Six Sigma aims for perfection – Metric and Philosophy explained

Six Sigma tools and methods focus on reducing process variation.

Six Sigma Metrics

Is 99% good enough? Let’s review some examples:

• 99% Good (3.8 Sigma)
  • 20,000 lost items of mail per hour;
  • 5,000 incorrect surgical procedures per week;
  • Two short or long landings at most major airports each day;
  • 200,000 wrong drug prescriptions each year.
• 99.99966% Good (6 Sigma)
  • Seven items of mail lost per hour;
  • 1.7 incorrect surgical procedures per week;
  • One short or long landing every five years;
  • 68 wrong prescriptions per year.

Cost of poor Quality: hidden costs and inefficiencies

• Credit Notes
• Returns
• Warranties
• Scrap
• Lost sales and revenue
• Unsatisfied and lost customers
• Inefficiencies
• Long cycles (production, delivery, collection)
• Poor asset utilization
• Inspections
• Excess inventories
• Expediting costs
• Re-work

Up to 20-30 % of the revenue is lost in inefficiencies in a 3 sigma company.

Six Sigma is a business mindset

• Continuously strive for
  • world class levels of quality;
  • highest level of customer satisfaction.
• Prevent defects/errors from occurring by
  • understanding and reducing process variation and
  • centering performance on target
    • enabling people operators to do it right the first time
• Improve processes and sustain improvements by using
  • process measures (data) and
  • statistical tools
    • in a team-based, methodical, systems approach