What is your definition Quality? There are a number of quality definitions what is your definition?

Common “Quality” Definitions:
Quality: “The totality of characteristics of an entity that bear on its ability to satisfy stated and implied needs.”
Quality: “An inherent or distinguishing characteristic, a degree or grade of excellence.”
Quality: Do the right thing and do things right all the time.”
Quality: The ratio of performance to expectation.
Each customer has their definition of quality. One way to meet their definition is by developing a quality management system.  Quality management systems serve a number of purposes.

• Establish a vision for employees
• Set standards of operation
• Sets goals for employees
• Motivates employees
• Develops the organizational culture
• Fights the resistance to change

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Multi-Part Quality Series 

Emerging Trends in Quality for 2017 and 2018

2017 what's different from last year and what are we looking at for 2018?

Companies are continually facing industry changes and market forces. Take a look at your smart phone for example. What version are you using, or what operating system did you just load? Six Sigma can be considered the same. It grows over time and can be used to complement any improvement activities. Six Sigma complements project management framework and business analysis framework. Newer, easier, and more robust improvements are developed every day just in the way many software companies use agile development and lean. Agile software development is a set of principles for software development in which requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration between self-organizing, cross-functional teams. Lean startups are using the “lean” terms to help startups shorten their product development cycles by adopting a combination of business-hypothesis-driven experimentation, iterative product releases, and validated learning. Iterations are no different than PDSA.

Some companies are infusing a number of “customer driven” initiatives in tandem with Six Sigma. In effect using Six Sigma for the larger projects and lean for the smaller waste driven.

Take global corporate initiatives, Companies are rapidly learning there is value added to their businesses using lean processes that have built in processes to help the environment and develop consumer “good will”. The Global Business Initiative on Human Rights’ (GBI) vision is that all corporations in all parts of the world respect the dignity and rights of the people they impact and interact with. The goal is to advance human rights in a business context through cross-industry peer learning, outreach and capacity building, and by informing policy.

Global corporate initiatives show sustainability for the future and socially responsible companies who understand the investment is necessary to lead the market in the future.

Many companies are striving for operational excellence designation, certification, or recognition. The Shingo prize is an example. The Shingo Prize is the world’s highest standard for operational excellence.
The Shingo Prize is based on a complete assessment of an organization’s culture and how well it drives world-class results. Shingo examiners focus on the degree to which the Shingo Guiding Principles of the Shingo Model™ are evident in the behavior of every employee. The examiners observe behavior and determine the frequency, duration, intensity and scope of the desired principle-based behavior. They also observe the degree to which leaders focus on principles and culture, and managers focus on aligning systems to drive ideal behaviors at all levels.

This focus is unique in the world and is the most rigorous way to determine whether an organization is fundamentally improving for the long-term, or just going through the motions of another flavor-of-the-month initiative.

Organizations that receive Shingo recognition fall into three categories:

Shingo Prize - a worldwide recognized symbol of an organization’s successful establishment of a culture anchored on principles of enterprise excellence

Shingo Silver Medallion - organizations maturing on the journey with primary focus on tools and systems for improvement

Shingo Bronze Medallion – organizations in the earlier stages of cultural transformation with primary focus on tools for improvement     
Most organizations do not wait to challenge for the Shingo Prize until they are likely to win it.

Interested in finding out more? Email us at info@instituteforstrategicimprovement.com for a coupon code to receive the Quality Management Systems Course for only $20.00

Project Management tips - The project charter shares important information and provides a framework for the who, what, where, when, and why a project is initiated and clearly establishes the goals of a lean or six sigma project. The charter conveys the risks, timelines, dependencies and expected results of a project. A sample is below.

Improved Customer Loyalty
Six Sigma can help your company with an almost endless multitude of improvement opportunities. Let’s discuss improved customer service as just one facet of the Sig Sigma landscape. Improved customer loyalty is accomplished by using Six Sigma tools to improve problem areas identified by the customer. The importance of customer loyalty cannot be underestimated in both short and long term profit margins of a business and Six Sigma can help your company get there. In order to improve customer loyalty it is important to understand the Voice of the Customer (VOC) and how to measure customer loyalty. Once the voice and measures are established Six Sigma process teams are able to pinpoint the required improvements and can ultimately and the project and its actions to the employees who have the most interaction with customers.  To improve customer loyalty there are several steps that can be taken using Six Sigma.

• Determine the voice of the customer in terms of customer loyalty to determine if the stakeholders are and what you will use to measure success criteria.
• Feed the success criteria into a system which allows for reaction.
• Six Sigma tools should be used such as Fish Bone Diagrams, Value Stream Mapping, Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA) and analysis of wastes.
• Determine improvement indices targets to determine customer satisfaction levels after the improvements are implemented to build a sustainable customer centric culture.
• Six Sigma is most instrumental for customer loyalty in determining the upper control and lower control limits, variability in processes, and variability in measurements for customer satisfaction and customer service data.

In the spirit of our top ten lists we will be adding top ten updates in between regular blogs.

Top Ten questions to ask for potential Six Sigma Projects
1. What problem(s) are you trying to address?
2. What are the benefits of the potential project and solving the problem(s)?
3. Do you have the commitment from management and stakeholders for the project?
4. Does the project have an achievable scope?
5. Can you quantify the benefits through a valid return on investment (ROI)?
6. Can you achieve the required outputs and deliverables?
7. Do you have capable measurement systems?
8. Do you have the analytical skills to manage the data?
9. Do you know your key process inputs?

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