vikasnar

First of all it is important to understand what is blocking the organization performance. Normally there is no consensus on this. More focus is given on cost cutting. It is short term advantage to cut the cost but initiatives which will increase sell, cash flow will add more to bottom-line than cost cutting in long run and it makes organization flexible to market changes. slecting a project which is strategically important and will make significant impact on bottmline will automatically impress the management. Conviction is utmost important. Once this is done, path to achieve desired goal is clearly defined in SS methodology. Vikas

Hi Vishwadeep This is good idea to start with. Many a times at functional level it is very difficult to link the benefits with company KPI but people focus on local optima and presume this as a business case. Let us take an example. A maintenance department in a company wants to start six sigma project. Objective can be 1) improve OEE/MTBF /MTTR 2) reduce overall maintenance cost Focusing OEE of all machines at a time will need huge resources and will derail the project. Normally the costliest machine or the one which gives maximum maintenance cost will be treated as critical machine. But will that be fine?. the machine which has enough capacity , if we improve the OEE of this machine will the company be able to sell anything extra? certainly will not and in this case the OEE as a KPI is misleading isn't it? preparing XY matrix looks to be first important activity. First level Y could be ROI, Net profit, operating expences. Any activity which will results in positive delta (difference in present and future) can be considered as business case and six sigma project. VN

In addition what is been said , I would like to add following Improvement of OEE for non critical capacities will not improve net profit / revenue or productivity since it already has excess capacity. If we improve the OEE of critical resource / equipment that will be net increase of output, hence revenue and bottomline So while slectiing a project it can be OEE / MTTR / MTBF of critical equipment. that will be better idea. vikas

In addition to the points already raised in this forum I would like to add following. The most important factor is conviction of top management. In case of SMEs typically run by enetrpreneurs the empowerment is restricted to one or two persons of the top. Unless they are convinced, improvment process will not start. The top management need to be very clear about "what to change" and "what to change" to with action plan and convinced about the impact on business drivers. seondly in SMEs business processes are very vaguly defined and same is about authority and responsibility. Responsibilities in the team should be clearly defined. The team need to be empowered to excute the plan. This is many times a constraint. Data based analysis may not be a culture and many times decisions are taken on gut feeling. Challenging the decisions taken on gut feeling will hurt egos. This is cultural a change and may be another constarint. VN

Dear Suresh, Thanks for your reply. I Know benchmark conducts training in Six sigma. What I want to ask, is it possible to get training in green and black belt together. Since I have been involved and lead lean implementation from last 3-4 years I got enough knowledge about Lean to drive implementation program but same time I would like to Update quickly about six sigma so I can use it wherever it can be best applied. As you have said in lean to tackle the variation no proper tool this will very useful to me. Also, the variation is the main cause of shifting bottlenecks. I do not want to stick to one but would like apply wherever the specific tool has a strength. TPM, SMED, TOC and Six sigma I would like use as tools where as LEAN will be an umbrella. Regards, Vikas Narkar

Hi Viswadeep and Suresh Here you gave very precise and useful information on "What is Six Sigma?". You have explained various ways of defining defects other than actual defect in product. Being a Lean passionate I am sure LEAN also resolves most of them. I believe process capability is addressed specifically by six sigma. please comment Vikas