Michael Cyger

Jessica Harper (managing editor of iSixSigma Magazine), Michael Marx (iSixSigma’s research manager) and I will be in warm Scottsdale, Arizona, May 7-10. If you’re looking to escape the weather and be (almost) guaranteed warm days and sunny skies, then consider joining us in Scottsdale for the ISSSP Six Sigma Leadership Conference. This year I vowed […]

This could be you! Are you a small or medium-sized business that’s seen great results with Six Sigma or process improvement tools? Do you rely on “Six Sigma thinking” to improve the customer experience? We’re looking for a company that would be an inspiration to other small and medium-sized businesses to feature in an article […]

Wiley Publishing, Inc. was kind enough to send me a few copies of the new Lean for Dummies book, hot off the presses.

I was cleaning up my office today and found two extra copies of The Lean Six Sigma Pocket Toolbook written by Michael George, David Rowlands, Mark Price and John Maxey of George Group, published by McGraw-Hill. It’s rated 5 out of 5 on Amazon.com and is a great compendium of every Lean Six Sigma tool […]

TAGSYS has announced what they are billing as the RFID industry’s first quality of service guarantee for pharmaceutical manufacturers. This new guarantee — what TAGSYS is calling the “Six Sigma Performance Program” — promises fewer than four failures in one million read opportunities in the item-level track-and-trace process. Read their entire Six Sigma guarantee.

We have a fantastic issue of iSixSigma Magazine coming up in May. The cover story is about Lonmin, a primary producer of platinum group metals. They focus on discovery, acquisition, development and marketing of minerals and metals. The short story goes like this: Prior to Brad Mills becoming CEO, the quality of life for Lonmin […]

Hitachi is running a series of advertisements in the Wall Street Journal focusing on their plasma TV technology capabilities. In today’s issue (March 13, 2007, p. A16), their ad talks about kaizen: No matter where in the world they’re made, Hitachi plasma TVs have one trait in common: They’re the product of kaizen, the Japanese […]

Praveen Gupta, President of Accelper Consulting, sent me a few copies of his new book entitled Virtually Stat Free Six Sigma. (Thanks for the reference to iSixSigma.com in the first chapter, Praveen!) Subtitled “Focusing on Intent for Quick Results,” this book dives into the biggest problems facing most companies and what tools are most likely […]

We have recently become aware of fraudulent emails and telephone calls from a person claiming to be from iSixSigma which was sent to multiple people, including some of our readers. The fraudulent email, which was sent by Aditi Raisurana and may be personally addressed, tells recipients that iSixSigma is “in the process of promoting our […]

It seems that no sooner does Hyperion start the transition from the acquisition of Decisioneering to the process of integrating Crystal Ball with their products, when Hyperion announces that *they’ve* now been acquired by Oracle! The deal is in cash for $52.00 per share, or approximately $3.3 billion. In an email I received today from Jim […]

Some of the biggest news to be announced yesterday and circulated around the IQPC Six Sigma Summit in Miami is that Hyperion is acquiring Decisioneering. For those of you not aware of Hyperion, they are one of the leading enterprise-wide BPM (business performance management) software applications in the world. As the press release on Decisioneering’s […]

He’s at it again. But this time I laughed out loud, I’m sorry to report. What are your thoughts?

Paula Parmeter, a Six Sigma advocate and pioneer, recently passed away. Everyone that knew Paula is tremendously saddened. Below is a tribute, written by Ilona Kirzhner.     iSixSigma has been nice enough to allow us to pay a Six Sigma Tribute to Paula (Feldman) Parmeter. In my knowledge of Six Sigma consultancies, practitioners, trainers, […]

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m starting to feel a little “winterized” already (or is that “non-winterized”?). The Seattle rainy season has hit multiple records this season and I’m looking forward to a break later this month by visiting warm — and hopefully dry — Miami for the IQPC Six Sigma […]

Dilbert and his pointy haired boss tackled two topics that are near and dear to my heart: Six Sigma and innovation. In one fell swooop, he reduced both topics to buzz words and hype. While I’m sure there are many people who may agree with Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert, I’m hoping this site […]

Is it related to design for Six Sigma? Is it TRIZ? Is it that guy in the corner cube who has 50 patents and tons of papers piled on his desk high enough to obscure anybody’s view as they walk by?

I spent the afternoon with the North West Quality Forum (NWQF). Today’s meeting took place on the Microsoft campus in Redmond, Washington, just North East of Seattle. It was my first time to Redmond, besides my house-hunting trip to the Seattle area a couple of years ago. The NWQF is a group of Seattle-based deployment […]

Some vendors have recently expressed concerns about the review of project tracking software programs that was published in the November/December 2006 issue of iSixSigma Magazine. I would like to share with you a statement regarding this article that will be published in the January/February 2007 issue. It was written by magazine editor Erin Ducceschi, and […]

The TRIZ Journal is now a division of CTQ Media LLC and a channel under Real Innovation (which will launch November 15th).

The most difficult problems in any Lean Six Sigma project or initiative relate to changing mind-sets. However, the right combination of vision, resources, incentives, skills and planning significantly increase the probably of success.

The American Society for Quality had an attorney send iSixSigma a cease and desist letter the other day for an article iSixSigma published back in 2001. In the article, Charles Waxer wrote, “ASQ only started offering certification a year or so ago.” This was in fact true in 2001, but since we don’t include a […]

I attended the IQPC Lean Six Sigma West Summit in Las Vegas from September 27-29, along with fellow blogger Michael Marx and the rest of the CTQ Media team. On Wednesday I gave a presentation entitled “From Good to Great Six Sigma: 5 Imperatives for Making the Leap.” Many delegates who attended the presentation asked for […]

Thank you to everyone who contributes thoughts, suggestions and comments to iSixSigma on how we can improve what we provide. We’re constantly making improvements to our technologies as a result. Our Discussion Forum is a popular Six Sigma-related destination on the Internet. Since our inception in May 2000, we’ve had about 94,000 postings. People have […]

Who would you like to hear speak at the IQPC 8th Annual Six Sigma Summit in Miami? Here’s you chance to be heard. Please take this short –one question– survey and choose your ideal speaker for the event in January next year. To participate in the survey follow this link: https://www.isixsigma.com/miamikeynote07