Better Management Through Lean Six Sigma

The average company can benefit from the discipline of lean and Six Sigma to manage quality and streamline the organization. ...

... "That's the power of Lean Six Sigma - having more profit from streamlining your existing processes, which will then free up resources to do the things you simply don't have time to do. " ...

Via Nova Scotia Business Journal: Six Sigma results

Process Improvement Portal Discussed

Use of portals to enable process improvement is discussed ...

Business Process Excellence Seminars

Upcoming process excellenc seminars ...

... "PROCESS IMPROVEMENT METRICS -- LEAN SIX SIGMA METRICS: July 22, CPCC Harris Campus. Speaker: Gary Klipp ... " ...

Via Charlotte Observer: Business Calendar

Six Sigma DMADV for Business Process Improvements

Six Sigma methodology can become your foundation for improvement of business processes. DMAIC or DMADV framework can provide the steps necessary to define opportunities, create change, and drive adoption. As companies implement and upgrade ERP systems, the improvement of business process is necessary to create value from the investment. ...

... "It not only provides the framework for setting up new business processes, but also for redesigning processes that have reached their inherent performance limits. The DMADV model includes the project phases of define, measure, analyze, design, and verify. " ...

Via SAP INFO: BPI, Improving Business Processes

Process Excellence with Six Sigma Discipline

IDS Scheer and Minitab will partner to integrated their solutions to enable Six Sigma methodology to visualize and enhance enterprise operational performance. ...

... "Customers need BPM to constantly align their processes with business needs. ARIS Six Sigma combines IDS Scheer's proven Business Process Excellence approach and Six Sigma's statistics-driven view. This not only guarantees visibility of the specific reasons for weak points in critical processes, but also enables customers to implement processes for continuous improvement. " ...

Via IDS Scheer AG: Unified Six Sigma Offering for Business Process Excellence

Perfect Process

Six Sigma seminar this spring ...

... "Creating Perfect Processes -- Six Sigma and Process Control, April 22, RCCC's Cabarrus Business & Technology Center. Speaker: Vinay Vasudev. " ...

Via Charlotte Observer: BUSINESS NOTES

Kanban 2-Bin System Supports Visual Reordering

Kanban system coupled with mobile scanning devices makes for lean inventory and procurement replenishment process. ...

TQM Total Quality Across the Organization

Total quality management requires a rethinking of the organization. The workforce should be enabled through training and mentoring. Roles should be defined to monitor quality in the process. And, the organization should understand how the customer values quality. ...

... "Put simply, Total Quality Management (TQM) is the process of instilling quality throughout an organisation and its business processes. " ...

Via Economic Times: Quality management

Hospital Lean Thinking Enabled By RFID Technology

Hospital will digitize lean thinking through the use of RFID technology in healthcare processes. ...

... "HealthIT Cluster chief executive Andrea Pettet says the trial aims to use RFID tagging to ease overcrowding in emergency departments, using the principles of lean thinking. " ...

Via Stuff.co.nz: Hospital Patient Tracking

Hospital Operational Efficiency

Kaizen and IT-enabled Processes Expected to Make Healthcare More Efficient and Effective

Lean practices are applied to healthcare in the UK as management systems are improved. ...

... "The Kaizen problem-solving system will also be applied to the turnaround time for lab tests, such as biopsy samples, which will help speed up diagnoses. Much of the work is likely to involve better use of IT systems ... " ...

Via The Scotsman: NHS Lothian

Leverage Information Technology in the Lean Manufacturing Environment

Information technology has role in the lean manufacturing enterprise of the future. ...

... "New competitive threats have emerged in Asia, and ahead-of-the curve manufacturers are leveraging IT not only to help establish partnerships in places like China, but to extract more out of their lean-manufacturing strategies, optimize business processes, enable growth, and learn more about their customers. " ...

Via Wisconsin Technology: Manufacturing IT

Lean Six Sigma Maritime Shipping Processes

Maersk partners with Mason School of Business to develop and deliver Lean Six Sigma training program for the company focused on business processes that enable maritime shipping. ...

... "The contract represents a customized engagement, where the faculty of the Mason School designed the Lean Six Sigma training and project management program to fit Maersk's unique needs and operating environment. Participants in the program will represent Maersk's key operating and business processes that will bring added value to its operations by using Lean Six Sigma methods to dramatically improve the effectiveness and efficiency of their processes. Lean Six Sigma is an integrated methodology, applying in a harmonized way two proven, powerful management methodologies: Lean and Six Sigma. Of these, Lean is primarily concerned with ensuring the efficiency of processes, so that they operate at minimum cost and at maximum speed, using resources in an optimal way. Six Sigma, on the other hand, focuses chiefly on process effectiveness, that is, customer satisfaction, high quality and near-zero defect rates. These methods have been known and used in business and industry for some time, primarily in a stand-alone mode. Integrated training and deployment of the two is a more recent development, where the Mason School's faculty has done groundbreaking work, based on long academic and hands-on industrial experience. " ...

Via College of William and Mary: Mason School of Business Partners with World's Largest Maritime Shipping Company

Six Sigma Supplier Development

Xcitec uses Six Sigma methodology to create supplier optimization projects that translate into successful supplier relationships. ...

... "Xcitec supplier development based on Six Sigma is carried out in 5 process steps (DMAIC = define, measure, analyze, improve, control): development projects are defined, measures established, causes documented and corresponding solutions and goals are set. Process progress is routinely measured and monitored in order to secure supplier development and to sustainably optimize cooperation with suppliers. Supplier and purchasers receive regular updates regarding development progress and the degree of implementation for the optimization measures. " ...

Via Xcitec: Strategic Purchasing

Business Process Improvement

Lean and Six Sigma are great methods if applied properly. A good understanding of the underlying business and business processes is critical. ...

... "And yet, some laboratory managers take six sigma and lean tools and misuse them. Incorrectly used, these tools can endanger the viability of a pathology department and the quality of the service. " ...

Via Medical Laboratory World: Business Process Improvement

Business Process Improvement through Six Sigma

CEO charts strategy to improve profitability and drive growth, targeting the use of Six Sigma to create disciplined business processes. ...

... "Improve the logistics of the Company's tissue supply operations in Detroit, USA. Our US operation has seen significant revenue growth from 2005 to 2006. In order to position the Company for future growth, action will be taken to standardise and systemise our key processes and biobank operations, via a six sigma review. " ...

Via Asterand: Strategy Announcement

Financial Services Business Process Improvement Use SixSigma

Information technology is not leading Six Sigma business process improvement in financial services. ...

... "majority of global financial services companies are using some form (or combination) of modern process improvement methodologies such as Lean, Six Sigma or Process Management. " ...

Via Bank Systems and Technology: Bank Process Improvement

Cummins Six Sigma Exemplary

Cummins is an exemplar in the application of Six Sigma to all business process and has integrated the methodology into its culture. ...

... "The diesel-engine maker estimates it has completed 2,500 Six Sigma projects since 2000, saving or avoiding more than $1.4 billion in costs. " ...

Via Indianapolis Star: Six Sigma Success Story

Six Sigma Customer Interactions

Covad differentiates in the hosting space through Six Sigma in the customer-facing business processes. ...

... "Covad partners with Source 1 HTMT on a six sigma process to continuously improve customer interactions. This is supplemented by other key vendor relationships, including third party quality monitoring and consulting. Continuous auditing, clarification and refinement of existing processes are also provided, for quality assurance and specialized, targeted customer solutions. " ...

Via Covad: Covad to Present at 2007 Outsourcing World Summit

Lombardi LeanSixSigma Business Process Management BPM Webinar

Webinar will explore integration of Lean Six Sigma and BPM initiatives. ...

... "live webinar: Connecting BPM and Lean Six Sigma. The hour-long event will broadcast on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 at 2:00 p.m. ET (18:00 GMT). Master Black Belt Lance Gibbs of Lombardi will discuss how companies can leverage existing Lean Six Sigma practices and assets in their BPM initiatives. He will discuss how companies that are doing BPM projects today can get started with Lean Six Sigma concepts, as well as how Lean Six Sigma practitioners can help get their companies' BPM projects started on the right foot. " ...

Lombardi and Industry Expert Highlight Connecting Business Process Management With Lean Six Sigma (LSS) Initiatives

JosephAbboud Lean Manufacturing Process

Men's clothing manufacturer, Joseph Abboud, is committed to on-shore manufacturing as its competes in a global environment through lean manufacturing principles. ...

... "Joseph Abboud's recently completed state-of-the-art distribution center is just one facet of the company's plan to expand the capabilities at its Belleville Avenue facility, while beginning to embrace a lean manufacturing process. " ...

Via SouthCoastToday: Link

SixSigma: Incremental Business Process Improvement Best

Hackett Group research sees Six Sigma as best utilized to support continuous improvement in shared service / back-office processes. Hackett finds that Six Sigma may be inappropriately applied to enterprise transformations, where it is weak. ...

... "Many Hackett clients find Six Sigma to be a powerful tool for incremental improvement. Using a combination of Six Sigma and LEAN, one U.S. client was able to achieve major progress in accounts payable, including a 50% reduction in payment processing time, largely by identifying errors and eliminating non-value-added activities. At another Hackett client, Six Sigma played a key role in their ability to decrease cycle times and reduce costs as they built a global shared services organization. Overall, Hackett's research shows that 86% of all finance shared services organizations have a strong commitment to continuous improvement programs such as Six Sigma. " ...

Via The Hackett Group: Six Sigma Not a Silver Bullet for Back-Office Improvements

SixSigma CEO: New Business Pedigree

Larry Ryan, PhD and Six Sigma-certified business leader, is named the new Chief Executive Officer of SulphCo. ...

... "Dr. Ryan comes to SulphCo from the General Electric Advanced Materials Division, where he led the Elastomers and RTV business. Dr. Ryan has a PhD from the University of Delaware, a Six-Sigma Blackbelt certification, and a long history of working with chemical process-dependent technologies. " ...

Via Yahoo! Finance: SulphCo Appoints New CEO and Chairman ...

Efficiency Program: Lean Manufacturing Training

SPX Cooling Technologies implements lean manufacturing to position the company to compete in the global marketplace. ...

... "They needed to retrain all their existing workers and wanted to install a more lean, advanced manufacturing process in order to become more competitive in the global environment ... " ...

Via Kansas City Business Journal: Read

Six Sigma Marketing ROI

Marketing is key to a successful business strategy that is focused on growth. A disciplined process is necessary for implementing marketing strategies that transform the business' commercial success. ...

... "In fact, the ROI process at Dow Corning actually emerged from its Voice of the Customer (Six Sigma) efforts." ...

Via MarketingProfs: Marketing ROI in 2007 ...

Executive Appointment: Six Sigma Philosophy Key

Executive appointed to drive efficiency and business process improvements through Six Sigma perspective. ...

... "In his new position, Mr. O'Keeffe will transform TNS Custom Research's Operations and MCP into best-in-class organizations by driving business-side efficiency and process improvements and by leveraging process and work-flow expertise gained from a decade of work with the Six Sigma philosophy. He will also be responsible for collaborating with TNS' global headquarters to help develop the company's overall global operations strategy. " ...

Via TNS: TNS Announces Michael O'Keeffe as Executive Vice President, Operations and MCP and Larry Levin as Executive Vice President, U.S. Consumer Goods & Services ...

Six Sigma Moto Legacy

Motorola has been able to integrate Six Sigma into its culture while accelerating its innovation engine. ...

... "the company's more lasting contribution to the world is something decidedly more wonkish: the quality-improvement process called Six Sigma. " ...

Via Business Week: Link

Balanced Scorecard Decision Support

Financial company deploys BI software to enable decision support through a balanced scorecard. ...

... "Pentaho Corp., creator of the world's most popular open source business intelligence (BI) suite, announced that Italian commercial finance firm Unionfidi S.C. has deployed Pentaho’s Open BI Suite to deliver a balanced scorecard, reporting, and analysis application that provides vital information and decision support to multiple departments. This application, built with the Pentaho Open BI Suite and called UFIntelligence, is deployed to Unionfidi S.C. employees in risk management, accounting, human resources, marketing, and other departments: said Davide De Ruvo, CIO at Unionfidi S.C.. The centerpiece of this application is a balanced scorecard that provides key metrics from multiple business perspectives including financial, customer, business process, and learning and growth. Our users also have access to supporting reports and analytical views linked to the scorecard, and receive standard reports relevant to their roles via e-mail. Users in the Loans Department, for example, receive frequent, timely reports on customer loan deadlines. " ...

Via Pentaho: Italian Financial Firm Unionfidi S.C. Deploys Pentaho for Enterprise Business Intelligence ...

Six Sigma Dashboard: Performance Management

Performance management enables focus on the Six Sigma banner metrics that drive cultural change. ...

... "Her company taps a bag of PM-oriented tricks, ranging from balanced scorecards to Six Sigma-all of which must be managed and tracked at the people, process, and technology levels. " ...

Via Enterprise Systems: Link

Lean 80 SixSigma 20: Air Force Operations

Air Force embraces Lean Six Sigma to change its culture with an eye towards an 80/20 split, when the improvement situation warrants. ...

... "Chief Norris agreed and said the wing is looking to use Lean tools about 80 percent of the time, and Six Sigma, Theory of Constraints and Business Process Re-engineering tools the other 20 percent. " ...

Via Air Force Link: USAFE's 1st AFSO 21 manager to Lean up Spangdahlem

Kaizen Toyota Corolla Dependabiity ...

Toyota Corolla's dependability is a result of relentless focus on continuous improvement through kaizen. ...

... "Every process -- from assembly operations to the paint shop, from bringing in parts to loading finished cars on trucks or trains -- has been refined. Toyota calls it kaizen, or continuous improvement. " ...

Via SanJose Mercury: The bestselling car ever

Microsoft CIO: GE SixSigma Disciple ...

CIO Stuart Scott, who has a background in Six Sigma from GE, speaks about the evolution of his role from an applications and business-process-focus to full CIO responsibility for driving IT innovation at Microsoft. ...

... "PressPass: It's said that you're a Six Sigma black belt. Could you explain what that means and why it's an asset, and tell us how you parlay that sort of expertise into success in your role as CIO? Scott: Six Sigma is a data-driven process for making business decisions and choosing investments that help ensure a return for your business. It's a discipline in which you use analytical tools to draw out statistically significant information. So if you're talking to customers, for example, you want to do that in such a way that you come away with a genuine understanding of what they want, and you grasp the difference between what you could do to make those customers feel better vs. what's critical to enabling those customers to be successful, and what's critical to Microsoft's growth. Using good data and analytical tools, you can invest in programs like improving the business or putting in a new information system with the confidence that you'll achieve the desired result in terms of incremental business value. For me, that's always measured in a ledger. Any benefit we talk about has to be quantified in a way that demonstrates increased shareholder value. " ...

Via Microsoft: Microsoft CIO Stuart Scott Outlines the Company's Commitment to People-Ready Business

Stuart Scott practices project portfolio management as CIO at GE. ...

Via CIO Magazine: Deciding Factors: "STUART SCOTT MAY BE the vice president and CIO of GE Industrial Systems, but he sees himself as a venture capitalist. "

Project Management Office PMO: Six Sigma Gate Process

Chiquita strengthens its leadership team. New CIO has background in project management offices PMO with Six Sigma process methods. ...

... "Singh came to Chiquita from Gillette in Singapore where he served as director, Asia Pacific business systems and regional chief information officer for four years. He combined three independent IT organizations into a single unit responsible for all Asia Pacific IT operations. In addition, he developed a regional project management office and drove the creation of a project development and approval process tailored to Asia Pacific needs and which incorporated Six Sigma concepts while also leading the regional SAP, JDE, and Fourth Shift enterprise resource planning teams. " ...

Via Chiquita Brands International: Chiquita Announces Organizational Changes To Facilitate Market Growth Opportunities ...

Executive Career Path: Six Sigma Manufacturing Manager

Ingersoll-Rand executive appointed. Has diverse career path that includes supply chain, information technology, and Six Sigma process improvement. ...

... "Gauld began his career in manufacturing with General Electric, where he moved though a variety of operations functions and applied his background in operations management to the development of more effective processes and systems. This focus led him to the role of manufacturing systems manager, in which he was responsible for driving Six Sigma initiatives and for implementing standardized systems across the business. He subsequently was promoted to chief information officer for GE's Electrical Distribution and Controls business. " ...

Via Ingersoll Rand: Ingersoll Rand Appoints William B. Gauld Senior Vice President, Enterprise Services ...

Six Sigma Key to Boardroom ...

Six Sigma professional joins company board of directors. ...

... "Dave is a business improvement consultant that specializes in the meeting and event industry. His company assists organizations in realizing top and bottom line growth by delivering customer focused solutions in business development, best practice and process improvement, strategic planning and training. Dave is certified in Lean Processes & DFSS for Six Sigma. " ...

Six Sigma Key to Boardroom: Via Passkey: Dave Lutz Named to Passkey Board of Directors ...

Passkey is the worldwide leader in online group hotel reservations. The Boston-based technology company offers event attendees, planners and providers with a powerful web-based on-Demand solutions that lets them make, monitor and manage their group hotel reservations Online.

Lean Kaizen: Team Drives Improvements ...

Kiesler Enterprises, a high-end custom cabinetry manufacturer, uses lean techniques to optimize performance for high growth and efficiency. ...

... "We also conducted Kaizens, short bursts of activity that result in significant improvements with the team. The Kaizen process helped redefine the relationship and interaction between sales and drafting. Both departments now combine resources and steps, said Joseph Murcko, project manager for the Arizona MEP. " ...

Via Yahoo: Custom Cabinetry Company Builds with Lean ...

The Arizona MEP is an affiliate of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) under the U.S. Department of Commerce. The national MEP is a network of manufacturing extension centers that provide business and technical assistance to smaller manufacturers in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Through MEP, manufacturers have access to more than 2000 manufacturing and business coaches whose job is to help firms make changes that lead to greater productivity, increased profits, and enhanced global competitiveness.

Training Opportunity: Six Sigma Process ...

Funding grants are available for Six Sigma process improvement training ...

... "Business services and healthcare organizations are also encouraged to apply for funds to train employees in process improvement initiatives such as lean manufacturing, ISO and Six Sigma. Organizations in these industries can request up to $25,000 per application for training that can be completed in 12 months or less. " ...

Via Democrat & Chronicle: Business

Via ETA: Secretary of Labor Elaine L. Chao Announces $195 Million for President Bush's Competitiveness Agenda: "The goal of the WIRED initiative is to transform regional economies by enlisting the skills of the numerous and varied players in those economies to research and produce long-term strategic plans that prepare workers for high-skill, high-wage opportunities in the coming years and into the next decade. "