Six Sigma is a work methodology applied to companies whose objective is to measure the company's operational efficiency and seek solutions and alternatives to improve it.
This methodology serves to eliminate variability, improve the quality, cost and time of any process or service. Together with the Lean improvement approach, it is one of the most advanced methodologies for process improvement.
Lean Six Sigma allows you to have processes under control at all times, establish measurable variables to analyze the operability of each of the areas of your company and define new strategies to optimize their efficiency.
With this, not only will operations improve, but you will also create a business identity in which the search for total quality and excellence will be your pillars.
The Six Sigma sub-methodologies: DMAIC and DMADV.
The Six Sigma methodology is subdivided into 2 sub-methodologies:
DMAIC: Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control.
This submethodology is used for those processes or products that already exist within the company. DMAIC studies the products or processes in the following way:
Define the process (Define) by mapping the process, identify the problems you may have and establish the final objective and the requirements to achieve it.
Measure the performance of the process (Measure) by recording the activities carried out during the process, while checking if the company has the capacity to meet the requirements of the processes.
Analyze the current process (Analyze) to see what the reasons are for the process to vary or underperform. That is, identify the faulty steps of the process.
Optimize the performance of the process (Improve) by eliminating the reasons that cause the failures in the process. For this, it is necessary to test different variants to find the optimal way to carry out the process.
Control the new process and its performance (Control) to avoid falling back into previous faulty ways of working. This process is usually done with poka-yoke, which is a quality technique that is applied in order to avoid errors in the operation of a system. For example, USB devices have a specific shape so that they can only be inserted correctly and, thus, their content can always be read.
DMADV: Define, Measure, Analyze, Design, Verify.
This sub-methodology is used for processes or products that do not yet exist and is made up of the following steps:
Define the procedures (Define) to follow in the process.
Prepare the measures (Measure) to be able to calculate the performance of the process.
Analyze what are the best practices and criteria (Analyze) to be able to measure and design the new process. To do this, the team studies the different activities of the process to check whether they add value or not, while trying to locate possible bottlenecks or errors. In this way, they can better review the requirements in order to meet the established objectives.
Design the process (Design) based on the established parameters to achieve the stipulated optimum performance.
Verify the process (Verify) by analyzing the performance of the process paying attention to the established metrics and parameters.
Benefits of Six Sigma.
Among the most important benefits of using Six Sigma in an organization are:
- Improve the quality of the products and/or services that the company offers.
- Improving customer satisfaction. It will have a more stable product, processes and services.
- Reduce operating costs by making processes more efficient.
- Reduce derived costs, returns and claims.
- Reduce delivery/response times for products or services we offer.
- Helps to solve recurring problems within the company's processes (those "usual" problems that we live with on a daily basis).
- Help decision making within the company.
- Helps to standardize processes and prevent "everyone from doing things their own way".
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