AQM-II

Apparel Quality Management-II

McKesson Corporation

By

Pratik Raj

BFT/17/548

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McKesson Corporation is an American

company distributing pharmaceuticals and
providing health information technology,
medical supplies, and care management
tools. McKesson is based in Irving,
Texas and distributes health
care systems, medical supplies
and pharmaceutical products. Additionally,
McKesson provides extensive network
infrastructure for the health care industry;
also, it was an early adopter of technologies
like bar-code scanning for
distribution, pharmacy robotics,
and RFID tags.

It is a Fortune Global 500 company, and the

6th highest revenue generating company in
the United States.

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McKesson Corporation Case Study

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Six Sigma
Six Sigma is a disciplined, statistical-based, data-driven approach and
continuous improvement methodology for eliminating defects in a product,
process or service. Six Sigma can also be thought of as a measure of process
performance, with Six Sigma being the goal, based on the defects per million.

McKesson was one of the first health care information technology and
transactional businesses to adopt the Six Sigma methodology, a management
philosophy developed by Motorola that emphasizes setting strong objectives,
collecting data, and analyzing results to enhance business operations.

McKesson's deep experience with complex back office, supply chain, and
information technology in health care management projects has earned us
recognition as an industry leader. By implementing Six Sigma discipline, the
company has achieved outstanding results:

 Transformed business from function-oriented to process-oriented

 Achieved more than $100 million in internal savings
 Proven method to identifying and eliminating profit leaks
 Improved customer experience and service capabilities
 Gained a competitive and cost advantage

McKesson’s Six Sigma success extends to an increasing number of

customers that have been trained in the methodology and are improving their
own health care information technology processes. From adding new value to
our supply chain partnerships to building momentum for consulting services,
McKesson Six Sigma helps our business-and our customers' businesses-attain
operational excellence.

Quality Improvement through Six Sigma

Six Sigma helps us work better by using data to drive decision making and
promote continuous quality improvement across our company. Using problem-
solving tools, Six Sigma reduces defects and minimizes variances.

By improving processes, we can see fewer errors, faster cycle time and less
waste.

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In FY19, McKesson completed 405 Six Sigma projects, which had more than
$160 million in cost savings and avoidance across our company, suppliers and
customers.

One of Six Sigma’s key objectives is to train, coach, and mentor employee
talent, in order to deepen the operational excellence culture across McKesson.
In FY19, employees in the countries covered by our centralized learning
management system completed 1,269 Six Sigma training courses.

Here are a few of McKesson’s Six Sigma projects:

 Driving enhanced value through the supply chain: In FY19, the U.S.
Six Sigma team completed five customer and supplier engagements that focused
on the supply chain, from enhancing communication with the customers and
suppliers to increasing service level metrics and improving cycle time for
resolution of open items.
 Reducing paper by going digital: In 2018, a Lean Six Sigma Team
Green Belt project paved the way into the digital future. When medicines are
delivered, there are a number of documents that must be printed out and
enclosed with the delivery to fulfill official requirements. The Portuguese
colleagues challenged those requirements to make a step towards the future. The
idea: saving paper consumed by digitizing the documents. In order to get the
green light for this desired change, the project team closely collaborated with
the Portuguese legal authorities. Although the official requirements initially
stated printed versions, the Portuguese team reached agreement with the
authorities on how to digitize this step, fulfilling the legal obligation concerning
transport documents. This LSS initiative has a positive impact on the company’s
carbon footprint as well as pharmacies, who now have less paper waste.
 Tracking to better control precursor returns: Precursors are products
with active pharmaceutical ingredients that can be used to make illegal drugs,
such as methamphetamine. As part of McKesson Canada’s commitment to
Health Canada, Six Sigma led a team to create an automated tracking system. It
provides visibility along each step of a precursor return—from when the
product is created and shipped to the customer to when the physical return
comes back into the McKesson building for processing.
These are just a few of our Six Sigma successes. Whether it’s reducing defects
or streamlining processes, we look forward to tackling additional projects in
FY20 and beyond.

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Tools and Techniques

Over the years, companies have included numerous tools into the Six Sigma
approach to make them more effective and to eliminate possible gaps after its
application. Such toolsets include statistical and analytical tools both from
industrial engineering and operations research fields. In this instance, these tools
enrich the practical and industrial approach with a stronger theoretical basis to
achieve a better equipment and resources utilization.

Steps Process
Define Define the requirements and expectation of the
customers.  Define the project boundaries. 
Define the process by mapping the business flow.
Measure Measure the process to satisfy customer’s need. 
Develop a data collection plan. Collect and
compare data to determine issues and shortfalls.
Analyze Analyze the causes of defect and sources of
variation.  Determine the variation in the
process. Prioritize opportunities for future
improvement.
Improve Improve the process to eliminate variation.
Develop creative alternatives and implement
enhanced plan.
Control Control process variations to meet customer
requirements.  Develop a strategy to monitor
and control the improved process.  Implement
the improvements of systems and structures.

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References
https://www.mckesson.com/about-mckesson/corporate-citizenship/six-sigma/

http://www.ijste.org/articles/IJSTEV3I8064.pdf

https://isssp.org/resource-tags/mckesson/

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/55ca5306e4b0c0f75a3a7c8f/t/579b937a9de4bb9f9
baa83c1/1469813626595/APQC+Bradford+Case+Study.PDF

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