Can Six Sigma Methodology be applied in Project Management?

You have probably heard of Six Sigma methodology in reference to a large firm like Motorola, GE and many more, but as a project manager have you ever implemented Six Sigma that how useful it could be for your projects and your organization?

Incorporating Six Sigma Principles into the project management process is a great way to go for companies focusing on continuous improvement and to increase overall project success rate. Many Organization uses to implement Total Quality Management(TQM), and Continuous Quality Improvement to serve in new product development, to reduce the cost of products, improving manufacturing or organization capabilities or analyzing new markets. Six Sigma practice is not just another project management initiative or process improvement programme, it is more than that because it is a continuous improvement strategy that includes cultural and statistical method.

What is Six Sigma Methodology?

Six Sigma is a methodology used to examine and address the weak point in a process that impede efficiency or that result in more errors than perfect. It refers to the aim of reducing the number of manufacturing defects to less than 3.4 parts per million.

To identify defects in a process in the manufacturing, project managers often use value stream maps to identify waste, reduce process cycle time and implement process improvement.

By understanding how your products or a service goes from an idea to your client’s hands, you can start finding ways to improve efficiency and quality, it’s all about improvement.

Failed in project management methods because due to weakness in business process implementation and couldn’t measure the effectiveness of the methodology. Six Sigma is an effective business management principle that provides a structured data-driven methodology with tools technique that firm can use to measure their performance both before and after Six Sigma projects. By implementing Six Sigma, management can determine the performance of their process and find out the root causes of variations so they can improve their processes to meet the desired performance level.

There are many challenges facing project managers: data collecting, and analysis and problem solving, measuring existing process, developing and making quantitative evaluations. By getting the help of tools and techniques, a manager can be successful in all of these challenges. This is successfully completed by means of understanding what the method is, how it is applied and how it is used.

Methodology of Six Sigma

There are two major methodologies used within Six Sigma, which are composed of five sections, i.e. DMAIC and DMADV.

DMAIC

It is a set of Six Sigma Methodology that works best for an organization looking to improve the manufacturing or production aspects of a business or an existing business processes.

Define: Define the scope, objectives, nature and returns of the project. When you have a clear idea of all these factors then you can judge where your project stands with respect to the desired goals.

Measure: Measure in detail the various aspects of the current process and its effectiveness.

Analyze: Analyze the data to, and among other things to evaluate the current process to find the root defects in a process or where the areas of improvement are.

Improve: Improve the process and makes changes in a business process so it helps to better align with corporate goals.

Control: Control how the process is done and build a system to keep the improved process in place.

DMADV

It is a set of Six Sigma process that works best for companies aims to create a new product or process or to improve customer or client’s relations:

Define: Define the customer or clients’ needs in relation to a product or service.

Measure: Measure the customer needs by using the data, response to a product and service and a product or service capabilities.

Analyze: Analyze the data and use that information to create new goals or design to meet customer or client needs.

Design: Design a product, service or process that will better address client needs to be based on findings.

Verify: Verify the design by running simulation program and then deliver the process to the client.

You may learn or heard about other methodologies under the umbrella of Six Sigma, including DFSS, DMEDI, and Lean Six Sigma. For professionals interested in discovering more about how these methodologies perform in a variety of business setting or how they could make an impact on your business.

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