how to become a lean six sigma organization
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7/27/2019 How to Become a Lean Six Sigma Organization
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reject a perceived opportunity. As the meetings progress and become part of the culture, there should be a pipeline of ideas being worked on at any given time. The end result should be a “bucket of opportunities” that the business leaderscan select from, according to the business needs. These would then be resourced accordingly.
Improve
All Belts must go through a certification process after satisfying certain clearly defined criteria (i.e., achieving a certainamount of savings, demonstrating usage of certain tools or presenting project benefits to the business leaders). At thisstage, the business will start to see the benefits of the initial Six Sigma projects.
The certification process and the project successes need to be highly visible in the organization so that all associatescan see that Lean Six Sigma is the way the company will be approaching business in the future. Part of this visibility canbe achieved by an appropriate celebration and recognition of project successes by senior management.
Once this level is reached, the Lean Six Sigma training program needs to be spread throughout the organization.Management should consider enlisting all associates for awareness training. The high-profile successes will alsogenerate a greater interest from other associates in attending training sessions.
Control
As the company continues to move toward becoming a full-fledged Six Sigma operation, the following events must befixed in the organization’s monthly calendar:
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Monthly project review meetings – Attendees: Belts, Champions and business leaders.• Project identification meetings – Attendees: Process owners, Champions, process operators and Belts.
• Validation of savings – Belts need to have savings validated by the finance rep.
The KPIs for this process need to be clear to all associates in the organization. These should include the following andshould be part of the senior management review process:
• Lean Six Sigma training plan versus target, continuously updated according to business needs
• Certification plan versus target
• Number of Belts with assigned projects (resource utilization)
• Savings versus target, including a required monthly financial report.
• Number of prioritized ready-to-assign projects versus target
Final Steps
When all of the above processes are in place, the organization will be well on the road to becoming a Lean Six Sigmacompany, where Six Sigma tools are utilized for everyday activities at every level.
The above requires a huge effort from senior management, at least in the early stages. There is a need to have a highlevel of discipline within the organization to ensure that the above meetings take place with the expectation that thoseassigned actions will deliver in a timely manner.
Initially, some resistors could perceive Lean Six Sigma as additional and unnecessary work. But as projects progress,with the required level of support, employees will see that the process simply helps them perform their roles in a far more effective manner, giving them greater potential for personal development and ensuring that their organization
remains competitive.
About the Author: Stephen Cassie, a chartered chemical engineer, joined Hexion Specialty Chemicals in 2001 as asite manager. While in this role, he trained as a Six Sigma Green Belt before moving on to become a Black Belt in 2004.In 2007 he moved into a Master Black Belt role, where he trains and mentors Green/Black Belt projects across Europe
and Southeast Asia. He can be reached at [email protected] .