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Lean teaches us batching is bad. Right? The answer is: It depends. If you can then answer the question, “it depends on what?” you’ll start to see that Lean is much more subtle and multifaceted than the seemingly simple elements and tools might imply.

Lean Six Sigma can be overwhelming to an organization if implemented without regard for an organization’s change management history, culture and readiness. That said, the starting point for Lean Six Sigma – as well as any organized approach to effecting change that both enhances customer experience and impacts profitability – is actually having a strategy that includes […]

Mikel Harry to Rejoin SSA as Vice-Chairman and Chief Knowledge Officer

A stakeholder of a Six Sigma project is anyone associated with the project either directly or indirectly. Examples of stakeholders are supervisors providing resources, team members, department heads and employees involved in the process. An up-front analysis of who the stakeholders are and how and when to involve them in the project can prevent potential […]

ISSSC, in associations with the Harrington Institute, is the first national company to offer dual certifications during Six Sigma Training and Certification courses.

Challenges Faced Today Offer Solutions for Tomorrow Six Sigma has come a long way from statistically oriented tools to today’s “not so data driven” tools like Lean and quality function deployment (QFD). The application of Six Sigma across different sectors has made this change from statistical tools to softer tools possible. The methodologies and framework […]

Defining “Pilot” The meaning of acronyms and words change over time – for example, ARM for many was an acronym for allergy relief medicine; banks use the acronym for adjustable rate mortgages. The same holds true for the meaning of pilot – the light that kept stoves burning, the title of an airplane captain or […]

There are people who say that Six Sigma is dead – that it has no value in modern business culture. But these people are mistaking growth and evolution for complete departure. It is true that aspects of Six Sigma have adapted to customers’ changing needs over the years, but its role as a problem-solving system […]

As Six Sigma continues to be adopted and integrated across the spectrum of global businesses, from manufacturing, to finance, to pharmaceuticals, it is important to recognize the evolution of the role of the Six Sigma professional within those businesses. Traditionally, Black Belts and Master Black Belts were expected to be experts on applying the tools […]

Roadmap for Lean Product Development-Process Patent Awarded to SBTI

Finding ways to automate and improve business processes is a major focus for today’s organizations. At the heart of every business is a complicated web of human and automated processes. For the business to be as effective as possible, these processes must be as efficient as possible. Service-oriented architecture (SOA) is a concept whose time […]

Breakthrough Management Group Hosts 2-Day Innovation Workshop for Executives

SigmaXL Announces Release of SigmaXL V5.1 Excel Add-in for Six Sigma Statistical and Graphical Analysis

Breakthrough Management Group Announces New Executive Education Program for Leaders in Charge of Growth and Innovation Inside Their Organizations

A high performance culture is the result of high performance actions. An organization should strive to implement actions which deliver the desired performance and assess the results of these actions on the culture. If these actions are successful, performance targets are achieved and a high-performance culture ensues. The pursuit of performance gains starts with defining […]

Breakthrough Management Group’s Online Executive Briefing Inside the Innovation Elite — Showcasing Best Practices of the World’s Most Innovative Companies, Now Available

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Bainbridge Island, Wash. (March 06, 2007) — iSixSigma Magazine announces the release of the fourth annual iSixSigma Global Salary Survey, the largest study of its kind, published in the March/April 2007 issue of iSixSigma Magazine. The results reflect salary and bonus data from more than 2,500 Six Sigma professionals around the globe […]

PowerSteering Accelerates Investment in Enterprise PPM

Structured, Online DMAIC Meetings Cut Project and Training Time

Lean Six Sigma Certification by Brain Scan Now Available Over Web

GOAL/QPC Leader Will Help Healthcare Professionals Use Quality, Creativity and Innovation Tools to Boost Productivity

A well planned Six Sigma deployment can lead to a rewarding experience and immense benefits for an organization. On the flip side, however, a flawed deployment may lead to disappointing results – the failure of the entire deployment effort, and/or a significant waste of time and resources. There are five problems in Six Sigma deployments, […]

Efficiency in projects comes from effective risk management. Through an example from a telecom supplier, see how Six Sigma’s DMAIC methodology can be applied in tandem with the six steps of project risk management.

One common problem many companies run into when starting Six Sigma and Lean efforts is what projects to choose. If they choose unwisely, the whole effort can be stalled or abandoned because the results may not be impressive enough to gain momentum for the cause. New practitioners should be wary of an initial project that […]

Tracking financial metrics, reporting on project status and sharing knowledge more easily are just a few of the benefits of project tracking software. This directory provides information about the capabilities and functionalities of several products. Sponsors: MoreSteam.com Tim Kelley, 414-247-1080, [email protected], moresteam.com SigmaFlow Jim Henry, 972-447-8340, [email protected], sigmaflow.com Six Sigma practitioners use project tracking software […]

2007 Pharmaceutical Technology Conference Focuses on Lean Design, Quality Initiatives and Cutting Edge Technologies

Their debut product is a comprehensive package of DMAIC training curriculum consisting of 1,235 slides of content along with instruction explanations per slide, 37 data sets and 19 templates in total.

Business could not have been better. Customers were reacting positively to the company’s new and enhanced service portfolio, the company entered the market without much competition and customer satisfaction was at an all-time high. Profitability continued to rise, and the company’s efficiency rate was impressive. But then things changed. New account numbers abruptly fell. Some […]

Lean Six Sigma and Global Supply Chain Practitioner Is Certified by Maryland/DC Minority Supplier Development Council

A bad taste can prevent some people, particularly the young and the elderly, from taking a medication – which can endanger their health. Taste can also influence what over-the-counter drugs people purchase and the choice between generic and brand-name medications. Because taste is such a key factor in compliance and purchasing decisions, optimizing taste is […]

As the popularity of Lean Six Sigma techniques expands into software and technology environments, the notion that these methods and tools can provide a quick fix, unrealistic results or a panacea (for all that is wrong) has been proliferated. Some of these notions are further compounded by the reality that many of these environments are […]

MoreSteam.com and ASQ Work Together to Drive Service Improvements

“There are lies, damn lies and statistics,” we have all been warned since the 19th century. The warning is apt these days because of questions about the use of statistics that have been on exhibit in recent months. The principal and founder of a performance improvement consulting firm professes that businesses using Six Sigma are […]

Project management is a discipline comprised of planning, organizing, and managing available resources, which results in meeting or exceeding project goals and objectives. Included in project management methodology are specific start and completion dates, as well as emphasis on constraints such as quality, scope, budget and time. In Green Belt training, project management may be […]

PowerSteering Announces Strong Q2 Sales Results

The beauty of Six Sigma, over other decision-making strategies is that it is, by nature, data driven – it involves making decisions backed by evidence. In the absence of data, then, what good is Six Sigma? A Black Belt without data is like a navigator without a compass; finding north becomes complicated, but not impossible. […]

When no process area is clearly failing, but the drive for continuous improvement remains, practitioners should use an end-effect rating system to determine where to focus efforts.

The most perfectly designed and built process or system is only as good as the human being who uses it. That’s the idea behind Human Sigma, a new branch of Six Sigma that focuses on improving the quality of the employee-customer encounter, particularly within sales and service organizations. Human Sigma proponents, including John H. Fleming […]

Of all the activities and tools used in the Measure phase of DMAIC, the thing many Belts struggle with the most is the cost of poor quality (COPQ), or the cost associated with the quality of a work product. Belts need to understand what COPQ includes, and what it does not, so they can determine […]

Goldman Joins MoreSteam.com

In the battle of “survival of the fittest,” every business must constantly re-evaluate its processes to improve how it delivers products or services to customers, while at the same time reducing its cost of doing business. Businesses that establish an effective continuous improvement culture will be able to sustain their competitive edge. Beginning in 2003, […]

Rapid Action Teams Help NewPage Win Lean Six Sigma Award

Organizations are often challenged with managing seemingly unmanageable work volumes with available staff. At times, staff may feel overwhelmed with high work volumes, or underutilized during periods of low work volumes. When a management team finds itself confronting these issues, team members may ask the following questions: How can staff respond to internal and external […]

Availability is one of the key metrics that demonstrates the overall performance of an information technology (IT) system. But defining and calculating the availability of an IT system from a business perspective is a challenging task. Most of the time, IT departments report availability values that are on the higher side (such as more than […]

Breakthrough Management Group International Hosts 2-Day Innovation Workshop for Executives – Seminar Targets Senior Leaders Looking to Enhance Organizational Innovation Efforts

Several management approaches, including Six Sigma, involve a key focus on process analysis. Too often processes are schematically represented in boxes and arrows. While this final result of a process analysis is beneficial, practitioners should ensure they are considering the numerous factors and components that influence a process and how it is viewed. Stakeholders and […]

Lean Six Sigma for information technology (IT) is still maturing and has not hit the critical mass to transform the industry to its next level, as it has in other industries in the past 10 years. This may be due in part to common myths about Lean Six Sigma for IT. These myths include: IT […]

Lean Six Sigma Shares Innovation with DOD Components

Organizations looking for a silver bullet customer metric look no further than the Net Promoter Score (NPS). Developed by Frederick Reichhold and his colleagues at Bain & Co., NPS provides an economical and concise metric for assessing how loyal a company’s customers are. Managing that measurement is the key to future growth. What Is NPS? […]

New Release of Crystal Ball Gives Users Scatter Charts and Microsoft Office 2007 Compatibility