Advance Innovation Group - Six Sigma Project Flow - DMAIC

One of the most common approaches to implementing Six Sigma utilized by the industry is DMAIC (Define Measure Analyze Improve Control) which is used to improve an existing process.

Organizations internationally have been trying to drive improvements in the processes to realize better performances in anything they are doing and hence have been adopting the DMAIC framework to drive and realize Continual Improvements.

In order to start a project, we first identify the improvement opportunity or the problem area that needs to be addressed via the project, after the focus area for improvement is identified, we identify the Project CTQ and start documenting the project.

The first phase "Define" is used to define the Problem in numbers, represent its financial impacts on the organization, represent the process/area that we are targeting for improvement, the target of the project, the team, process, team deliverable etc.

We define everything to ensure that the project team, stakeholders, and the management have the same understanding about the project and whenever we want to initiate a project in the organization, we will need it to be approved by the management and whenever we will approach the management for project approvals, they will have their own set of questions, so, we anticipate the questions that can be asked by the management for project approvals and pro-actively answer them in Define Phase, just to simplify the approval process.

After the project is approved, we move to Measure Phase, which is one of the most important phases of the SIx Sigma Project as it revolves around data and as is well said "Anything you cannot measure, you cannot improve or control" because for justification of improvement, you will need to quantify the magnitude of improvement and the magnitude will come from numbers and numbers from Data and for Data, the first thing we do in Measure Phase is we prepare a Data Collection Plan (DCP). Utilizing the DCP, we basically define the parameters of data as in we define the Operational Definition, the Defect Definition, Specification, Data Type, Formula etc. Following this plan we collect the data from the organization, while collecting the data, there are chances that the data might be incorrect, it can be fudged or manipulated, so, to ensure correctness of the data, we will validate it using the Measurement System Analysis (MSA), after the data is successfully validated, we move ahead and calculate the Process Capability.

Define and the measure phase of Six Sigma only revolve around "Y", the Problem, from next phase "Analyze" we start looking at the Causes of the problem, the purpose of Analyse phase is to do the "Root Cause Analysis", we identify the statistically impacting causes (Xs), the first step to identify the Root cause is Brainstorming, for which we identify a Cross Functional team, with whom we brainstorm to identify the Potential Causes to the problem, after the Xs are discovered, we collect data around all these Xs and check their statistical relation with Y using the Hypothesis Testing, the purpose of Hypothesis testing is to Filter out the "Non Impacting" Xs and to Filter IN and actual Impacting Xs. So, in Analyze phase we identify the Vital Xs.

With these Vital Xs we move to the "Improve" Phase, in Improve phase we identify the Action Items that shall be implemented to Improve Y, to design the Improvement Plan, we brainstorm with the team of process/domain experts, with whom we again brainstorm to design the Improvement Plan and after approvals implement this plan. Post implementation, we collect data to validate the improvement by conducting the Before-After Analysis, after the improvement is validated, we move ahead to the Control Phase.

The purpose of "Control" Phase is to ensure the sustenance of Improvement for which we use Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA) which gives the set of the Corrective and Preventive Actions that constitute to the "Control Plan". Control Plan is established to ensure that the Improvement sustains. After implementing the Control Plan, we again collect the data and on that data, we prepare the "Control Charts" to check whether the process is under statistical control or not. After the process is in Control that means the process is in Control and the Improvement is sustained.

After the process is in Control, we conduct the Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) to calculate the benefits driven out of the project and then send the project to the Management for approvals of formal closure. As soon as the approvals are received are received, we Sign Off from the Project.

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