DFSS Supporting Linear and Iterative Development
Posted by: meikah | 10 June 2010 | 8:31 pm
Image Source: iSixSigma.com
Filed under: Customer Service, DFSS, Six Sigma, Software/Technology
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Motorola’s Approach to Software DFSS
Posted by: meikah | 24 November 2009 | 11:10 pm
Six Sigma Zone shares Motorola‘s approach to software DFSS.
View the PowerPoint presentation here.
Filed under: DFSS, Motorola, Six Sigma, Software/Technology
1 Comment |
Six Sigma and Branding
Posted by: meikah | 26 May 2009 | 8:48 pm
Your brand differentiates you from others. It also because of your branding that customers seek you out amidst piles of other similar products. Brand strategy therefore is crucial to your business.
Thus, companies think of ways to develop a brand and sustain it. Perhaps, not many know that Six Sigma is also a versatile, effective framework for connecting executive goals (business strategy), marketing communication (brand promise) and management (operational activities).
An article on iSixSigma discusses how Design for Six Sigma’s DMADV for brand strategy.
| Table 1: Adapting Design for Six Sigma’s DMADV for Brand Strategy | |
|
Design for Six Sigma |
Brand Six Sigma |
| Define the project goals and customer (internal and external) deliverables. | Ensure that operational activity is delivering on the competitive advantage and customer expectations created by the brand promise. |
| Measure and determine customer needs and specifications. | Determine the measurable extent and scope of competitive advantage and customer expectations created by the brand promise. |
| Analyze the process options to meet the customer needs. | Work back from the brand promise through brand associations and tangible brand attributes/CTQs to ensure that operational building blocks – business goals, organization, processes, administration and metrics – are producing the competitive advantage and delivering on customer expectations generated by the brand promise. |
| Design detailed processes to meet customer needs. | Design and implement the operational building blocks. |
| Verify the design performance and ability to meet customer needs. | Use measurement to verify that the operational building blocks are producing the tangible brand attributes/CTQs contributing to the brand associations and brand promise. |
Filed under: Brand Strategy, DFSS, DMADV, Six Sigma
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Six Sigma Product Development Models
Posted by: meikah | 17 December 2008 | 8:54 pm
Product development here refers to drug development in pharmaceuticals. The characteristics of the process are:
- it is a single event unique to itself
- highly cross-functional, which needs communication, coordination
- decision making is complicated
- bring products to the market quickly
HERE is the process of drug development. And to improve the process and ensure a successful development, many pharmaceuticals go into Six Sigma.
Six Sigma models concentrate on eliminating potential sources of variation in processes. On the shop floor, Six Sigma follows what is known as the DMAIC roadmap (Define Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control). Moving Six Sigma into the product development phase would employ a version of DMAIC tailored according to the type of development structure being used and the product being developed. When Six Sigma moves to the product development phase of a product’s lifecycle it is termed Design for Six Sigma (DFSS). Three different versions of DFSS have been developed: DMADV (Define, Measure, Analyze, Design and Verify), IDOV (Identify, Design, Optimize and Verify), and DCOV (Design, Characterize, Optimize and Verify). The DMADV model has been very successfully deployed in the medical device industry, while DCOV, with its characterization phase is more suitable to in the drug development process.
Click on the image for a bigger version.
Related post:
Lean Six Sigma to Product Development
Filed under: DFSS, DMAIC, Deployment, Pharmaceuticals, Six Sigma, Tools/Toolkits
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Improving IT Processes the Lean Six Sigma Way
Posted by: meikah | 18 September 2008 | 10:10 pm
Many IT processes only use IT management software. Only a few have ventured into other management methodologies such as Six Sigma or Lean Six Sigma.
So far, the only T organizations and CIOs that have applied Lean Six Sigma to their IT processes include those at Bank of America Corp., Sara Lee Corp., National City Corp., Xerox Corp., GE, and Seagate Technology LLC.
These organiziations have shown that IT processes can be defined, measured, analyzed, improved and controlled in a way that helps align projects and assures business results – the Lean Six Sigma way.
What’s the difference when you have Lean Six Sigma way your IT processes?
The following are traits of poor IT portfolio management practices:
- Poorly defined processes
- More projects than capacity
- Poor visibility of what is being worked on
- Poor or no alignment to strategic objectives
With Lean Six Sigma:
- Focus on facts and data to prioritize and select projects and resources.
- Establish roles, responsibilities and accountabilities driven by performance data.
- Link and align business goals to project goals (driving the businesses closer to software and IT functions).
- Require frequent review of performance data and supporting analysis.
- Refuse to accept redundancy, overlap and poorly prioritized projects and resources.
Read the whole discussion here.
Filed under: DFLSS, DFSS, IT, Lean Six Sigma, Six Sigma
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Chrysler and Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 20 August 2008 | 11:16 pm
I was reading this article on New York Times about Chrysler. The owners are giving the executives of the beleaguered company time to fix it.
The article lengthily discusses the difficulties that Chrysler now is facing: from its falling out with Daimler to low sales to decreased market share, and to products not moving in the market.
The solution that the company is seeing is to reposition their products to the kind that customers will embrace. The company is not only going to streamline operations and conserve cash, but it will also explore alliances with other automakers.
I am just surprised that there is no mention of Six Sigma or DFSS, or any other initiative that the company will be going into or will be continuing to weather the storm.
I’ve shared the news about Chrysler deploying Six Sigma and DFSS here. I wonder if the company is still into them.
Filed under: Automobiles, Chrysler, DFSS, Six Sigma
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Mentor Graphics Uses Design For Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 21 July 2008 | 7:53 pm
TradingMarkets reports:
Mentor Graphics, a supplier of electronic design automation systems, has announced that its virtual prototyping tool, SystemVision, will support Design for Six Sigma methodologies to achieve cost-effective design innovation by a model-driven development process.
The development process for a product made up of a complex blend of hardware and software, analog and digital signals, sensors and actuators, and a mix of disciplines, such as electrical, mechanical, or hydraulic, is difficult to manage efficiently. At the same time, using physical prototyping to optimize the design for manufacturability becomes prohibitively expensive, cumbersome, and time consuming.
Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) methodologies combined with model-driven development can result in order-of-magnitude improvements in both productivity and quality when virtual prototyping, automated data collection, and statistical analyses are used to guide the model-driven development process.
Filed under: Benefits and Savings, DFSS, Deployment, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Organizations
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SixSig Book Feature: Design for Lean Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 7 May 2008 | 7:25 pm
ad-hoc-news reports that Research and Markets has announced the addition of Design for Lean Six Sigma to their offering.
Design for Lean Six Sigma is the only book that employs a “road-map” approach to DFSS, which allows corporate management to understand where they are in the process and to integrate DFSS methodology more fully into their overall business strategy. This is a similar approach to that used by Forrest Breyfogle in his successful book: “Implementing Six Sigma, 2E”.
This approach will allow corporate management to understand where they are in the process and to integrate DFSS methodology more fully into the overall business strategy. Another important aspect of this book is its coverage of DFSS implementation in a broad range of industries including service and manufacturing, plus the use of actual cases throughout. Continue reading…
Filed under: DFSS, Lean Six Sigma, Six Sigma References, Tools/Toolkits
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Six Sigma Continues at Chrysler
Posted by: meikah | 3 March 2008 | 9:39 pm
It is clear that the Chrysler group is big on Six Sigma. A couple of years ago, reports on Daimler-Chrysler going into Six Sigma and being benefitted by it hit the frontpage news.
First, there was news about Chrysler adopting DFSS thereby making them more proactive and receptive the what their customers want.
Second, Daimler-Chrysler strengthens its Six Sigma deployment by integrating structured innovation methodologies into its DFSS program.
And now the latest is that Chrysler LLC will boost the company’s Six Sigma by sending its people to training. Giving training programs is not new at Chrysler. In fact, its technical specialist program has been established since 1988. The company just decided to offer Six Sigma trainings in addition to its already tested training modules.
According to the news in ReliablePlant magazine:
The new technical fellow and master black belt senior specialist programs will build on the company’s existing technical specialist and master black belt programs.
Why particularly these programs?
Black belts use different problem-solving methodologies, including Lean Six Sigma, Design for Six Sigma, critical thinking and Shainin Red X to solve various technical and process issues throughout each vehicle program. They progress through the black belt ranks to the current top rank of master black belt specialist. The new top rating of senior specialist demands tougher criteria, but provides greater personal recognition and reward – and benefits to Chrysler’s Product Development operations.
Last year, I heard news about problems and issues—both financial and management—besetting Chrysler. I hope this move will help solve these issues, too.
Source:
Six Sigma Zone News
*Photo credit: thecarconnection.com
Filed under: Automobiles, Chrysler, DFSS, Deployment, Manufacturing, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Organizations, Technology, Training
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Six Sigma Improves Alarm Management at Monsanto’s Soda Springs, Id., Phosphorus Plant
Posted by: meikah | 19 February 2008 | 11:47 pm
Monsanto Soda Springs‘s plant in Soda Springs, Idaho, produces elemental phosphorus, or P4, most of which is sent to other Monsanto facilities to make PCL3, the primary ingredient for Roundup herbicide.
The process of manufacturing elemental phosphorus begins with mining the phosphate ore. Mining involves working with a furnace, the right temperature, thus it requires sophisticated controls. Monsanto was using Fishers’ PRoVOX distributed control system (DCS) in the early 1980s, and then DeltaV control system by 1996.
The control system was kept to a minimum because it was costly then. When digital control systems alarms became easy and cheap, Monsanto found itself overusing the system. It caused as many problems as it solved.
That was when Monsanto began turning to Six Sigma, with emphasis on alarm management. The alarm problems came down to too many alarms and alarming practices can cause incidents.
The company’s Six Sigma team used cause-and-effect fishbone diagram to investigate the possible causes of alarm problems. They applied the Six Sigma DMAIC system to the problem:
- Developed an alarm management philosophy and selected alarm metrics (the Define phase).
- Assessed the present alarm system (Measure/Analyze phases).
- Reduced the number of nuisance alarms (Analyze /Improve phases).
- Rationalized alarms by need and priority (Improve phase).
- Developed an alarm configuration database (Improve – Control phases).
Source:
ControlGlobal.com
