SIX SIGMA FOR PROCESS AND QUALITY IMPROVEMENT

2  Quality Management and Six Sigma in Perspective

Two primary sets of costs are involved in quality:
1. control costs
2. failure costs
Costs broken into four categories:
1. Prevention costs
2. Appraisal costs
3. Internal costs of defects
4. External costs of defects
3  Japanese Approaches to Quality

 In 1950 the Japanese government invited W. Edwards Deming (then a professor at New
York University) to give a series of lectures on quality control to help Japanese engineers
reindustrialize the country.

W. Edwards Deming:
o Major source of poor quality is variation
o Quality improvement the responsibility of top management
o All employees should be trained in use of problem solving tools and especially
statistical techniques

Deming’s 14 Points
1. Create constancy of purpose
2. Adopt the new philosophy
3. Cease dependence on mass inspection
4. End practice of awarding business on basis of price tags
5. Improve constantly and forever
6. Institute modern methods of training
7. Institute modern method of supervision
8. Drive out fear
9. Breakdown organizational barriers
10. Eliminate arbitrary numerical goals
11. Eliminate work standards and quotas
12. Remove barriers that reduce pride of workmanship
13. Institute a vigorous program of education and training
14. Push the 13 points everyday
8  Total Quality Management (TQM)

 Better to produce item right the first time than to try to inspect quality in
 Quality at the source - responsibility shifted from quality control department to workers
 History of TQM:
 o Dr. Shewart began using statistical control at the Bell Institute in 1930s
o Military standards developed in 1950s
o After World War II, Japanese Union of Scientist and Engineers began consulting
with Deming
o Deming Prize introduced in Japan in 1951
o Quality assurance concept proposed in 1952
o Juran makes first trip to Japan in 1954
o Quality becomes Japan’s national slogan in 1956
o First quality circles created in 195710,000 quality circles by 1966
o 100,000 quality circles by 1977
o First U.S. quality circle 1974

Five Steps in TQM:

1. Determine what customers want
2. Develop products and services
3. Develop production system
4. Monitor the system
5. Include customers and suppliers

Joseph Juran
 Quality Control Handbook (1951)
 Employees speak in different languages
 Quality Trilogy
 Quality Planning
 Quality Control
 Quality Improvement
 Need to place more emphasis on planning and improvement

Organizations progress through four phases:

1. Minimize prevention and appraisal costs
2. Appraisal costs increased
3. Process control introduced increasing appraisal costs but lowering internal and
external failure costs
4. Prevention costs increased in effort to lower total quality costs
14  A Brief History of Six Sigma

 The Six Sigma concept was developed by Bill Smith, a senior engineer at Motorola, in
1986 as a way to standardize the way defects were tallied.
 Sigma is the Greek symbol used in statistics to refer to standard deviation which is a
measure of variation.
 Adding “six” to “sigma” combines a measure of process performance (sigma) with the
goal of nearly perfect quality (six).
 
In the popular book The Six Sigma Way, Six Sigma is defined as: a comprehensive and
flexible system for achieving, sustaining and maximizing business success.
 Six Sigma is uniquely driven by close understanding of customer needs, disciplined use
of facts, data, and statistical analysis, and diligent attention to managing, improving, and
reinventing business processes.

Six Sigma projects generally follow a well-defined process consisting of five phases.
1. Define
2. Measure
3. Analyze
4. Improve
5. Control
17  The DMAIC Improvement Process

THE DEFINE PHASE:

 The define phase of a DMAIC project focuses on clearly specifying the problem or
opportunity, what the goals are for the process improvement project, and what the
scope of the project is.
 Identifying who the customer is and their requirements is also critical given that the
overarching goal for all Six Sigma projects is improving the organization’s ability to meet
the needs of its customers.
 Defining and Measuring Quality

 Conformance to specifications
 Performance
 Quick response
 Quick-change expertise
 Features
 Reliability
 Durability
 Serviceability
 Aesthetics
 Perceived quality
 Humanity
 Value


Benchmarking:
Benchmarking involves comparing an organization's processes with the best practices to be
found. Benchmarking is used for a variety of purposes, including:
 Comparing an organization's processes with the best organization's processes.
  Comparing an organization's products and services with those of other
organizations.
 Identifying the best practices to implement.
 Projecting trends in order to be able to respond proactively to future challenges
and opportunities.
23  Quality Function Deployment (QFD)
Two key drivers of an organization’s long-term competitive success are :
1. the extent to which its new products or services meet customers’ needs, and having
the organizational capabilities to develop and deliver such new products and
services.
2. Tools for helping translate customer desires directly into product service attributes.

Four Houses of Quality:

1. Customer requirements
2. Technical requirements
3. Component requirements
4. Process deployment requirements

THE MEASURE PHASE:

 The measure phase begins with the identification of the key process performance
metrics.
 Once the key process performance metrics have been specified, related process and
customer data is collected.
 Two commonly used process performance measures, namely,
o Defects per Million Opportunities (DPMO) and
o Process Sigma.
27  Defects Per Million Opportunities

 Earlier it was noted that a literal interpretation of Six Sigma is 3.4 defects per million
opportunities (DPMO).
 This may have caused some confusion for more statistically inclined readers, which we
shall now attempt to reconcile.

Process Sigma:
 How sigma itself can be used to measure the performance of a process.
 One way to measure the performance of a process is to calculate the number of
standard deviations the customer requirements are from the process mean or target
value.
30  DPMO for Alternative Process Sigma Levels
Motorola’s Assumption the Process Mean Can Shift by as Much as 1.5 Standard Deviations.
THE ANALYZE PHASE:

 In this phase our objective is to utilize the data that has been collected to develop and
test theories related to the root causes of existing gaps between the process’ current
performance and its desired performance .

Brainstorming:
The brainstorming approach:
o Do not criticize ideas during the brainstorming session.
o Express all ideas no matter how radical, bizarre, unconventional, ridiculous, or
impractical they may seem.
o Generate as many ideas as possible.
o Combine, extend, and/or improve on one another’s ideas.
35  Brainstorming: Actions to Enhance Team Creativity

 Create diversified teams.

 Use analogical reasoning.
 Use brain writing.
 Use the Nominal Group Technique.
 Record team ideas.
 Use trained facilitators to run the brainstorming session.
 Set high standards.
 Change the composition of the team.
 Use electronic brainstorming.
 Make the workplace a playground.
36  Cause and Effect Diagrams

37  Process Capability Analysis

39  THE IMPROVE PHASE:

Design of Experiments (DOE)
OFAT and 1FAT - one factor at a time.
Shortcomings:
 Not typically possible to test one factor at a time and hold all the other factors constant.
 Not possible to account for interactions or joint variation between variables
 some of the major considerations associated with DOE include:
o Determining which factors to include in the experiment.
o Specifying the levels for each factor.
o Determining how much data to collect.
o Determining the type of experimental design.

Taguchi Methods:
Design for Manufacturability (DFM)
- Procedure for statistical testing to determine best combination of product and
transformation system design that will make output relatively independent of
normal fluctuations in the production system
45  Statistical Quality Control

46  Chance Versus Assignable Variation

Chance variation is variability built into the system.
 Assignable variation occurs because some element of the system or some operating
condition is out of control.
 Quality control seeks to identify when assignable variation is present so that corrective
action can be taken.
47  Control Based on Attributes and Variables

 Inspection for Variables: measuring a variable that can be scaled such as weight, length,
temperature, and diameter.
 Inspection of Attributes: determining the existence of a characteristic such as
acceptable-defective, timely-late, and right-wrong.

Control Charts:
 Developed in 1920s to distinguish between chance variation in a system and variation
caused by the system’s being out of control - assignable variation.
 Repetitive operation will not produce exactly the same outputs.
 Pattern of variability often described by normal distribution.
 Random samples that fully represent the population being checked are taken.
 Sample data plotted on control charts to determine if the process is still under control.

Two Control Charts:

1. Sample Means Chart
2. Range Chart

SIX SIGMA IN PRACTICE

Six Sigma Roles:
 Master Black Belts.
 Black Belts.
 Green Belts.
 Yellow Belts.
 Supporting Roles: Champions/Sponsors. Process owners.

QUALITY IN SERVICES
 Measuring is difficult.
 Training in standard procedures often used to improve quality
 One way to measure quality of services is to use customer satisfaction surveys
  J.D. Power and Associates uses surveys to rate domestic airlines, hotel chains, and rental
car companies.
Service Defections
 Organizations should monitor customer defections
 feedback from defecting customers can be used to identify problem areas can
determine what is needed to win them back
 changes in defection rate can be used as early warning signal
69  Quality Awards/Certifications

70  The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award

 71  Chapter 4: Six Sigma for Process and Quality Improvement

ISO 9000Guidelines for designing, manufacturing, selling, and servicing products.
 Selecting an ISO 9000 certified supplier provides some assurance that supplier follows
accepted business practices in areas covered by the standard
 Elements of ISO 9000:
o Control of Inspection, Measuring, and Test Equipment
o Inspection and Test Status
o Control of Nonconforming Product
o Corrective and Preventive Action
o Handling, Storage, Packaging, Preservation, and Delivery
o Internal Quality Audits
o Training
o Servicing
o Statistical Techniques
o Management Responsibility
o Quality System
o Contract Review Design Control
o Document and Data Control
o Purchasing
o Control of Customer Supplied Product
o Product Identification and Traceability
o Process Control
o Inspection and Testing
 ISO 14000- Series of standards covering environmental management systems,
environmental auditing, evaluation of environmental performance, environmental
labeling, and life-cycle assessment.
o Intent is to help organizations improve their environmental performance
through documentation control, operational control, control of records, training,
statistical techniques, and corrective and preventive actions.