Dec 25 2019
Your Lean Six Sigma Belt Program Is the Problem | Dan Markovitz | Industry Week
“I visited a company a few weeks ago that asks all of their employees to do a green belt project. It’s not mandatory, but completion of a project is part of their annual review. Not surprisingly, the management boasts that nearly everyone does a project. You know how many people do a second project? Less than 5%. This company is doing okay, but they definitely don’t have a culture of continuous improvement.”
Source: Industry Week
Michel Baudin‘s comments: Dan’s article is spot on, except in his assessment of statistical tools. Depending on the company’s situation, none of the ones he lists may be needed. Other tools, like SMED, cell design, mistake-proofing or JKK may be more relevant. Data science is needed in semiconductors and pharmaceuticals but the statistical tools Dan describes as “advanced” are not. ANOVA, regression, and t-tests go back 100 years; Design Of Experiments (DOE), a good 50. As for Ishikawa’s “7 tools of QC” from the 1960s, I have never seen them used as advertised anywhere. They are sorely in need of an update in every respect, from data acquisition to analysis and presentation.
#leansixsigma, #blackbelts, #datascience,#7toolsofqc
December 25, 2019 @ 3:09 pm
One of the biggest problems with the belt system of Six Sigma is that it introduces a segregation system and hierarchy of ability.
We must always remember total human intelligence (TI) has four dimensions.
Intellectual (II), Emotional (EI), Physical (PI – physical skills, experience), & Moral (MI).The successful individual & organisation requires the engagement of all four; the balance will depend upon their role.
The leader’s role is to engage, focus & develop all of them.
The belts are awarded for mental study, and limited practical experience.
As we all know real ability come from the reverse process.
I like to tell our frontline people that with their practical experience in the workplace they are the black Braces of the organisation.
Some famous support for practical learning.
“One learns by doing the thing; for though you think you know, you have no certainty until you try.” Sophocles 500 BC. — “All knowledge is inaccurate & vain when it is not based on experience.” Leonardo Da Vinci. — “What we learn, we learn from doing,” Aristotle. —“The books tell you how to do it. You hold the clubs just so. But until you’ve found out for yourself, you never really know.” — David Hope Remember, you can’t learn to plough a field by turning it over in your mind. – Irish proverb.
“Don’t just be a collector of facts. Try to penetrate to the secrets of their occurrence, persistently search for the laws that govern them.” Ivan Pavlov.
“Understanding is my favourite word. I believe it has a specific meaning – to approach an object/subject positively & comprehend its nature.” Taiichi Ohno.
Konosuke Matsushita explained why we need access to all our people’s ability, not just a few managers and belted individuals.
“The survival of firms today is so hazardous in an increasingly unpredictable environment that their continued existence depends on the day to day mobilisation of every ounce of intelligence. For us, the core of management is the art of mobilising and putting together the intellectual resources of all employees in the service of the firm. Because we have measured better than you the scope of new technological and economic challenges, we know that the intelligence of a handful of technocrats and managers, however brilliant they may be, is no longer enough to take them up with any real chance of success. Only by drawing on the combined abilities of all its employees can a firm face up to the turbulence and constraints of today’s environment.”
December 26, 2019 @ 5:49 am
This is a great example of misapplying metrics to further a goal. The goal is a continuous improvement culture. If measure green belt project completion, you will get just that. Actually changing your culture to desire continuous improvement requires actual leadership.