How IBM Dublin Implements Lean Six Sigma to Go Green
Posted by: meikah | 18 February 2010 | 6:52 pm
IBM has been very vocal about their green initiatives and using Lean Six Sigma for most, if not all, of their processes.
An article on Environmental Leader discusses how IBM goes green by using Lean Six Sigma. IBM initially:
- Formed a team of about 40 volunteers from around the world and from various groups across the organization to examine areas where improvements could be made – primarily in energy, packaging, solid waste and supplier environmental initiatives. The team members participated in this project in addition to their regular duties. Nearly all the ideas for improvements came from within the group – not from management – and over time we expanded the team to 100 and then 200 employees.
- The first-year results were impressive. Switching to lightweight, recyclable plastic packing material reduced packaging by 290 metric tons, incidentally lowering GHG emissions for outbound transportation. A variety of energy conservation initiatives in plant and office locations reduced power consumption by 6,300 megawatt-hours.
- for the second project, a Lean Six Sigma specialist at our Dublin, Ireland, facility learned about a concept developed at IBM Research to apply those principles to energy, water, waste and emissions. With the encouragement of his managers, he worked with the plant’s environmental, operations and process improvement teams to start a pilot project at the plant, using this methodology developed to collect and analyze energy data throughout the plant.
Source: iSixSigma News
Filed under: Environment, IBM, Lean Six Sigma, Six Sigma, Sustainable Business
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Six Sigma for Hardware Inventory at IBM
Posted by: meikah | 1 February 2010 | 8:46 pm
Technology is in a roll these days. A newly launched product today is obsolete the next day. So manufacturing companies of technology products often deal with inventory.
IBM serves a global market and thus you can imagine how they manage the supply chain and inventory. Due to fast depreciation in technology products, machines go to the inventory are not worth as much as they age. So, IBM conducted a Six Sigma project to reduce their hardware inventory.
The steps:
- determine the issue
- perform a root cause analysis
- find the solution
- establishing the results of the project
- learn from the whole process
Filed under: IBM, Inventory, Six Sigma, Supply Chain, Technology
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The Best of Six Sigma Practice in the Philippines: IBM Services
Posted by: meikah | 13 July 2009 | 8:56 pm
This is in continuation of the Best of Six Sigma Practices in the Philippines Benchmarking Forum I attended last April. I have shared with you Bank of Philippine Islands’ Best Practices.
Today, I will be sharing those of IBM Business Services.
For one, the company perhaps has the most number of Black Belts, Green Belts, and Yellow Belts. They really train their people for Six Sigma. Then they combine Quality methodologies and Lean, and then Six Sigma in their initiatives. This is what they do.
- QIPs (Quality Initiatives Programs) – all employees should complete at least 1 QIP for the year. The QIP encourages all employees to think of a bright idea, share it, and work on it.
- QPIC (Quality, Plan, Improve, and Control) and DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control) – the company uses the two to improve their processes. QPIC for projects with initial root causes and potential solution identified. DMAIC for projects without initial root causes and potential solution identified.
The Benefits of Six Sigma programs to IBS:
- contributed to numerous productivity improvement and quality improvement benefits – approximately USD3.2M annualized Level 1-5 savings and USD2.7M Level 1 (Hard) savings for 2008
- total of 195 trained Six Sigma specialists in the center and 100% Six Sigma oriented population
- turned around two unsatisfied clients to become referenceable after implementing Six Sigma in their domains
- the Manila Delivery Center Six Sigma program has been lauded by clients as world-class and has been one of the key selling points during client presentations
Some of the success factors:
- sound infrastructure in place to support the Six Sigma program
- ownership/accountability of front-line supervisors and middle managers
- well-trained Six Sigma Black Belts
- 100% support from top management and Mnila senior management
The important thing is that IBM Services reward their people for a job well done. Project teams are given the 6S Milestone Award, which is 10% of the total annualized hard savings of the project.
Filed under: Best Practices, IBM, IBM Services, Lean, Quality, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Organizations, Technology
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IBM Leads the Green Coalition Through Lean Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 25 June 2009 | 8:24 pm
IT Wire reports:
A new alliance led by IBM aims to improve energy, water, waste and greenhouse gas management through interoperability. Green Sigma applies Lean Six Sigma principles and practices to these areas.
IBM is teaming with ABB, Cisco, Eaton, ESS, Honeywell Building Solutions, Johnson Controls, SAP, Schneider Electric, and Siemens Building Technologies Division to create the Green Sigma Coalition.
The partner companies will work with IBM to integrate their products and services with IBM’s Green Sigma offering, which applies Lean Six Sigma principles and practices to energy, water, waste and greenhouse gas emissions in all operational areas, including transportation, IT systems, manufacturing and distribution, offices, and retail spaces, IBM officials explained.
Continue reading…
It’s good to know that big and successful companies are going into their Green initiatives and are using the principles of Lean and Six Sigma.
Filed under: IBM, Lean, Lean Six Sigma, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Organizations, Sustainable Business
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Innovation of the Week: Stream Computing from IBM
Posted by: meikah | 22 May 2009 | 3:46 am
The software enables massive amounts of data to be analyzed in real time. The new software is called IBM System S.Big Blue is making System S trial code available at no cost to help clients better understand the software’s capabilities and how they can take advantage of it for their business. This trial code includes developer tools, adapters and software to test applications.
Filed under: Data, Data Analysis, Data Quality, IBM, Innovation, Innovation Update
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IBM Consulting Helps Government Go Green Through Lean Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 8 March 2009 | 8:07 pm
Through IBM Consulting’s program, government organizations will learn to analyze energy and water use, assess waste management, evaluate overall environmental impact and develop improvement strategies. Called IBM Public Sector Energy and Environment Diagnostic, the program uses a proprietary Heat Map tool to provide an initial analysis.
Where does Lean Six Sigma come in?
The public sector diagnostic is designed to be used together with many of these other offerings. For example, after completing an analysis and identifying areas for improvement with the public sector diagnostic, clients can use Green Sigma(TM), which applies Lean Six Sigma principles to measuring and monitoring energy and water usage throughout a organization’s operations, and the Carbon Trade-off Modeler, which helps evaluate and balance carbon dioxide emissions and energy usage with other key factors throughout a supply chain — cost, service and quality.
*Photo from Stock.Xchng
Filed under: Green Sigma, IBM, Lean Six Sigma, Public Sector, Sustainable Business
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Here Comes IBM’s Green Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 18 August 2008 | 8:45 pm
In October last year, IBM announced that they would be launching their green initiatives soon. Its focus would be on developing processes to reduce the carbon intensity of products and processes, and creating a lean green business.
That dream has come to fruition as IBM launches Green Sigma business consulting. Based on Lean Six Sigma, Green Sigma aims to reduce usages of energy and water by using a software that manages networked sensors and data analysis.
CNET‘s Green Tech shares IBM’s carbon dashboard for tracking energy usage at businesses and a more detailed description of how Green Sigma works. Read the post here!
With the present environment degradation, companies—especially manufacturing companies—are among the biggest contributors of carbon and other toxic wastes. With this Green Sigma solution, companies can now have a shot at sustainable business.
Clean and green, and efficient and prosperous!
Update:
Greenbang’s Take on IBM’s Green Sigma
Filed under: Environment, Green Sigma, IBM, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Organizations, Sustainable Business
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Six Sigma and Green Initiatives at IBM
Posted by: meikah | 8 October 2007 | 12:26 am
Business Green Blog writes about IBM launching a Green Sigma service soon. From the name alone, the new service will be a combination of Six Sigma, lean, process management principles, and green initiatives.
The focus will be on developing processes to reduce the carbon intensity of products and processes and create a lean green business. Read more…
In manufacturing especially, carbon usage is big. With this new innovation from IBM, I’m pretty sure other companies can learn from this. Other companies may already have their own green initiatives and are about to incorporate lean or Six Sigma, or both.
If you are among the latter, please do share your experiences here.
Source:
iSixSigma News
*Photo from Stock.Xchng
