Six Sigma Culture

How to create a culture that thinks and operates in terms of complete customer satisfaction. How to build a workforce that is engaged and committed to the success of the company.

During the Cold War two American submarines sank; there were no survivors. Now, shift this to your work situation.
- Is there a hierarchy of command and responsibility?
- Is the workforce diverse, with different levels of education, training, and knowledge?
- Is everyone well trained and qualified for their respective assignments?

The answer to these three questions is most likely yes. However, if documentation of the training needs and job certification requirements for a qualified employee at all job assignments is lacking, you must define them and commence remedial action to bring the incumbent
workforce up to minimal requirements.

- Do all of the employees realize that they are part of a larger whole?
- Do the employees realize what their roles are and how they contribute to the success of the company?
- Does everyone have respect for each member of the workforce?
- Is there a sense among all employees that they will succeed or fail as a unit?

Unless you have already established a Six Sigma, or equivalent, culture, the answer to these questions is probably no.

Six Sigma is about creating a culture where all of these things are established and deployed throughout the entire workforce.
Six Sigma is about providing a structure in which everyone knows what is expected of them, what their contributions are, and how to measure their own success.
Six Sigma is about creating an environment where people feel good about themselves.
Six Sigma is about providing the training and tools that everyone will need to maximize their and their team’s performance.
Six Sigma is about being results oriented, fueled by continuous improvement, and focused on customer satisfaction.

A Six Sigma culture contains:
❑ A diverse workforce with varying levels of education
❑ Training programs to teach the required skills
❑ An understanding by everyone of their roles for success
❑ A unified workforce where everyone feels like part of a greater whole
❑ Mutual respect for everyone’s knowledge and skills
❑ A commitment to succeed
❑ A focus on customer satisfaction

Black Belts and Green Belts
Within the high-tech manufacturing operations within Motorola, the practice of training some engineers and technologists in advanced forms of experimental design, data analysis, and process control was initiated in the early 1980s—prior to the introduction of Six Sigma. These individuals were known as local statistical resources (LSR).
Usually, they came from the process engineering or manufacturing engineering groups. I was on the leading edge of these initiatives at Motorola. Typically, one out of ten engineers was trained as statistic resources for the engineering and technical community. These individuals are referred to as black belts.
During this same time, factory workers were formed into teams based on the Japanese model of quality circles.
These team members received some training and coaching in problem-solving methods and in the interpersonal behaviors expected of team members.
As the improvement efforts within Motorola evolved, and following the introduction of Six Sigma, these teams evolved into the total customer satisfaction, or TCS, teams. Team members were trained on problem solving tools, continuous improvement models, and teaming skills. These individuals were the precursors of green belts.

The terms “black belt” and “green belt” were not applied to the Six Sigma program at Motorola until the 1990s. Since that time, as Six Sigma has grown to become recognized as a leading-edge standard for companies in manufacturing, service, and retail, many programs include special-assignment employees with the title of black belt or green belt.

A highly effective and cost-beneficial method for deploying green-belt and black-belt skills throughout an enterprise is to not create specialists with the title of black belt and green belt, but rather to consider all of your employees as potential green belts.

All employees are capable of learning the skills and techniques required to become a
green belt. From this “army” of green belts, select those individuals who will receive the additional training required to become your black belts.
Your first-line supervisors and middle management associates are ideal candidates; however, you will discover that some frontline workers also exhibit the aptitude for becoming black
belts. These individuals who have an aptitude for facilitating and leading teams will require additional training in influence management skills, coaching, teaming techniques, program management, and running effective meetings.

Typically, 5 to 10 percent of the employees will be needed as black belts. In high-tech operations, a small number of individuals trained in advanced statistical analysis and experimental design will be needed. These individuals can also be called black belts.

The goal of any enterprise should be to get all of its employees trained in the techniques required to become a green belt, including the seven problem-solving tools, the six-step model for continuous improvement, and the interpersonal skills required to effectively participate on a team.

One of the lessons learned at Motorola was that the direct labor teams drove the majority of the cost savings, quality improvements, and higher customer satisfaction levels. The people who actually perform the tasks are the experts on the task.
They have a sense of what is preventing them from doing a better job, and by utilizing the six step continuous improvement method, they can come up with the solutions. Also, when the workers take on responsibility for their own performance, there is a sense of ownership and accountability. When they determine the fixes and the changes that are necessary for improving their operation, buy-in is a given. This pride of ownership and improved performance leads to greater worker efficiency and high morale.

According to Joyce Wycoff:
When an organization commits to creating an environment
which stimulates the growth of everyone in the organization,
amazing things start to happen: ideas pop up everywhere, people
start to work together instead of “playing politics”; new opportunities
appear; customers begin to notice service and attitude
improvements; collections of individuals begin to coalesce into
teams.”

The Required Six Sigma components are:

Reward and Recognition is a system for celebrating the accomplishments of a team or work unit, including a way to be honored in front of the workforce. Executive bonuses must be tied to the success of the Six Sigma program.

Training must be provided to teach everyone the new skills and knowledge required to implement Six Sigma.

Uniform Measurement requires that all work units in manufacturing, administration, and service determine what is acceptable delivery to the customers. Unacceptable deliveries are counted and converted to a defect rate measurement.

Facilitators are the employees who have the aptitude and receive the training required to work with others and assist them in the transition to Six Sigma.

Communication must be provided so that everyone understands what is expected of them.
Senior Executive Behavior must model the expectations of Six Sigma.

Creating the Cultural Structure

Senior Management Roles and Engagement

A good way to understand a Six Sigma–based total quality management system is by defining the words in terms of:
TOTAL Everyone committed
QUALITY Meeting the customers’ expectations
MANAGEMENT Collaborative focus

Stated another way: Within a Six Sigma system, everyone is committed to meeting the customers’ expectations through the use of a collaborative focus.

Benchmarks for companies that have effective systems in place are the winners of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. A study of the winning companies from the first years of that award showed that they all had many aspects of Six Sigma in place.

Commonalities of Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award recipients are:
1. All operations and functions concentrate on total customer satisfaction. This applies whether serving internal or external customers.
2. There are mechanisms in place to determine customer satisfaction levels. Customer satisfaction is constantly monitored, and programs are in place to improve it.
3. The Quality Culture is cascaded down from the senior management leadership team. They have defined the corporate vision and have deployed it throughout the company.
4. Senior management is involved with monitoring, mentoring, and encouraging the new culture. They constantly reinforce positive performance.
5. Supplier relations have changed from simply buying based on price alone to buying from the lowest cost-to-do-business-with suppliers. Suppliers are expected to have systems in place to ensure delivery of defect-free parts or service on time.
6. The role of middle management is changed. Middle management is often the most threatened group of employees. At the same time, they are often the group expected to be most instrumental in facilitating and driving cultural changes.
7. There are internal controls in place to identify defects and mistakes. There are active programs to eliminate errors.
8. Benchmarking is used as a tool to drive improvement of the company in all aspects of doing business.
9. There is some form of employee empowerment. Or, at least, there is a system that allows and encourages employees to use their intelligence and take the initiative required to make things better.
10. There are metrics in place to measure the quality levels of all operations and functions. Attached to these are programs for continuous improvement.
11. Training, training, training. As employees are asked to assume new roles, to redefine what makes them successful, to learn new skills, and to learn the new cultural norms, training is imperative.
12. There are aggressive goals. People are challenged to work more efficiently. They are taught the skills and techniques required to achieve higher levels of performance.
13. Teams are abundant. In some cases there are cross-functional and multilevel teams. At the very minimum, work units are identified as teams and are taught the interpersonal skills required to function as a team. Supervisors transition from the traditional
command-and-control role to the role of coach mentor-facilitator.
14. There is a reward and recognition system in place. As new behaviors are expected from everyone, positive examples are recognized and celebrated.
First and foremost, senior management must determine and create the culture that will enable all of these things to happen. They must set the vision for the enterprise.

Senior management must be resolved to do whatever it takes to make the new culture work. They must be willing and able to modify their own behaviors to model the new rules and norms. They must be committed to the long haul. The course must be set and held steady. It took the Japanese twenty years to realize the benefits of their quality programs.

Organizational Development
A key to the success of Six Sigma is that :
- Everyone in the company must know what they contribute to the success of the company.
- Everyone must have a clear understanding of why they are employed and receiving a paycheck.
- Everyone must understand this in light of how their actions affect the customers.

The leadership of the company must complete an articulate framework of how the company will function to serve its customer base. One easy model for an Organizational Development framework is the acronym MOST, which represents Mission, Objectives, Strategies, and Tactics.
Mission
The company must make a clear and concise statement ofwhy it exists and the customers that it serves. The mission statement may also include how the company serves the
customers’ customers. A good mission statement must contain a description of what success will look like when you are fulfilling it.
A mission statement is more concrete than a vision statement. Whereas the vision has an ethereal quality, the mission statement must be reach-out yet achievable.
A vision has a sense of “In my next life I want to be. . . .”A typical vision may read, “To be recognized by everyone worldwide as the best company to work for.”

Objectives
Objectives are the quantifiable high-level goals of the company.
- They are the statements of how you will determine and measure your success.
- They must be statements of what you are striving to achieve; however, the numerical targets
should not be published.
- The company should hold the actual performance to objectives in tight security.
Objectives might look like this:
•Increase market share
•Reduce manufacturing costs
•Increase new product introductions
•Reduce cycle times for product delivery and service response
•Zero safety incidents
•Reduce water and air emissions
•Improve profit
•Improve quality in product, service, and administrative functions

The number of objectives should be between five and eight. If the list is too large, it becomes a laundry list of wishes. If the list is too small, it can be limiting.

Strategies
Strategies are the means that you will use to accomplish the objectives. Strategies define the expectations of your culture. From these strategies your employees should have a clear understanding of what is expected behavior.
Strategy statements may include:
❑ Respect for all people
❑ Cross-functional teaming
❑ Continuous improvement programs
❑ Superior services to our community, customers, and employees
❑ State-of-the-art technology
❑ Open communication between employees at all levels
❑ Training and personal growth for all employees
❑ Innovative manufacturing techniques
❑ High integrity
❑ A clean and safe work environment
❑ Exceeding customers’ expectations in all aspects of doing business with us

The mission statement, objectives, and strategies are typically generated by the senior management team at an off-site location. A two-day session facilitated by an organizational
development facilitator is an effective means to accomplish this. Mission, objectives, and strategies must come from the company leadership team.

These are a top-down communication of what is to be accomplished, how success will be determined, and what means are to be used.

Tactics
Tactics are the actions that will be taken, within the strategy guidelines, to accomplish the objectives and fulfill the company’s mission. Once the mission, objectives, and strategies have been communicated throughout the company, each department and division must provide a detailed
action plan containing:
-What will be done
-Who is responsible for doing it
-When it will be completed

These action plans form the foundation for what each work unit is expected to get done daily, weekly, and monthly throughout the year.
These plans need to be tied to at least one of the company objectives. In this way, every
employee throughout the company will have a clear understanding of what is expected of them, what their value to the overall success of the company is, and why they are employed.

A good action plan is posted and distributed to all affected employees. Work units must review their performance and progress on a regular time interval. Depending on the volume and cycle time of work, work units should review their performance weekly, biweekly, or monthly.
Division or department heads should review each work unit at least once a month. This gives an opportunity to provide feedback and to identify where barriers may need to be removed, what resources need to be added, and where management may need to spend more time assisting
their subordinates.

The elements of a Six Sigma culture are:
❑ Active and visible senior management involvement
❑ A mission statement defining success
❑ Objectives and strategies
❑ Action plans detailing tactics
❑ A methodology for managing change
❑ Training
❑ Teams