Lean Six Sigma : Combining Six
Sigma Quality with Lean Production
Speed by Michael George
Excellent!
The Breakthrough Program for Increasing Quality, Shortening Cycle
Times, and Creating Shareholder Value In Every Area of Your
Organization Time and quality are the two most important metrics in
improving any companys production and profit performance. Lean Six
Sigma explains how to impact your companys performance in each, by
combining the strength of todays two most important initiatives--Lean
Production and Six Sigma--into one integrated program. The first book
to provide a step-by-step roadmap for profiting from the best elements of
Lean and Six Sigma, this breakthrough volume will show you how to:
* Achieve major cost and lead time reductions this year
* Compress order-to-delivery cycle times

* Battle process variation and waste throughout your organization
Separately, Lean Production and Six Sigma have changed the face of the
manufacturing business. Together, they become an unprecedented tool
for improving product and process quality, production efficiency, and
across-the-board profitability. Lean Six Sigma introduces you to todays
most dynamic program for streamlining the performance of both your
production department and your back office, and providing you with the
cost reduction and quality improvements you need to stay one step ahead
of your competitors. Lean Six Sigma shows how Lean and Six Sigma
methods complement and reinforce each other. If also provides a detailed
roadmap of implementation so you can start seeing significant returns in
less than a year.--From the Preface Businesses fundamentally exist to
provide returns to their stakeholders. Lean Six Sigma outlines a program
for combining the synergies of these two initiatives to provide your
organization with greater speed, less process variation, and more bottom-
line impact than ever before. A hands-on guidebook for integrating the
production efficiencies of the Lean Enterprise with the cost and quality
tools of Six Sigma, this breakthrough book features detailed insights on:
* The Lean Six Sigma Value Proposition--How combining Lean and
Six Sigma provides unmatched potential for improving shareholder value
* The Lean Six Sigma Implementation Process--How to prepare your
organization for a seamless incorporation of Lean Six Sigma tools and
techniques
* Leveraging Lean Six Sigma--Strategies for extending Lean Six
Sigmas reach within and beyond your corporate walls Variation is evil.--
Jack Welch Six Sigma was the zero-variation quality lynchpin around
which Jack Welch transformed GE into one of the worlds most efficient--
and valuable--corporations. Lean Production helped Toyota cut waste,
slash costs, and substantially improve resource utilization and cycle times.
Yet, as both would admit, there was still room for improvement. Lean Six
Sigma takes you to the next level of improvement, one that for the first
time unites product and process excellence with the goal of enhancing
shareholder value creation. Providing insights into the application of Lean
Six Sigma to both the manufacturing processes and the less-data-rich
service and transactional processes, it promises to revolutionize the
performance efficiencies in virtually every area of your organization--as it
positively and dramatically impacts your shareholder value.
Personal Review: Lean Six Sigma : Combining Six Sigma
Quality with Lean Production Speed by Michael George
There are innumerable ways to ineffectually "implement" (fail at) process
improvement. George's book tells how to succeed.
Reducing lead times has just as much potential for improving performance
as improving quality. Most of the methods and tools of Six sigma do not

focus on time; similarly, those of Lean Production do not focus on quality.
The purpose of the book is to show how to simultaneously improve cost,
quality, speed, and invested capital. This is not accomplished by working
faster, but by reducing idle time between value-added steps.
George recommends solving first the external quality problems that affect
the customers, then determine which steps add the longest wait times.
Most material in a process spends 95% of its time waiting. Reducing this
by 80% also allows overhead and quality cost decreases of 20%, in
addition to faster delivery and lower inventory.
Ensuring that projects selected are of the highest priority to the
organization and its customers is essential to obtaining management
commitment.
Project sponsors (who are or report to the P&L manager) own the process
that is to be improved by a specific project; they are the specific authority
to implement improvements and long-term accountability to ensure the
improvements stick.
Having a structured approach to process improvement is essential lest the
group go on ad infinitum without results. Motorola used five phases:
1)Define the goals and value of a project. 2)Measure via data collection
and process mapping. 3)Analyze using Pareto analysis to create priorities.
4)Improve. 5)Control, via feedback, mistake-proofing. A gate review
conducted with the deployment champion (person in charge of Lean Six
Sigma) and project sponsor occurs at each phase.
Use the sigma level as a process metric, not as a goal - goals are
established by customers.
A "Lean process" is one in which the value-added time is greater than 25%
of total process time.
Cross-training others as backups is a way to reduce waiting times when
lines build. Reducing setup times allows smaller batch sizes and less WIP
and process time; alternatively, provide more work stations, each set for a
different output.
Value-Added Work: A task that adds a form or feature, allows lower price
and/or defects, faster delivery. A task required by law, reduces financial
risk, supports financial reporting requirements.
Non Value-Added Work: Counting, transporting, inspecting, rework,
expediting, multiple signatures or approvals.
Getting Started: Obtain CEO engagement after identifying a compelling
need for change, and training him on Lean 6 Sigma background. Develop

financial and performance goals for 1-2 years, and gain P&L manager
commitment. Track project through DMAIC to final results. Do not focus
on the program's cost, rather its returns.
Those believing book value is of considerable importance in valuing a firm/
stock would benefit from Berkshire Hathaway's experience auctioning
spinning equipment. Replacement cost was estimated at $30-50 million;
the sale grossed $163,122.
Improving setup time - perform in advance all work that can be done while
operating, eliminate the need for adjustments.
Long lead times automatically create a high level of variation in lead time,
and increase quality problems. Reduced lead times reduces the need for
and reliance on forecasting.
Do not link Lean Six Sigma implementation with suppliers to price
concessions by them - rather, obtain reductions through competition to
reduce the number of suppliers. Also, do not try to implement with all
suppliers at once - focus.
Reduce complexity by reducing the number of products and/or number of
different components. (Latter can create over-building, but also generates
increased volume discounts and fewer errors, and faster design.)
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