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Six Sigma DMAIC Phases Application in Y Company: A Case Study
Six Sigma DMAIC Phases Application in Y Company: A Case Study
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Mohammed Alkahtani
College of Engineering,
Industrial Engineering Department,
King Saud University,
Riyadh 11421, Saudi Arabia
Email: moalkahtani@ksu.edu.sa
Abstract: Six Sigma has been used by large organisations to improve the
performance of their manufacturing processes. The objective of this paper is to
analyse the problem of increasing demand of flour in wafer biscuit production
in Y Company. This problem leads to decrease profit and external customer
satisfaction. In this study, define, measure, analyse, improve and control
(DMAIC) methodology of Six Sigma is used to develop the solutions for the
problem. Root causes are determined by using cause-and-effect analysis. Pareto
chart helped to focus attention on the major important root causes. Moreover, a
brainstorming concept was conducted with experts from the production,
maintenance and quality control departments, which helped in formulating the
solutions. The study presents the applicability, feasibility and impact of
DMAIC methodology on the company, which carried out the reduction in
deviation rate of flour material usage from approximately 27.55–10.45% on the
production line.
Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Kaid, H., Noman, M.A.,
Nasr, E.A. and Alkahtani, M. (2016) ‘Six Sigma DMAIC phases application
in Y company: a case study’, Int. J. Collaborative Enterprise, Vol. 5, Nos. 3/4,
pp.181–197.
1 Introduction
Six Sigma is a successful tool used by companies to reduce cost, increase profitability,
reduce defects, reduce variations in the design and improve satisfaction of customer.
Six Sigma aims to combine statistical and quality tools into a standard methodology
designated by the acronym DMAIC, which is described as define, measure, analyse,
improve and control. DMAIC approach helps the company to identify the major root
cause of any problem. Six Sigma was released in 1990s by Motorola Corporation. This
approach has made Motorola Corporation to have high quality products, high profit and a
leader in the area. Hahn et al. (2000), Redling (2005) and Brue (2005) defined Six Sigma
as a business tool to reduce the defects and variations of the processes. The studies of
Markarian (2004) and Kumar et al. (2008) state that Six Sigma can not only be used in
industrial applications, but it can also be applied to improve business processes such as
Six Sigma DMAIC phases application in Y company 183
purchasing, logistics, airports, banks and hospitals. There are many other benefits that can
also be obtained from the application of Six Sigma such as an increase in operations
knowledge and participation of staffs in Six Sigma projects (Su et al., 2009; Banuelas
et al., 2005). DMAIC is an effective methodology to solve any problem in any service or
manufacturing industry. Several research papers have been published for product or
service quality, cost, performance, defect, waste, downtimes, customer satisfaction in
achieving operational excellent (Zhiying and Jing, 2006; Pan et al., 2007; Safwat and
Ezzat, 2008; Deshmukh and Lakhe, 2008). The basic tools of DMAIC methodology such
as statistical process control (SPC), cause-and-effect analysis, Pareto chart, failure mode
effect analysis (FMEA), process capability, one-way and two-way analysis of variance,
gauge repeatability and reproducibility and design of experiments have been used to
implement Six Sigma (Shu and Liu, 2011; Meng et al., 2011; Vijayakumar et al., 2013;
Gupta and Kumar, 2014).
It is taken for granted in the literature that some of the areas for applications
of Six Sigma in manufacturing and service sectors which are not explored yet with
full potential. For example, the areas of enhancement and integration of Six Sigma with
other quality initiatives, critical success factors for successful deployment of Six Sigma,
and Six Sigma implementation strategies. Therefore, in this paper, Six Sigma is used
to analyse the problem of increasing flour demand in wafer biscuit production in Y
Company. This problem leads to decrease profit and external customer dissatisfaction.
The DMAIC methodology was demonstrated using a case study to judge the
effectiveness of the integration testing.
Including Section 1, this paper provides a literature review of previous researchers
works related to Six Sigma in Section 2. The concept of DMAIC is discussed in
Section 3. The application of DMAIC on a case study is presented in Section 4. Finally,
Section 5 shows the conclusion and future work.
2 Literature review
From the statistical point of view, the term ‘Six Sigma’ is defined as having less than 3.4
defects per million opportunities or a success rate of 99.9997% (these computations
assume a 1.5 Sigma shift in the process mean, 1.5 to account for long-term variation)
where Sigma is a term used to represent the variation about the process average.
Similarly, in the business world, Six Sigma is defined as a business tool used to improve
business profitability, effectiveness and efficiency of all operations to meet or exceed
customer’s needs and expectations (Antony and Banuelas, 2002). In this section,
Six Sigma researches have been classified in three categories: tools and techniques
of Six Sigma, Six Sigma in manufacturing organisations and Six Sigma in service
organisations.
(Wessel, 2003). Antony and Banuelas (2002) presented the application of design of
experiment (DOE) with Six Sigma in order to find out the key process parameters which
affect the tensile strength of welded joints. Lazreg and Gien (2009) linked Six Sigma and
maintenance excellence with quality function deployment in order to improve model of
organisation maintenance function, eliminate the errors and reduces the cycle time of
maintenance. Yeung (2009) has explored the use of supplier, input, process, output and
customer (SIPOC) in Six Sigma to monitor product and services provision for customer
satisfaction. Process capability, gauge repeatability and reproducibility, one-way and
two-way analysis of variance, cause-and-effect analysis, Pareto chart, FMEA and DOEs
have been used to implement Six Sigma (Shu and Liu, 2011; Meng et al., 2011;
Vijayakumar et al., 2013; Gupta and Kumar, 2014).
application of Six Sigma in service sector is concentrated in a few services. Tang and Pei
(2010) analysed the main factors that affect customer satisfaction through combining
with the Six Sigma methodology and giving out advices on improving the service.
The study was focused on the phenomena of customer, waiting long time, so he is
unsatisfied with the bank counter service. Tenali et al. (2015) applied the Six Sigma
DMAIC model to improve the admissions to placements ratio in technical institute
through considering all the most important factors with psychological remoteness of
students.
3 DMAIC methodology
DMAIC phases are a typical Six Sigma methodology for process improvements by
reducing defects and process variations. Figure 1 illustrates the DMAIC phases; each
phase can be explained as follows:
Define: The define phase has three main components. The first step is to determine the
customer (internal and external) and carry out a voice of the customer (VOC) analysis to
find out the service, product or process features, which are critical to the customer’s view
of quality, called critical to quality (CTQ). The second part is performing an SIPOC
(supplier, input, process, output and customer) analysis to know the suppliers to the
process under study, the inputs provided by those suppliers, very high level of abstraction
of process flowchart under study, the process outputs and finally identify the customers
or market segments for the outputs. The third step is detailed process flowing; similar to
the high-level process flow, but each process section is mapped in more detail. Finally,
formulate and introduce problem statement, project scope and team goals.
Measure: The second phase of the DMAIC is to measure the current performance of the
process, and detect the factors that affect the behaviour of the process. Process definition
and data collection plan build validity and consistency into data. Data reflect process
performance and provide insight of the process. If a team wants to evaluate variation in a
186 H. Kaid et al.
process (process sigma), it will need to collect data. A data collection system is a type of
measurement system. The goal of the measure phase is to quantify and confirm the
problem; to clarify or revise the problem statement; to identify the steps in the current
process and to determine the wanted outcome. The measurement is one more step in the
way to make a fact-based decision. Measurement occurs at three different stages of the
process–inputs, process and outputs. Input measures represent measures of the key CTQs
(critical to quality characteristics) placed on suppliers. Moreover, input measures indicate
supplier performance and correlate to output measures. Process measures are internal to
the process and include key control elements for improving the output measures. Output
measures are used to determine how well customers’ CTQs are being satisfied.
Analysis: This phase analyses the data that were collected in the measure phase to
identify the potential root causes of the problem. Several quality tools are used to
determine root causes and its corresponding effect on the problem, such as Pareto
diagram, cause-and-effect analysis, five why analysis, and failure modes and effects
analysis. The outputs of this phase demonstrate the root causes that most likely affect
process variation.
Improve: The improve phase consists of developing and selecting the optimum or near
optimum solutions for the best results and most robust performance. There are many tools
used for improvement process, which are brainstorming and benchmarking. Four steps
are required to do improve phase.
• generate improvement alternatives or concepts
• evaluate and select solutions that capable of improving the process
• perform cost/benefit analysis
• validate the improvement.
Control: In this phase, the improvements are ensured to be standardised, revised,
documented and institutionalised. The new process is monitored via your defined metrics
and other measurement tools to assess their capability over time.
4 Case study
deformation, baking, cutting, creaming and packing. Then, the output is a final wafer
biscuit product. Finally, there are two customers, which are internal and external
customers. Figure 2 illustrates the SIPOC diagram for wafer biscuit product.
Figure 2 SIPOC for wafer biscuit product (see online version for colours)
Next, the process flow is designed to provide a complete depicted sequence of steps in
order to determine the flow in the process and opportunities for improvement. Figure 3
displays the process flow for wafer biscuit product.
Figure 4 shows the flour usage per month during the period. The figure shows that the
required quantities per month are different because the monthly demand is different.
Moreover, there is a high deviation from required value. That is to say, there is a lost in
flour usage per month. The flour deviation rate is shown in Figure 5. The capability of the
process has been evaluated using process capability analysis based on flour deviation
rate, which has been performed by using the statistical software Minitab16. Figure 6
illustrates the Minitab results, which indicates that Cp and Cpk are equal as 0.21. That is to
say, a substantial part of process output will be out of specifications. Therefore, the
results recommend that more efforts are required to reduce the flour deviation rate.
188 H. Kaid et al.
Figure 3 Process flow for wafer biscuit product (see online version for colours)
Figure 4 Flour usage per month (see online version for colours)
Figure 5 Flour deviation rate per month (see online version for colours)
Figure 6 Process capability analysis of production line (see online version for colours)
Next, Pareto chart is used to point out the most frequently flour loss areas and their
defects. Figure 7 displays Pareto chart of flour loss areas, the maximum lost flour appears
in ovens, packaging machines and cutting machines areas. Moreover, Figure 8 displays
Pareto chart of defects types in areas, the major types of defects that contributed to the
flour to be lost are pasting on the templates, high humidity, crumbs through the cutting,
increasing weights and high bubbles. Therefore, these areas and defects need to be
tackled. In particular, these defects contribute 85% to the overall lost quantity. Therefore,
the improvement team decided to focus on the reduction of these defects.
190 H. Kaid et al.
Figure 7 Pareto chart of flour loss area (see online version for colours)
The analysis was performed to find the root cause(s) of the problem. Brainstorming
session based on the experiences of management and improvement team members was
conducted to identify possible causes of these defects. The cause-and-effect diagram was
constructed to illustrate and categorise the possible causes of the problem. Once finished,
the diagram assisted to find the root causes and provided improvement ideas. In general,
six main categories are used in a cause-and-effect diagram, which are material, man,
maintenance, management, machine and environment. The brainstormed root causes are
presented in the cause-and-effect diagram that shown in Figure 9. Through the analysis of
diagram, we can assess that the main causes of flour loss are:
• oven templates and heaters
• cutting blades and speed
Six Sigma DMAIC phases application in Y company 191
• packaging vibration
• dough mixer downtimes
• added rework
• the temperature of work boundaries
• lack of preventive maintenance
• lack of regular inspection equipment.
Figure 8 Pareto chart of defects types in areas (see online version for colours)
Table 2 Proposed solution for obtained root causes from the improve phase
Table 2 Proposed solution for obtained root causes from the improve phase (continued)
Table 2 Proposed solution for obtained root causes from the improve phase (continued)
After implementing the suggested solutions, a pilot run was conducted and readings for
seven continuous samples were taken again to check for improvements. Figure 10
presents the Minitab results of process capability analysis of production line after
improvements, which indicates that Cp and Cpk are both equal as 0.70. It is evident that
the Cp has been increased by 233%, i.e., from 0.21 to 0.70, which means that most of the
process output will be out of specifications. Therefore, the results revealed that more
efforts are required to reduce the flour deviation rate.
Figure 10 Process capability analysis of production line after improvements (see online version
for colours)
from time to time in order to obtain appropriate results. This will facilitate the
observation tasks of the operators and the maintenance crew as they will only need to
review the date of previous and next service appeared on the sticker and will inform the
maintenance staff to perform the routine maintenance tasks on the machines. In addition,
the machine operators should be trained in quality control and assurance so that if there is
any change in the process, they should inform the quality supervisor on time. Proper
implementation of these suggestions will help out in eradicating the changes in the
process.
This paper presents the utilisation of DMAIC Six Sigma methodology, aiming to find
solutions for the problem of increasing flour demand in wafer biscuit production line at Y
Company. First, SIPOC and process flow were used to understand the problem and
identify the areas of improvement. Then, the data were gathered for 20 months and
analysed using Minitab software after which the process capability analysis in terms of
Cp and Cpk was used to evaluate the ability of the process to meet the target specification.
Next, root causes were identified by using cause-and-effect analysis. Pareto chart was
constructed to focus on the major root causes. Moreover, a brainstorming session was
conducted with management and improvement team members, which resulted in
successful formulation of the solutions. Finally, after DMAIC methodology
implementation, the Cp is enhanced by 233%, i.e., from 0.21 to 0.70, which indicates that
a substantial part of process output will be out of specifications. Therefore, the results
recommend that we more efforts are required to reduce the flour deviation rate. The
future research direction involves integrating DMAIC methodology with other quality
tools, conduct the methodology in solving problems of other products as a whole in the
company and calculate the weightage of each root cause using paired comparison method
or analytical hierarchy process.
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