Key Points

• LSS in education is a great way to increase the quality of your efforts.
• Putting the students first means that you can tailor things to their needs.
• LSS is a great fit for education, despite not having a clearly defined output.

Is Lean Six Sigma in education even feasible? We often think of Lean Six Sigma as more at home in the confines of the manufacturing sector. There, you’ve got clearly defined inefficiencies, non-value-added activities, and so forth. However, there is certainly some merit in looking into how LSS applies to the education framework.

So, with that in mind, why not take a closer look at some of the tips and strategies you can use for students ranging from K-12 ages up to higher education? Lean Six Sigma is a flexible and ultimately scalable approach that works quite well in a variety of applications. You might find that Lean Six Sigma in education is a natural fit.

What Is Lean Six Sigma?

If you’re new to the concept, welcome to our site. Lean Six Sigma is a hybridization of Six Sigma and Lean, both disparate concepts with a history in manufacturing. Lean itself is focused on reducing waste, increasing efficiency, and ultimately avoiding or minimizing non-value-added activities throughout the production cycle. This suits Six Sigma equally well. Six Sigma as a methodology is focused on increasing efficiency while putting the customer first.

The hybrid approach to this methodology shows the power of both approaches within the manufacturing world. However, as we’ve seen over the last few years, it fits just about everywhere. These principles are being employed everywhere from manufacturing to less likely industries like the tech sector.

Lean Six Sigma in Education

Lean Six Sigma in education might not seem like a natural fit at first glance. However, there is a certain degree of flexibility the approach brings. You’ll find that it can only increase the chances of your educational efforts succeeding. Education is a touchy subject. Striking the right balance is where you’ll find the best success.

That said, LSS provides the tools needed to get down to what matters. While we often are concerned about the quality of the materials, that isn’t the whole picture for education. A lot is going on behind the scenes where things can falter. In particular, the administrative side of education is prone to bloat and waste.

With the right approach, this isn’t a concern. So, why not hedge your bets and reduce the chances of your efforts going awry?

Putting Students First

One of the first things every beginner to LSS will learn is the customer comes first. In an industry like education, the customer isn’t immediately clear. However, there is one component to any educational effort that remains a constant: students. As such, rather than putting the customer first, you’re doing the same for the students in your charge.

Expectations are what you’d surmise from any educational effort, development, and nurturing of skills to better serve students in the real world. This is where Lean Six Sigma in education gets an opportunity to shine, as applying LSS principles to schooling provides the means to focus on your students. Further, you have immediate contact with your students, meaning you can tailor approaches to meet their goals and expectations.

This leads to a personalized and flexible approach to schooling. In turn, this ultimately provides happier students who can excel in their given areas of study.

A Culture of Improvement

The Lean Six Sigma mindset is geared towards improvement. If that isn’t the first word on your lips when looking at processes, then something is wrong. The same applies to Lean Six Sigma in education. Given any school, you’ll likely find a culture built around maintaining the status quo, hitting thresholds for educational standards, and so forth.

What if it doesn’t have to be this way? Schooling doesn’t have to rely on the same rote routines performed day in and day out. You don’t have to stick to the same inefficient way of entering grades, administering tests, and so forth.

This is where the LSS mindset gets an opportunity to flex its muscles. By utilizing tools like the 7 QC tools alongside a solid DMAIC effort, you’ve got all you need to start cutting through the chaff. In time, you’ll see a higher standard of education take place in your institution.

Putting Skills in Educator Hands

Lean Six Sigma is something that takes hold of an entire organization. Your staff might not be fully certified, but they’ll get used to the tricks of the trade fairly quickly. The same will hold when looking at your educators, administrators, and other staff. When taking part in any LSS effort, they’ll be developing skills that go beyond just pure education.

These are skills that are building blocks for greater quality and provide vital training for things like problem-solving, decision-making, and analyzing the reams of data any school produces. At the end of the day, it isn’t just the students who are learning.

You’re giving your staff a greater breadth of training that they can further apply to their time in the classroom, which is worth its weight in gold.

Using Data for Decisions

Data is one of the big cornerstones of Lean Six Sigma. As you approach Lean Six Sigma in education, it is time to start taking notice of the data you produce, and harness it toward the decision-making process. This isn’t going to be an overnight process by any means. You’ll spend quite a bit of time developing key metrics, looking over historical data, and figuring out what works best for your institution.

However, with due time, you’ll find that these efforts ultimately are going to make a leaner and meaner decision-making process. You could certainly take the time to go with a gut reaction. That said, you’ll find working with hard empirical data is going to yield better results that lead to happy students.

Reducing Waste

It has been decades since I was in a K-12 institution at this point, but I remember marveling at just how archaic things were. This likely hasn’t changed with modern schooling, despite the advent of modern technology and digital tools to help ease the process. This is where Lean Six Sigma in education has a chance to get past those inefficient processes done daily.

Take the time to map out your processes, look at where the bottlenecks are, and trim it down. It might not always work, but you can surely hammer out the old ways into something decidedly more modern. Schools always seem to lag behind the times when it comes to how they approach daily operations.

With the right sort of workforce mentality, this doesn’t have to be the case. You can approach the way you deal with students and their needs with more flexibility, and ultimately more value-added activities are emphasized along the way.

Keeping the Stakeholders Happy

So, pop quiz, who are your stakeholders in education? This is a core part of the LSS experience, identifying both your stakeholders and their expectations. In this case, you’ll be looking at your parents, students, and staff alike, who all are part of what we’d consider stakeholders in this industry. Keeping your stakeholders happy is what keeps the business afloat. If you aren’t delivering quality quarter after quarter, you’ll be in for a rude awakening at the end of the fiscal year.

This holds the same sort of weight when looking at Lean Six Sigma in education. You’re ultimately trying to deliver a quality experience and service that leaves everyone involved in the equation happy with your efforts.

Other Useful Tools and Concepts

Ready to learn a little bit more? Why not take a look at Lean Six Sigma for startups? Lean Six Sigma isn’t just for massive organizations, as we’ve discussed at length today. With the right touch, it can work just as well for a startup trying to find its footing.

Additionally, you might want to peruse how TQM is transforming with the digital age. The advent of new tools has brought new approaches to how we’re pursuing quality.

Conclusion

Is Lean Six Sigma in education possible? Certainly, but it does mean you’ll have to change your approach to the methodology itself. However, when done correctly, you’re giving yourself the means to better improve the quality of education you’re delivering to your students.

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