Strategic Six Sigma Management: Implementation and Benefits

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Lorenzo Del Marmol

March 21, 2014

Strategic Six Sigma

Strategic Six Sigma Management: Implementation and Benefits

We think that what’s great about Six Sigma is that it benefits any aspect of any industry when done right. But we also think that, as manager, if your take it a step further into strategic Six Sigma, you can gain the full range of benefits. Although it’s all right for companies to implement this initiative to create silos for company production, a strategic approach is going to create the long-lasting, transformative change that your company needs to survive ‘forever’.

When Motorola developed Six Sigma in the 1980s, they thought simply about cutting costs, improving processes and accelerate production cycles. Now, businesses employ it as a high-level LEADERSHIP tool to transform companies into lean, mean, zero-defect and zero-variance machines. On the strategic level, Six Sigma can guarantee a constant customers satisfaction, growth and relevance for any company in any industry. Who can attest to this? GE, Dow Chemical and Lockheed Martin all adhere to strategic Six Sigma and know how powerful it is.

The initial approach of silos and piecemeal intervention of Six Sigma is expected, but strategic approaches want the initiative to permeate the whole company. There are four basic steps to applying strategic Six Sigma in your company. As manager or as business owner keep in mind that it’s best for a Black Belt to implement these:

  1. Determine how your company adheres to customer needs and wants.
  2. Establish which processes will reduce variations that do not align with what the customer wants.
  3. Developing new products and services that meet customer satisfaction.

Once you’re done implementing these, go back and do it again. The key a strategic Six Sigma approach is that you must keep yourself innovative to your customers by adapting to the changes in their emotions and the market trends. If done correctly beyond the usual Six Sigma implementation, you can expect your company to weather anything the market experiences.

Although we like to give our readers inspiration and hope for their companies, we also know when to give them caution. Be prepared for a rocky start to your strategic Six Sigma project. Keep in mind that the results of your endeavour isn’t going to be the shallow, transactional data that your sales produce. Although you have to pay close attention to your sales and your metrics, you need to look at the transformational level.

 You have to take into consideration how your culture, leadership, mission and vision and employee satisfaction changes throughout the whole project. Everything must move forward and adhere to the strategy.

 What benefits can you reap when you apply Strategic Six Sigma effectively over a period of time? Here are the things you and your company can look forward to:

 1. You get a definite set of key performance metrics.

These numbers and data are going to keep your company up to a standard your customers expect and establish your dominance in your industry.

2. Knowledge on which specific improvement projects should be undertaken.

One of the hardest decisions to make in any business is which parts of your operation to concentrate on first. Only Strategic Six Sigma can identify these projects.

3. Leadership is always aligned with the projects.

Since you’ve trained your Black Belts and they’ve probably echoed their training to create other Green Belts, you can be sure that your company is slowly overrun by people who know about Six Sigma and how to maintain it.

4. Enhanced communication and engagement with your customers.

Since you’ve used customer satisfaction, wants and needs as the basis for your products and services, you have created incomparable value to your customers. Before you know it, you’ve made most of your clients into brand ambassadors simply because you’ve created a client experience they can expect and predict.

Voice of the Customer or VOC

Please share this insight to inspire operational excellence and customer satisfaction in every organisation. It’s free like this ad free article. Thank you :-)

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