Anybody have any experience with Six Sigma?

[brainshrub]

http://www.6sigma.us/

Looks like another round of managerial pseudo-science to me, but I don't work in Corporate America.

Does anyone have any experience with this?

[crispini]

1. We don't use it,

we're an ISO shop. A lot of customers will sometimes require you to get some kind of quality certification, so that's a good reason to do it. Our industry tends towards ISO so that's what we have. :shrug:

[alcibiades_mystery]

2. Complete hack bullshit

They tried to institute some Six Sigma bullshit in my last job, and we all just laughed at them. Green belts and black belts and all manner of statistical nonsense. A complete joke.

[bearfan454]

3. I taught SPC at IBM for 5 years

It does work if the company is really committed to it. It never worked at IBM because production quotas were number one no matter what. They even had me phony up CPK charts to make it look better. Half the people there were lucky to be able to get their timecard in on the computer. There is no way most of those people would have been able to figure out standard deviations even with the statpak software we had. One guy even asked me why we used a poisin distribution meaning Poisson(sp). They were able to get the concept of attribute or variable. Residuals, range charts, parts per million defects, forget it.

[brainshrub]

7. Corporations lie on outsite auding forms!

*gasp*

Does anyone else know about this?

/sarcasm.

[bearfan454]

11. ISO internal auditing was a joke too.

I would go to an area to do an audit. Most of the people scattered when they saw me coming. I had one person ask me what I was doing in his area. I told him I was there to do an ISO audit. He says - fuck you and fuck your audit too. The manager says - Oh just blow it off Stevo. Audit someone else. Real commitment to quality, huh ?

[cdsilv]

4. it's been around awhile - at least since the early 80's

.. as I remember ( and it has been a LONG time), 6 sigma means 6 standard statistical deviations from 'the norm'. 3 to one side, 3 to the 'other'.

If a company wants to be certified as a 'quality' company their products cannot deviate more than 6 sigmas from 'optimum' quality.

I think the ISO 9XXX standards require this.

This includes not only products but processes as well.

All I can say is that it works. If a plant producing a graded product is judged and compensated by 6 sigma, their products improve.

Its another one of those examples where you get improvement based on what you measure.

[benburch]

5. Yep...

At Motorola.

It can work as advertised. But it can also become a PHB's most deadly tool of repression.

[Wickerman]

6. A relative of mine had to implement it in his office

and was QUITE relieved when the proponent of it left the helm of the corp. He hated it and so did his empolyees - everyone found it psycho-babble since not all the higher ups bought into it.

[RagAss]

8. It's bullshit...instituted at my work place a few years back..

You can force anything into a statistical paradigm and claim victory...look at the current administration for example....

The truth is where people are involved you normally get it right half the time...and wrong the other half.....just my opinion....

[bearfan454]

13. You can make ANY set of data look like you want it to.

Just change the scale it is measured on. For example:
We only made 75 percent of our required production. The chart would say that we are 3/4ths of the way to meeting our commitment. As long as there is a chart to show at higher up management meetings that shows an upward trend in something good or a downward trend in defects, they are happy.

[BootinUp]

9. To anyone...is it really any different

than SPC methods that have been around for decades?

[MissWaverly]

10. it makes my head want to explode

it takes a work process and identifies how many mistakes can
be found, I don't want to deal with the 179,000 possibilities, identify
what the most prevalent errors are and deal with them, plus you cannot
understand the gobblygook.

[brainshrub]

12. Most comments from this thread seem to agree with you.

SS sounds more like a religion than science. IMHO, if you want quality products you pay your employees a fair wage, you treat everyone with respect and you listen, and respond promptly, to customer feedback.

Perhaps I should come up with a "system" of my own. It seems to pay pretty darn well.

[MissWaverly]

15. the issue is quality control

At my job, there has been an endless stream of consultants and they always have a new and better process, this lasts for about 2 years, and
then it's scrapped and along comes another set of consultants. The
problem is that most employees in their area know how to improve quality, know how to improve the work process but they will not listen
to the rank and file, they have to import experts and the more exotic the better.

[elehhhhna]

18. "an expert's just a guy from out of town"

[madrchsod]

14. another way to blame the workers

because the management hasn`t a clue on how to get the job done right and on time. it`s just more of the same old bullshit from the 80`s- americans are the dumbist workers in the world.

[Indykatie]

17. 6S Experience

I have had a lot of experience with 6S projects. I agree that the company must be really dedicated and willing to provide the training, financial resources and commitment at the highest levels of the organization. My experiences have been positive. Many of my projects would not have been recognized as being so successful if I didn't have 6S as a verification tool.

[MissWaverly]

19. I think the problem is that computers are upon us

It used to be that you had men with plastic pocket protectors and a
clip board and they were everywhere, they saw that the guy was sleeping
on a pallet in the storeroom. Now we have computers and we do 50
spreadsheets to show a drop in production level from 9 pm to 3 am,
bring back the guys that walked around.

[Mom_and_Dad]

16. We have both ISO and SixSigma in our organization

I have a PhD with a lot of statistical skills anyway so it doesn't add much to me but it does provide a tool for many people to analyze their processes and drive improvements. It means that improvements will be for a reason and that you are less likely to make change for changes sake.

ISO9000 standards do not tell you what your quality standards are you write your quality statement to reflect your business. By using SixSigma as part of your ISO program you will have effective followup to any CARs and PARs

Here is the link for the American Society for Quality.