really requires is a change in organizational behavior - from the top to the bottom. That may or may not be easy depending upon the culture of the transitioning organization.

If I can answer any questions for you, my contact information is in my profile.

Pete: I neglected to mention that you will find a white paper, The Pros and Cons of Six Sigma, available from within my profile or by clicking on this link: http://www.focus.com/briefs/operations/pros-and-cons-six-sigma/.

Two separate improvement initiatives that are very strong together. Lean – Simple & Wing-to-Wing focus – Breadth (understanding the whole). Six Sigma – Advanced tools & focused approach – Depth (understanding the details). Lean puts focus on improving the flow of value by eliminating any waste in the flow, whilst Six Sigma on improving process capability. At the end they both can help you improve the processes. Depending on what you want to improve, you eiher choose one of the two or both.

Hi Pete

I would like to add to the feedback that you have received about Six Sigma, there have been a lot of analysis on the effectiveness of Six Sigma (the methodology). Many of the projects that have used SS have frequently not returned the results that were expected. This is not the fault of SS but in the application of it.

SS is an excellent tool to determine the cost effectiveness of a project as part of the decision making process as to whether a project should be taken on. The problem is that many of these analyses have been undertaken by isolating scope to the view of the project alone. In order to better understand the cost of projects and their ROI, you really need to include another management tool, Theory Of Constraint (TOC).

TOC focuses the improvement projects on only the aspects of a process that currently defines what a process capability is. Without using TOC as the initial guide to where improvement is needed, any other management tool will not return what is expected.

Grant

Good answers so far. To continue your research for understanding see the web address below.

http://www.sixsigmaonline.org/six-sigma-training-certification-information/ar...

Lean Six Sigma implies the coordinated application of Lean methodologies, backed up by Six Sigma.
I can't agree that Lean only covers "low hanging fruit" as the application of Lean tools and methods can go quite deep.
Properly used, Lean will remove all of the waste from the value stream, yielding the most productive and lowest cost process.
Six Sigma is used on specific processes where an unacceptable amount of variation might still exist, even after the waste has been removed.
The value of applying Lean before Six Sigma is that the unnecessary and wasteful operations have been removed which prevents applying the very rigorous Six Sigma tools to a process that shouldn't be there in the first place.
Generally Lean tools and methodologies can be applied more quickly and on a broader base than the very specific Six Sigma tools.

Pete, you've received some very good input so far...although I agree with Ray about the inaccuracy of the "low hanging fruit" comment.

LSS is a methodology that should not intimidate you at all. Presuming you are a reasonably intelligent person who can handle a rather rigorous discipline that makes extensive use of statistics, then you can grasp it. In short, Lean works to reduce waste and Six Sigma works to reduce variation. And, you should note there are low hanging fruits in both those areas.

There are many sources of knowledge from which to draw. Our firm licenses self-instruction courseware for LSS; http://opensourcesixsigma.com. You can begin with the Project Selection Process to initiate a deployment then use many of the other courses to develop the skill levels needed to address the complexity of the issues you face. We even offer an Enterprise License for companies wishing to manage their own deployment

Jump in! Best wishes!

Pete,

You're correct in your assumption that you can't go halfway. In fact to institute such a program completely, requires the entire organization's commitment to making the program succeed, starting with top manangement. If there's no buy-in all the way around you'll never reap the full benefits.

Six Sigma by itself Uses the DMAIC approach (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) to take the "voice of the customer", that is what really matters to the customer. It takes variation out of the process in order to improve the quality of a product or service.

Lean takes the extra step to remove any waste out the process. Waste comes in several forms, over production, early production, excessive material or people movement, excessive inventories. Anything that does not add value to the final product. And remember, the customer determines what value is because it is what they are willing to pay for. It's value add if it satisfies three tests:
1) It changes shape or form
2) The customer cares about it
3) It is done right the first time.

Russ Harding