Six Sigma Define Phase

The define phase consists of:

1. Defining the Improvement Project you are going to undertake
2. Defining the process you are going to improve.

A. Defining The Project

A-1. Project Charter
“A project charter is a formal, typically short document that describes your project in its
entirety — including what the objectives are, how it will be carried out, and who the
stakeholders are.” (wrike.com)
You can also include detailed cost benefit analysis (CBA) wherein you calculate the
exact costs to be incurred and exact benefits to be realized.
You can also include a Multi-Generation Plan (MGP) to establish the milestones in
order to reach a long-term project goal in smaller steps and/or identify follow-up
project generations early on. This will also ensure uniform understanding of the
improvement process. An example of an MGP is given below.

A-2. Gantt Chart

Gantt chart or time line are a type of bar chart used in process/project planning and
control to display planned work and finished work in relation to time.

B. Defining The Process

A very crucial step is to define the process you want to improve. This will help identify
important aspects of the process and provide foundations for the Measure phase of
DMAIC methodology because what you measure will depend on understanding of what
the process is and what are its important aspects.
A number of tools can be used to understand the process and its important aspects.
B-1. SIPOC Diagram
SIPOC stands for Supplier-Input-Process-Output-Customer. It is a high level process
map, benefits of which are as under:
1. It helps visualize the overall process
2. It displays a cross-functional set of activities in a single and simple diagram
3. It uses a framework applicable to processes of all sizes
4. It helps to maintain a “big picture perspective” to which additional detail can be
added.
A typical SIPOC model for an assembly and packaging unit is presented below:

B-2. Flow Chart

A flowchart depicts in a pictorial form, the

sequence in which conditions are to be tested

and process activities carry out a particular task.

See the example.

B-3. Quality Function Deployment (QFD)
QFD is a systematic way of documenting and breaking down customer needs into
manageable and actionable detail. It is a planning methodology that organizes relevant
information to facilitate better decision making and a way of reducing the uncertainty
involved in product and process design.
The basic building block of QFD is the house of quality. It is represented in a
multidimensional matrix sometimes called L-matrix and shows the correlation between
“What’s” and “How’s” of the process stages. The figure below shows the structure of
house of quality. A full QFD product design project will involve a series of these
matrices, translating from customer and competitive needs all the way down to detailed
process specifications. It helps to identify the critical quality characteristics. The
characteristics critical to quality (CTQ) are nothing but a product feature or process step
that must be controlled to guarantee that you deliver what the customer wants.
B-4. Critical to Quality Tree
The critical-to-quality tree helps translate the voice of the customer—customer needs
and wants stated in their own words—into measurable product or process
characteristics stated in the organization’s terms and with performance levels or
specifications that will ensure customer satisfaction.
Procedure:
1. List customer requirements for the product or service in their own words. Place each
requirement in a box in the first tier of a tree diagram.
2. Address the first requirement. Ask questions to make the requirement more specific.
Useful questions include:
• What does this really mean to the customer?
• What does this mean for each subsystem or step in our process?
•How could we measure this?
Don’t get too specific too fast. Keep the answers only one step more detailed than the
first tier. Write answers in a second tier of the tree diagram.
3. Do a “necessary and sufficient” check of the answers. Ask two questions:
• “Is meeting each of these characteristics necessary in order for the customer to
be satisfied that the initial requirement was met?” If the requirement can be
achieved without meeting a characteristic, that characteristic should be removed.
• “Would meeting all these characteristics be sufficient for the customer to be
satisified that the initial requirement was met?” If the characteristics are not
sufficient, decide what is missing and add it.
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 for each answer in the second tier, creating a third tier.
Continue until you have reached characteristics at a level of detail that are meaningful
to the organization and can be measured.
5. Repeat steps 2 through 4 for each customer requirement identified in step 1. It is not
necessary that each branch of the tree be the same length.
6. Check that all the characteristics at the end of each branch are measurable. Use
operational definitions to clarify them. These are critical-to-quality (CTQ) characteristics.
7. Define targets for each measure.
Example:
Ben-Hur’s Pizza wishes to add home delivery to their services in order to expand their
business. They have surveyed current and potential customers to determine what would
make them order Ben-Hur pizza instead of a competitors’ or instead of a different kind
of food. Summarized VOC data told them that when customers order-in pizza, they
want “hot pizza, now, with my choice of toppings and crusts, at a reasonable cost.” To
learn what this means in more detail, they constructed a CTQ tree.