Recently, I’ve met a lot of executives in companies and organisations who have asked a common question: “How do we combine Six Sigma with lean management?” Or “We’ve implemented Six Sigma, so how do we introduce lean?” “And vice versa.
Here’s my views and some practical experience.
First, we have to figure out what Lean is and what is Six Sigma Of course, everyone’s understanding may be different. Therefore, first let’s look at the purest definitions of these two to get closer to their essence.
What is Lean?
The core concept of lean is to eliminate all kinds of waste in the process of corporate activities, advocate pulling operation from the customer side, and continuous production in the form of a single piece flow according to the takt time This allows the maximum possible added value of business activities.
Lean is actually an idea of how a business works, not a tool! Lean defines what “value” is from the customer’s point of view, not from the company’s point of view Think that the product or service provided is value.
Once this is clear, value-added, and non-value-added activities across the enterprise are easily identified.
The next step is to figure out how to “appropriately” eliminate non-value-added activities so that the product or service flows smoothly to the customer. Here, eliminating waste step by step and just right is key.
Lean places a strong emphasis on human factors, such as employee morale, proficiency, total involvement, continuous improvement thinking, and so on. More is intuitive judgment and simple data analysis.
The problems encounter in the implementation process are:
Employee resistance, lack of change thinking, employee instability, various operating processes are not standardise, quality is unstable, etc.
What is Six Sigma?
The main purpose of Six Sigma is to eliminate or reduce variation in the value process. In practice, Six Sigma emphasizes the leadership of the top management and the support of the organizational structure, works in the form of project teams, and uses many powerful statistical analysis tools, such as DOE, hypothesis testing, etc. The common problems encountered in the implementation process are unrepresentative data, errors in statistical analysis tools, one-sided pursuit of formalization, lack of good control after process improvement, and employees are afraid of statistical tools.
A combination of the two!
A process full of variation cannot be smooth! As mentioned above, lean is a macro way of thinking about business operations, and Six Sigma provides a very powerful analytical tool.
Our approach is usually to develop a detailed lean long-term implementation plan for the company, including the state you will achieve in the future, the tools you will use, and when, where, and by whom Persons responsible for the implementation of tasks, etc. Without this vision, Six Sigma experts will not understand the direction and plans of the entire organisation and the impact of implementing Six Sigma on the entire enterprise.
Their role and impact are limited to the “point”. Where the identify problem is locates, reducing variability. From a lean point of view, most of the business activities within a value stream (including services, production, administrative) can be classify as a non-value-added component.
So, when Six Sigma experts go to solve problems and reduce variation, they are faced with the fact that this “problem” is often replaced or changed! Because companies need to build a smoother value stream and do less waste! Once you have the plan and tools in place, it’s time to carve out where Six Sigma experts come in.
Lean can be used as a macro strategic strategy of the enterprise and develop phased plans adapted to it, determine direction, scope, and process, and then improve it in combination with Six Sigma tools.
On-site improvement is a good reflection of the strengths of lean, simple, and intuitive, quick results, and DMAIC Projects combine to exert greater effect. For most Indian companies, there is still a big gap in standardization and stabilization.
Conclusive
The author’s suggestion is to first carry out enterprise diagnosis, use value stream mapping tools for analysis, formulate future status and development implementation plans according to the characteristics and development direction of enterprises, and then flexibly use a variety of lean and Six Sigma tools according to the implementation plan to achieve continuous improvement goals in stages and gradually enhance the long-term competitiveness and operating efficiency of enterprises.
The author insists that lean represents an important strategic direction for the operation. As well development of enterprises in the new era. The Six Sigma can be implement as the height of corporate strategy. But it cannot provide the strategic direction of enterprise development.
Think about the operation of the enterprise from a lean perspective, help the company establish a clear future state implementation plan, and use the advantages of Six Sigma to reduce the variation of value streams.
The result is that the strengths and benefits of Six Sigma become part of the company’s strategy and direction. The Six Sigma’s contribution to the success of change across the enterprise is maximise. Including increasing business effectiveness and customer satisfaction. Six Sigma management experts are no longer alone, or just improving on “points”. Because Six Sigma has been integrate into the long-term growth and success of the business.