Aviation is one Industry that is highly competitive. The competition is getting more and more intense with a number of players venturing into Aviation over the years. The competition is not restricted to adoption of technology alone but is in all areas right from new product/service introduction to customer service. New

products/packages need to be introduced to the market at high speed and faster than the competitors. Before than even designing the right product/package that suits the needs of majority of customers is the key. Hence,

Lean Six Sigma has lot of applications right from capturing customer VOC till actual delivery of service.

Recently, World Aviation Group has aligned its key business processes with the Six Sigma Methodology. World aviation is a company delivering services to aviation industry with an equal equity stake of Air Malta and Cassar Airways Services Pvt Ltd, Sydney. Boeing, GE Aircraft Engines are other world famous companies in the Aviation sector that have benefitted from Six Sigma both in Manufacturing & Service Operations.

Some of the Lean Six Sigma Projects done in Aviation Industry are:

• Speeding up turnaround times in all customer interfacing processes
  
• Achieving cost reduction in Airline Operations by identifying & removing wastes
  
• Improving customer feedback on critical factors impacting customer satisfaction
  
• Designing an effective customer feedback capturing & analysis process
  
• Reduction in Turnaround time for Intermediate Maintenance on GE Aircraft Engines from 83 days to 5 days.
  
• Reduction in repair time and cost of the Aircraft Engine
  
• Increasing %age of on time departures
  
• Reducing customer waiting time in Check-in queues
  
• Reduction in overall maintenance and repair costs
  
• Improving overall safety of Operations
  

Source - Duggan Inc

Reduction in Turnaround time for Intermediate Maintenance on GE Aircraft Engines from 83 days to 5 days.

Sir, this looks astonishing , can you please elaborate which tools and methods you have used to achieve this ?

Rajeev Dandona

[email protected]

Dear Rajeev,

Please have a look at the source of this information

http://www.dugganinc.com/cms/index.php?aid=125

There is a major area in aviation which till now probably very few have put under measurable terms - SALES & MARKETING .

Like any other industry the department does work on numbers i.e Target vs Achievements . But most of the parameters are based on intagible hypothesis . like potential of a customer . Now if in one particular year a corporate house generated business worth Rs X doesnt necessarily means next year also it will . It would completely depend on the health and growth of that organisation .

Like above there are lots of areas in the Sales & Marketting in Airlines which if worked on concept of Six Sigma can do wonders for the airlines .

Six Sigma is a boon for services industry to identify the recurring problems and to identify ways to resolve it...

because for these industry customer delight is the differentiator...

found this interesting article about SouthWest airlines and the impact of six sigma in their performance..

http://sreahm.blogspot.com/2012/07/southwest-airlines-lean-six-sigma.html