...Importance of Six Sigma as Process and Sustainability Improvement in United Parcel Services Martin Tunggadjaja March 2013 ABSTRACT Six Sigma is a process improvement developed by Motorola in 1985 that encompasses a set of strategies and tools acquired in order to improve the current business practice and systematic processes to fulfill the objectives. It is initially designed to measure how many faults or defects are in the process so that they can be eliminated systematically as part of improvement to reduce weaknesses and reinforce quality. One of popular process improvement methodology that is part of Six Sigma is DMAIC, which consists of: Define, Measure, Analysis, Improve and Control. Originally Six Sigma was first incorporated into manufacturing industries; this methodology also applies well to logistics companies since the focus is customer-oriented. Supply chain management is a key strategic factor for increasing organizational effectiveness and for better realization of goals such as enhanced competitiveness, better customer care and increased profitability (Gunasekaran, Patel, Tirtiroglu, 2001, p71). Therefore, Six Sigma as shown to be successful in delivering business benefits through variation reduction (Knowles, Whicker, Femat, 2005, p51). This paper discusses how Six Sigma apply to the logistics processes and an example case study of United Parcel Service (UPS) incorporating this technique to reposition itself in the world’s most improved logistics and...
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...Master Thesis Software Engineering Thesis no: MSE-2008-21 November 2008 Applying Six Sigma in Software Companies for Process Improvement Adnan Rafiq Khan Long Zhang School of Engineering Blekinge Institute of Technology Box 520 SE – 372 25 Ronneby Sweden This thesis is submitted to the School of Engineering at Blekinge Institute of Technology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Software Engineering. The thesis is equivalent to 2*20 weeks of full time studies. Contact Information: Author(s): Adnan Rafiq Khan Address: Folkparksvagen 1905, 37240 Ronneby, Sweden. E-mail: adnanrafiqkhan@gmail.com Long Zhang Address: Villa Flora 951, 37236 Ronneby, Sweden. E-mail: zhl10154@gmail.com University advisor(s): Conny Johansson (Head of Department, Department of Systems and Software Engineering) School of Engineering Blekinge Institute of Technology Box 520 SE – 372 25 Ronneby Sweden Internet Phone Fax : www.bth.se/tek : +46 457 38 50 00 : + 46 457 271 25 ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT First of all we thank our supervisor, Conny Johansson, for continuously providing the support, encouragement and motivation during the thesis. His advices, suggestions and feedbacks were really helpful and made this effort an enjoyable one. We are thankful to our faculty reviewer Dr. Robert Feldt. His feedbacks and comments were very useful to design this thesis. We would like to thanks Mr. Kai Xiao, a student at BTH, for introducing...
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... 6 Dynamics of organizational learning and continuous improvement in six sigma implementation Taina Savolainen Department of Business and Economics, University of Joensuu, Joensuu, Finland, and Arto Haikonen Genworth Financial, Helsinki, Finland Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the dynamics of organizational learning and continuous improvement (CI) in the context six sigma implementation in business organizations operating in multicultural environments. Design/methodology/approach – A specific research question is: does learning mechanisms and continuous improvement practices support each other and how, and what type of learning can be identified in the improvement of business processes. The question is linked to one of the fundamental issues currently discussed in the field of organizational learning; how do organizations get “from here to there”, in other words, what is the dynamics of the processes of learning and how progressive learning is achieved. A case study of a few Finnish companies is made and a procedural implementation model is applied. Findings – The findings suggest that the learning process is characterized by measurement, detection and correction of errors, and cost reduction. In six sigma implementation, learning is a single-loop type of learning. It is an incremental change process which reminds a technical variant of the learning organization. Continuous improvement occurs through procedural practices (the DMAIC-cycle) which...
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...Sigma Significance of Six Sigma By Suhasini Pratapagiri Stratford University INTRODUCTION: WHAT IS SIX SIGMA? Six Sigma is a highly disciplined process that helps a company focus on developing and delivering near perfect products and services. Six Sigma at many organizations simply means a measure of quality that strives for near perfection. Six Sigma is a disciplined, data-driven approach and methodology for eliminating defects (driving toward six standard deviations between the mean and the nearest specification limit) in any process – from manufacturing to transactional and from product to service. The fundamental objective of the Six Sigma methodology is the implementation of a measurement-based strategy that focuses on process improvement and variation reduction through the application of Six Sigma improvement projects. This is accomplished through the use of two Six Sigma sub-methodologies: DMAIC and DMADV. The Six Sigma DMAIC process (define, measure, analyze, improve, control) is an improvement system for existing processes falling below specification and looking for incremental improvement. The Six Sigma DMADV process (define, measure, analyze, design, verify) is an improvement system used to develop new processes or products at Six Sigma quality levels. It can also be employed if a current process requires more than just incremental improvement. Both Six Sigma processes are executed by Six Sigma Green Belts and Six Sigma Black Belts, and are overseen...
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...1 Case study On Six Sigma at Wipro Technologies: Thrust on Quality Abstract: Six Sigma at Wipro Technologies: Thrust on Quality Wipro Technologies is a global services provider delivering technology-driven business solutions that meet the strategic objectives of clients. Wipro has 40+ ‘Centers of Excellence’ that create solutions around specific needs of industries. Wipro delivers unmatched business value to customers through a combination of process excellence, quality frameworks and service delivery innovation. Wipro is the World's first CMMi Level 5 certified software services company and the first outside USA to receive the IEEE Software Process Award. Wipro has one of the most mature Six Sigma programs in the industry ensuring that 91% of the projects are completed on schedule, much above the industry average of 55%. Six Sigma provides the tools for continuous improvement on existing processes thereby helping sustain the SEI-CMM Level 5 and CMMi certifications. This case focuses on the initiatives taken by Wipro Technologies to implement the Six Sigma Quality tool to achieve sustained strategic business results. It explores the implementation procedure at Wipro Technologies and the benefits reaped by the company on account of adopting Six Sigma. The case also throws light on the recent developments in the Six Sigma concept including Wipro’s Six Sigma Skill base and consulting experience and explains how the company intends to build its expertise and...
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...Case study On Six Sigma at Wipro Technologies: Thrust on Quality Wipro Technologies is a global services provider delivering technology-driven business solutions that meet the strategic objectives of clients. Wipro has 40+ ‘Centers of Excellence’ that create solutions around specific needs of industries. Wipro delivers unmatched business value to customers through a combination of process excellence, quality frameworks and service delivery innovation. Wipro is the World's first CMMi Level 5 certified software services company and the first outside USA to receive the IEEE Software Process Award. Wipro has one of the most mature Six Sigma programs in the industry ensuring that 91% of the projects are completed on schedule, much above the industry average of 55%. Six Sigma provides the tools for continuous improvement on existing processes thereby helping sustain the SEI-CMM Level 5 and CMMi certifications. This case focuses on the initiatives taken by Wipro Technologies to implement the Six Sigma Quality tool to achieve sustained strategic business results. It explores the implementation procedure at Wipro Technologies and the benefits reaped by the company on account of adopting Six Sigma. The case also throws light on the recent developments in the Six Sigma concept including Wipro’s Six Sigma Skill base and consulting experience and explains how the company intends to build its expertise and experience '' to bring continuous process improvement to the organization. ...
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...Dynamics Mission Systems, a global company that specializes in military defense. To improve product cost, scheduling, quality, and performance, General Dynamics Mission System have deployed an active Lean Six Sigma program. Lean Six Sigma is a combination of two processes, Lean and Six Sigma. Lean is a systematic method for the elimination of waste. Six Sigma is a methodology for eliminating defects, mistakes, or failures in business processes. Both processes are a set of principles aimed at continuous improvement. Lean Six Sigma has become a popular technique for deploying continuous improvement in the manufacturing arena, but not all companies have successfully benefited from the Lean Six Sigma process—mainly due to poor execution. Jeyaraman and Teo (2010) “A Systematic Review of Lean Six Sigma for the Manufacturing Industry” and Albliw, Antony, and Lim (2015) “A Conceptual Framework for Critical Success Factors of Lean Six Sigma” contains comprehensive research studies in the functional area of Lean Six Sigma. These research studies have identified gaps that may be preventing users from benefiting from the Lean Six Sigma implementation strategy. Research Problem Lean Six Sigma has become a popular technique for continuous improvement. Many companies have employed Lean Six Sigma to their manufacturing...
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...history of Six-Sigma The roots of Six Sigma as a measurement standard go back to Carl Frederick Gauss (1777-1885) who introduced the concept of normal curve. Six Sigma as a measurement standard in product variation can be traced back to the 1920´s when Walter Shewhart showed that three sigma, from the mean is the point where a process requires correction. As history would seem to have it, the beginnings of Six Sigma really come from 1979 when an exasperated Motorola executive named Art Sundry said, at a meeting, “The real problem at Motorola is that our quality stinks!”. Apparently, this statement led to series of activities that in turn led to the discovery of the crucial correlation between higher quality and lower development costs in manufacturing products of all kinds. The problem was that the common thought was that quality initiatives simply cost too much money. What Motorola realized is that if these initiatives were done right, improving quality would actually reduce costs. Motorola decided to take the approach that high quality products should actually cost less to produce. Motorola reasoned that the highest quality producer should be the lowest cost producer. THEORETICAL ANALYSIS OF THE CONCEPT OF SIX-SIGMA What is Six-Sigma Six-Sigma has at least three different meanings depending upon the context; there is not one answer to what is Six-Sigma. The first answer to what is Six-Sigma is that it is a management philosophy. Six-Sigma is a customer...
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...Quality Management Of Aqua-Fun ----Case 1 in Chapter 6 Team 4: Yudan Ding Wenqian Xu Xianjing Zhu Yukun Chen SCHM2301 Prof. Omar Elwakil 10/08/2013 Quality Management of Aqua-Fun 1. Cost of Quality Analysis A focus on quality management demands that the total cost and benefits of quality performance be first understood by everyone in the company. In order to successfully launch a companywide Six Sigma, the first step is to dig out all relative cost categories that associated with managing quality and quality failures. The marketing research and other similar costs categories should all be included in the Cost of Quality (CoQ) analysis. 1.1 Identification of Cost Categories Based on Roberta’s current CoQ analysis, there are 18 cost categories with question marks that she either did not have data for or wasn’t sure about including. For the prevention costs, Roberta is having problem with the costs of marketing research, customer/user perception surveys/clinics, supplier quality planning, supplier quality planning, quality program planning and reporting, and other prevention costs. As mentioned earlier in the case, Roberta wasn’t sure how the marketing manager would feel about including marketing research as a category in the CoQ because it seems that marketing research as well as the customer perception surveys have no direct relation with preventing product defects. In fact, the fast development and introduction of new product is a key factor that differentiates...
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...Control Charts and Introduction to Six Sigma Session 12: Control Charts and Introduction to Six Sigma concepts Control Charts and Introduction to Six Sigma Control Charts - Topics of Discussion – – – – – Control Chart History Control Limits Individuals and Moving Range Charts X-bar and R Charts Subgrouping Control Charts and Introduction to Six Sigma Typical Process Metrics • • • • • • • • • Cycle times Lead times Productivity Schedule variance Budget variance Employee satisfaction Customer satisfaction Safety incidents System users (# hits) • • • • • • • • • Days sales outstanding Customer service calls Request for quotes Proposal development Attrition/retention Bid win rate Transactional defects Sales orders Revenue dollars What are some metrics associated with your projects? What are some metrics associated with your projects? Control Charts and Introduction to Six Sigma Control Charts – “While every process displays Variation, some processes display controlled variation, while other processes display uncontrolled variation” (Walter Shewhart). – Controlled Variation is characterised by a stable and consistent pattern of variation over time. Associated with Common Causes. – Process A shows controlled variation. X-Bar Chart for Process A X-Bar Chart for Process A UCL=77.20 UCL=77.20 75 X a C a fo P ce B -B r h rt r ro ss 8 0 U L 7 .2 C= 7 7 Sample Mean 7 0 X= 0 8 7 .9 L L 6 .7 C= 4 0 6 0 5 0 Special Causes 0 5 1...
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...face a constant need for improvement. The manufacturing paradigm has shifted from craft manufacturing to mass production and more recently to a newer approach – the lean manufacturing. In mass production, large quantities of the product were produced and the focus was more on quantity than quality. But with the increase in competition and the gradual saturation of the market the need to develop a new paradigm that focuses more on the process i.e., improved quality, delivery and cost performance has emerged. This has led to the introduction of Lean Manufacturing which focuses on waste elimination and creation of flow within an organization. In the words of Shigeo Shingo “The most dangerous kind of waste is the waste we do not recognize.” Lean and six-sigma are methodologies backed by powerful tools that help in improving quality and productivity thereby improving overall profitability and competitiveness. The lean philosophy was initially pioneered by Toyota manufacturing company and aims at various methods of eliminating waste and improving the process flow. Six Sigma on the other hand, focuses on reducing variation using problem solving and statistical tools. It was first implemented in the Motorola Company as a safety margin for product performance. SIX SIGMA Six Sigma is a continuous improvement strategy that focuses on minimizing defects and variation and aims at achieving 3.4 defects per million in productions, design and process flow. Six Sigma minimizes variation in the...
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... 6 SIGMA In 2001, Caterpillar launched its 6 Sigma program to drive change to achieve the company’s long-term strategic goals (Caterpillar uses 6 Sigma to identify its Six Sigma initiatives). This 6 Sigma process was, and continues to be, extremely successful. Some of the results include first-year benefits that exceeded implementation cost and achievement of the revenue goal two years earlier than planned. We’ll briefly discuss Six Sigma in general, describe Caterpillar, and show the entrenchment of 6 Sigma within the company’s strategic planning process. April 2010 I S T R AT E G I C F I N A N C E 25 C OVE R S TO R Y What Is Six Sigma? Six Sigma is a total quality management (TQM) technique pioneered by and applied to Motorola processes in the 1980s by Bill Smith, a Motorola engineer who became known as “the father of Six Sigma.” Since then, other companies, such as Bank of America, Honeywell International, Raytheon, and General Electric, have taken these learned processes and expanded them. Even though many people have reservations about the potential savings from Six Sigma, a story by Charles Waxer (“Six Sigma Costs and Savings: The financial benefits of implementing Six Sigma at your company can be Significant,” www.isixsigma.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view= item&id=1228<emid=187) reports that GE saved more than $12 billion over five years, Honeywell saved $800 million, and Motorola saved $15 billion over 11 years. Each company takes the Six Sigma process...
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...LSS lean Six Sigma Abstract Purpose – Although research has been undertaken on the implementation of lean within various industries, the many tools and techniques that form the “tool box”, and its integration with Six Sigma (mainly through case studies and action research), there has been little written on the journey towards the integration of the two approaches. This paper aims to examine the integration of lean principles with Six Sigma methodology as a coherent approach to continuous improvement, and provides a conceptual model for their successful integration. Design/methodology/approach – Desk research and a literature review of each separate approach is provided, followed by a view of the literature of the integrated approach. Findings – No standard framework for lean Six Sigma or its implementation exists. A systematic approach needs to be adopted, which optimises systems as a whole, focusing the right strategies in the correct places. Originality/value – This paper contributes to knowledge by providing an insight into the evolution of the lean Six Sigma paradigm. It is suggested that a clear integration of the two approaches must be achieved, with sufficient scientific underpinning. Keywords Lean production, Six sigma Paper type Literature review 1. Introduction The Toyota Production System (TPS) provided the basis for what is now known as lean thinking, as popularised by Womack and Jones (1996). The development of this approach to manufacturing began shortly after...
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...Exploring Six Sigma Ricardo Vergara Training Management 3340 April 29, 2012 Abstract This paper explores Six Sigma, the business initiative that was developed by Motorola in the early 1990s. This program has had very good success with some very large corporations such as Allied Signal and General Electric. This paper will explore the methodology of each of the five phases in the Six Sigma model. The five phases are Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control (DMAIC) Phases. The Six Sigma model will then be evaluated based on the researched information. Further, a recommendation will be made concerning whether an organization should implement Six Sigma based on the evaluation. Establishing a Six Sigma Program Introduction: In a world class business environment, employees will be stimulated to strive toward a goal of total quality and continuous process improvement. The benefit of achieving this goal is to become more competitive in the marketplace by reaching business excellence in meeting and exceeding the demands of the customers. The improvements in productivity and the reductions in cost will make stretching towards this goal a feasible business mission (Constanza, 1996, p. 251-252). Operations managers...
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... Manufacturing | Quality Management Techniques Quality management can be considered to have four main components: quality planning, quality control, quality assurance and quality improvement. Quality management is focused not only on product/service quality, but also the means to achieve it. Quality management therefore uses quality assurance and control of processes as well as products to achieve more consistent quality. For Factual approach to decision making quality improvement techniques are used. Effective decisions are always based on the data analysis and information. PDCA cycle PDCA (plan–do–check–act) is an iterative four-step problem-solving process typically used in business process improvement. It is also known as the Deming circle, Shewhart cycle, Deming cycle, Deming wheel, control circle or cycle, or plan–do–study–act (PDSA). Meaning PLAN Establish the objectives and processes necessary to deliver results in accordance with the expected output. By making the expected output the focus, it differs from other techniques in that the completeness and accuracy of the specification is also part of the improvement. DO Implement the new processes. Often on a small scale if possible. CHECK Measure the new processes and compare the results against the expected results to ascertain any differences. ACT Analyze the differences to determine their cause. Each will be part of...
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