Australian Companies Looking to Go Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 21 September 2008 | 8:18 pm
At this time of global economic crisis, many business any where in the world have to find ways to stay afloat. Many have embarked on performance and quality improvement methodologies and principles.
Lately, there has been an increasing demand for senior level executives who have functional specialization and experiences in in Lean manufacturing principles including Six Sigma, TQM, 5S, Kaizen, Kanban, and Quality Circles. It is hoped however that implementing these Lean principles will pervade entire organizations and be their culture. Read more…
It’s good to know that companies are now acknowledging these improvement methodologies to protect and grow their business.
Filed under: Benefits and Savings, Deployment, Lean, Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma, TQM
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Innovation of the Week: 4 Steps to Innovation
Posted by: meikah | 19 September 2008 | 3:24 am
For most companies, innovation is overcoming the company’s daily challenges such as cutting costs, enteiring new markets, meeting customer needs, or coming up with new products and services.
RealInnovation.com outlines the following four steps to innovation:
- Always Be On the Lookout for Problems
- Re-form/Re-phrase the Company’s Response
- Know Latest Trends
- Take Help From Customers in Order to Improve
Filed under: Innovation, Innovation Update
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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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Six Sigma Deployment Champion and Project Champion
Posted by: meikah | 18 September 2008 | 9:07 pm
In a Six Sigma deployment, you will need two champions. One a deployment champion and the other a project champion.
What is the difference?
Filed under: Deployment, Deployment Champion, Project Champion, Six Sigma
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Looking at Lean/Six Sigma Again
Posted by: meikah | 18 September 2008 | 8:57 pm
Over at Reliable Plant, there’s a video showing Dr. James Harrington explaining Lean and Six Sigma.
Harrington is one of only five Grand Master Six Sigma black belts worldwide. He has published more than 25 books related to performance improvement. In the book Tech Trending, Dr. Harrington was referred to as “the quintessential tech trender.†Read more…
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Filed under: Lean, Lean Six Sigma, Six Sigma, YouTube
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St. John’s Mercy Medical Center Goes Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 16 September 2008 | 11:41 pm
When executives at St. John’s Mercy Medical Center in Creve Coeur noticed patients in wheelchairs lining the halls as they waited for physical and occupational therapy, they thought there must be a better way. Continue reading…
Indeed, there is. To improve the situation they used the principles of Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma.
The results:
- improved quality
- reduced waiting times
- shorter lengths of stay for patients
- improved outcomes
- a lot of other secondary effects
Filed under: Benefits and Savings, Healthcare, Lean Manufacturing, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Organizations, St. John's Mercy Medical Center
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Using Six Sigma in Cardiac Cath Lab
Posted by: meikah | 16 September 2008 | 11:14 pm
Heartsite.com defines cardiac catheterization or Cath as “a specialized study of the heart during which a catheter, or thin hollow flexible tube, is inserted into the artery of the groin or arm.” Continue reading…
It is a highly specialized and very important procedure. And for a hospital to do something to improve processes in this kind of lab is big on my book.
New York Presbyterian Hospital recently embarked on a comprehensive initiative to improve throughput in the cardiac catherization labs at the Columbia University Medical Center, New York Weill Cornell Medical Center, and Children’s Hospital of New York-Presbyterian sites.
At the New York-Presbyterian, the focus was on the various sub-cycle times impacting throughput – including case start time, room turnaround time and patient prep time. As a result of these multiple projects, the hospital gained 312 hours of procedure time without incurring any additional capital expense. An overview of one project conducted at Children’s Hospital of New York demonstrates how the Six Sigma DMAIC methodology provided the framework and tools to raise departmental productivity by improving first case start times.
Filed under: Benefits and Savings, Healthcare, New York Presbyterian Hospital, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Organizations
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Six Sigma Could be the Secret of Bank of America
Posted by: meikah | 16 September 2008 | 9:45 pm
The finance world trembled at the news of Lehman Brothers‘ announcement of bankruptcy. And we all know that when big financial insitutions like Lehman fails, the economy takes a deep lingering breath.
Merrill Lynch, nother financial institution would have gone the say way as Lehman, had it not gotten its much needed help.
Despite the economic crisis, Bank of America keeps afloat. In fact, it has just announced a $50 billion acquisition of Merrill Lynch. Viewed diffrently by different sectors, the acquisition is deemed to make Bank of American sturdier, and into becoming a financial global empire.
To be able make that acquisition, Bank of America shows everyone that the bank is sound. And this could be attributed to its Six Sigma initiatives. It has been about seven years that Bank of America embarked on its Six Sigma journey.
The stories below will tell us the Bank of America Six Sigma journey. Check them out!
Banking on Six Sigma
BoA Turns to Six Sigma
Bank of America: Investing in Six Sigma
Filed under: Bank of America, Benefits and Savings, Finance, Six Sigma, Six Sigma Organizations
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Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Embrace Lean Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 14 September 2008 | 9:49 pm
Pharma Focus Asia reports:
Pharmaceutical manufacturers are looking to Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma principles to help them boost operational efficiency and improve quality, while facilitating compliance.
The reasons:
- increasing cost of research and development
- growning inefficiency in the manufacturing environment
- rising product recalls
- increasing competition from generic drug manufacturers
- declining development pipeline
Are you undergoing the same problems?
Then, maybe it’s time for you to also look into Lean and Six Sigma.
Filed under: Benefits and Savings, Lean Six Sigma, Manufacturing, Pharmaceuticals
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Rhode Island Government Goes Into Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 14 September 2008 | 9:29 pm
It started when government employees started leaving ahead of the changes in the health insurance coverage for retirees. With the leaving also comes a cut in budget.
Left with fewer employees and a budget cut, government agencies cannot afford to make its operations suffer. So what Gov. Donald L. Carcieri did was to try out Six Sigma.
Providence Business News reports:
Last month, top administrators from a dozen of the state’s largest agencies attended Six Sigma training sessions at Providence-based global conglomerate Textron Inc…
In full-day sessions… 75 state administrators picked through state government functions and processes, locating inefficiencies, prioritizing services, determining where job openings need to be filled and what needed to be streamlined…
The idea: Give department directors and their underlings some methods for dealing with the reduction in the state’s payroll, which has shrunk by more than 1,000 jobs in the last year.
Now, even governments turn to Six Sigma for improved processes, and the list is growing.
