Lean Six Sigma Academy

Entropy, Salmon, and Swimming

June 4, 2008 By Ron Pereira 9 Comments

Entropy A can of soup falls if you drop it, your car tire blows out when a nail punctures it, and eventually my barbeque grill cools down after grilling steaks, even in the hot Texas air. Why is this? Allow me to explain.

While these things are all different, they do share a common denominator. They’re all explained by the second law of thermodynamics – entropy.

Defined, entropy is a measure of the disorder or randomness in a system. Put another way, entropy helps us measure the energy that disperses or spreads out in a process, any process.

Entropy, our foe

Here is where we begin to understand how this second law of thermodynamics describes a fierce foe to those of us trying to improve processes in our factories, hospitals, and office buildings.

It would seem that entropy never seizes. It never grows tired, frustrated, or bewildered. It’s never sick or complains about a sore back. It just relentlessly presses on.

And while I realize entropy is a measure and not really a thing… I’m pretending, if you’ll allow me, that it is a thing… a relentless thing in fact.

This thing explains why my garage looks great for a week or two after our annual spring cleaning and then falls to pieces a few months later. It’s why the fifth S (sustain) is so darn hard. It’s why control charts were invented (to determine when the disorder is getting out of hand).

And its why, as I’ve stated many times before, I personally believe “controlling” or even “sustaining” gains is next to an impossible task, long-term. Why? Because entropy works harder than you and me and all our friends combined. It’s just a fact of life.

What to do?

Right, so entropy is relentless and never tires and controlling gains are next to impossible. That’s just great. Let’s all just pack our bags and quit, right? Wrong.

Have you ever watched salmon swim upstream? It’s really one of the most amazing things you’ll ever watch.

I can only imagine how hard it is for these fish to battle the current. I wonder how tired they get? I wonder what motivates them? I wonder if they realize many of them will die on the journey?

I can’t answer these questions. But I do know these salmon may be the perfect role models for how we should approach our battle with entropy.

Swim Like Hell

You see these salmon aren’t satisfied with maintaining their present position (i.e. controlling gains). Chinook salmon, for example, swim more than 900 miles and climb 7,000 feet from the Pacific Ocean as they return to spawn each year. So with massive odds facing them they set off against a mighty foe and swim.

And so it is with us, we too must swim (i.e. continuously improve). In fact, we must swim like hell with full knowledge that entropy is waiting for us to relax… so it can do what it does best… bring disorder back to the system.

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Filed Under: Featured, Leadership, Lean, Six Sigma

Eight Reasons Your Lean/Six Sigma Initiative Could Fail

June 1, 2008 By Ron Pereira 7 Comments

These 8 things could prove deadly to your lean and/or six sigma initiative. How many do you recognize?

The number of people trained is a key performance metric. While this may be something worth tracking when first starting out on the continuous improvement journey, I’d say this metric is next to useless as a long-term performance measurement. You can train hundreds, even thousands, and bring zero value to the organization.
The number of people certified is a key performance metric. Similarly, if the number of belts or lean gurus certified is a key measure, I’d say you are in it for the wrong reason. Badges and certifications are nice, and rewarding, but handing out marble plaques and T-Shirts should not be the driving force of your efforts.
Tools are used for the sake of a checklist. This is a real problem in the six sigma world. In some cases, a magical checklist listing all the tools a green or black belt must use in order to certify exists. Often times this list forces the belt down a path they may not need to travel as far as what tools they use. If, for example, simple linear regression is not needed to solve a problem stop forcing the belt to use it.
You spend more time quantifying savings than working on the actual project. I’ve seen people complete a project in a month, yet they spend 2 months battling with their controller over how much the project saved. This is pure waste! Before you start the project make sure you and your controller are in agreement as to what the savings will be if the objective is met.
Boiling the ocean. Instead of attempting to improve the on time delivery across your entire plant with a single green belt project, why not focus in on one product variant after some Pareto analysis? You may actually succeed.
It’s a program and not a philosophy. Programs, by definition, end. Conversely, the ancient origin of the word philosophy (philosophía) means “love of knowledge” or “love of wisdom.” And true love, as the good book tells us, never ends. So, make sure your lean and/or six sigma activities are part of an overall business philosophy and not a flavor of the month program.
It’s all about their resume. If the sole reason an individual is interested in learning new lean and six sigma skills is to pad their resume you have a big issue. Do your best to understand an individual’s true motivation for wanting to learn new skills. This is a tricky one, since we want all employees to learn. If this problem is rampant there may be larger, more systemic organizational issues that need to be addressed.
You attempt to control gains. If I had invented the DMAIC roadmap I would have made one major change. I wouldn’t have called the last phase control. Instead, I would have called it continue! You see, I am of the opinion that no gain can be controlled long-term. You are either improving or digressing. So, stop trying to control things… instead never stop improving them!

Do you agree with this list? Can you think of anything I’ve missed?

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Filed Under: Featured, Lean, Six Sigma

8 Dimensions of Quality

May 28, 2008 By Ron Pereira 18 Comments

By Chris Akins of Trident-Consulting LLC

The definition of quality is often a hotly debated topic. While it may seem intuitive, when we get right down to it, “quality” is a difficult concept to define with any precision.

The most fundamental definition of a quality product is one that meets the expectations of the customer. However, even this definition is too high level to be considered adequate.

In order to develop a more complete definition of quality, we must consider some of the key dimensions of a quality product or service.

Dimension 1: Performance

Does the product or service do what it is supposed to do, within its defined tolerances?

Performance is often a source of contention between customers and suppliers, particularly when deliverables are not adequately defined within specifications.

The performance of a product often influences profitability or reputation of the end-user. As such, many contracts or specifications include damages related to inadequate performance.

Dimension 2: Features

Does the product or services possess all of the features specified, or required for its intended purpose?

While this dimension may seem obvious, performance specifications rarely define the features required in a product. Thus, it’s important that suppliers designing product or services from performance specifications are familiar with its intended uses, and maintain close relationships with the end-users.

Dimension 3: Reliability

Will the product consistently perform within specifications?

Reliability may be closely related to performance. For instance, a product specification may define parameters for up-time, or acceptable failure rates.

Reliability is a major contributor to brand or company image, and is considered a fundamental dimension of quality by most end-users.

Dimension 4: Conformance

Does the product or service conform to the specification?

If it’s developed based on a performance specification, does it perform as specified? If it’s developed based on a design specification, does it possess all of the features defined?

Dimension 5: Durability

How long will the product perform or last, and under what conditions?

Durability is closely related to warranty. Requirements for product durability are often included within procurement contracts and specifications.

For instance, fighter aircraft procured to operate from aircraft carriers include design criteria intended to improve their durability in the demanding naval environment.

Dimension 6: Serviceability

Is the product relatively easy to maintain and repair?

As end users become more focused on Total Cost of Ownership than simple procurement costs, serviceability (as well as reliability) is becoming an increasingly important dimension of quality and criteria for product selection.

Dimension 7: Aesthetics

The way a product looks is important to end-users. The aesthetic properties of a product contribute to a company’s or brand’s identity. Faults or defects in a product that diminish its aesthetic properties, even those that do not reduce or alter other dimensions of quality, are often cause for rejection.

Dimension 8: Perception

Perception is reality. The product or service may possess adequate or even superior dimensions of quality, but still fall victim to negative customer or public perceptions.

As an example, a high quality product may get the reputation for being low quality based on poor service by installation or field technicians. If the product is not installed or maintained properly, and fails as a result, the failure is often associated with the product’s quality rather than the quality of the service it receives.

Summary

It should be obvious from the discussion above that the individual dimensions of quality are not necessarily distinct. Depending on the industry, situation, and type of contract or specification several or all of the above dimensions may be interdependent.

When designing, developing or manufacturing a product (or delivering a service) the interactions between the dimensions of quality must be understood and taken into account.

While these dimensions may not constitute a complete list of relevant dimensions, taking them into consideration should provide us with a better understanding of the slippery concept of quality.

What other dimensions can you think of?

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Filed Under: Six Sigma

Dealing with Doubting Thomas

March 30, 2008 By Ron Pereira 4 Comments

Today, Roman Catholics around the world read about Doubting Thomas.

No matter what your personal belief system is, I think there is much to learn from this story, especially for those of us attempting to drive change in our organizations.

Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve,
was not with them when Jesus came.
So the other disciples said to him, “We have seen the Lord.”
But he said to them,
“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands
and put my finger into the nailmarks
and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”

Since Thomas did not see the resurrected Jesus with his own eyes, he just couldn’t bring himself to believe that He had in fact rose from the dead (even though his friends told him this was the case).

Beating my head against a wall

When I hear these verses, I am reminded of the times I have attempted to get people to try new ways of working only to face massive opposition (e.g. that won’t work here… we’re different… you just don’t understand).

The most frustrating part is, like the “other disciples,” I have seen the things I am promoting work with my own eyes!

Now a week later his disciples were again inside
and Thomas was with them.
Jesus came, although the doors were locked,
and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.”
Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands,
and bring your hand and put it into my side,
and do not be unbelieving, but believe.”

Go to Gemba

In many cases, in order to get people to believe in what we are saying (e.g. one piece flow is best, 5S is critical, variation is the enemy, etc.) we must show them.

We could make a half goofy video, shoot a statapult in a green belt course, or make paper airplanes. Or we can bypass the games and head straight for the gemba, or the place the work is done, and just do it.

However, no matter how much evidence we provide, the only way a true and lasting transformation will occur is when these doubting Thomases develop a blind faith and trust in what we are preaching.

Thomas answered and said to him, “My Lord and my God!”
Jesus said to him, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me?
Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.”

Let’s face it, in the end we cannot show the skeptics of world everything. Eventually, they must begin to believe in what we are saying.

The good news is, once this new found faith takes root (and it will if we persevere), great and powerful change will result.

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Filed Under: Leadership, Lean, Six Sigma

LSS Academy Series Review – Six Sigma Edition

March 23, 2008 By Ron Pereira 2 Comments

First of all, Happy Easter! My family and I were in Oklahoma the last few days. As is very typical with me during road trips, I began to think about this blog. I am not sure if this is entirely healthy (me always thinking about this blog) but I guess that’s a story for another day.

Ahhh, Quiet Time

In any event, this quiet time (yes, the kids were sleeping) allowed me to reminisce on what we have discussed over the past year or so on the blog.

I quickly came to the realization that I have written quite a few “series” related to various lean and six sigma topics. So, to save you the time of digging through the archives I thought I would share a few of these with you this evening.

Let’s start with six sigma related series tonight… and then later this week we will dive into lean. So you guessed it, this will be a 2 part series where we talk about series. Cool, eh?

Descriptive Statistics

In August of last year I wrote a series on descriptive statistics. Don’t lie… makes you want to yawn, right? Thanks to all the crappy stats professors out there this topic definitely has a bad reputation.

Well, with this known, I attempted to gain it some much needed street cred back. In part 1 we started off talking about the 3 measures of central tendency. Then, in part 2 we got all crazy and dove into the 3 measures of dispersion.

Control Charts

If you think of yourself as a “lean guy” or “lean gal” you may wonder what benefit (if any) this six sigma stuff can be to you.

Well, while control charts are not a six sigma only tool… they are heavily stressed during a six sigma practitioners development. With this said, if you are into lean and not using control charts you are missing out on one very powerful tool.

In part 1 of this series, we started slowly as we discussed the history of control charts. Then, in part 2 we talked about the controls charts used with attribute data – namely the p, c, and u charts. Finally, in part 3 we learned about my personal favorite, the Individual and Moving Range control chart.

Fun with Confidence Intervals

When people mention the words confidence intervals I cannot lie… I get excited. But, alas, I realize I am a little weird. So in order to make this topic a bit more digestable for normal people… I wrote a 2 part series.

In part 1 we dipped our foot in the water and explained the difference between population and sample statistics. Then, in part 2 we got into things far more deeply.

Simple Linear Regression

One of the first series I attempted focused in on the very popular topic of regression. This is another topic those mean college profs did their best to make us hate. Well… hate no more friends.

In part 1, of this 3 part series we learned about some of the basics of regression. Then, in part 2 we talked about two very cool concepts – R Sq (adj) and P values. Finally, in part 3 we talked about residuals and the ultra important differences between correlation, causation, and extrapolation. If you click on only only one link in this article.. click this last one.

Hangin’ with Taguchi

While not a traditional series, the articles I wrote on Taguchi methods have been quite popular as determined by their number of page views. So I thought I would conclude with these.

My first Taguchi related article touched on the famous Taguchi Loss Function (in addition to why so many folks seem to hate Mr. Taguchi’s guts). Next, we discussed one of my favorite process capability measures, the Taguchi Index – Cpm. Finally, I later shared some insight into my favorite design of experiment – the Taguchi L18 DOE.

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Next up we I will share some of the lean related series from the past year. But the links above should keep you plenty busy until then.

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Filed Under: Featured, Six Sigma

Brett Favre – Greatest Ever?

March 5, 2008 By Ron Pereira 4 Comments

“No data have meaning apart from their context.”
- Donald Wheeler

Unless you live under a rock (or perhaps outside of the USA) you have likely heard that Brett Favre has decided to retire from the NFL.

Like him or not, no one can deny Favre’s greatness. He played the game the way it is meant to be played. He was tough, competitive, and left everything on the field. Personally, while not a Packer fan, I always enjoyed watching him play. To be sure, I will miss him.

Greatest Ever?

The sports radio shows are all debating where to place Favre on the list of all time best QB’s. Most have him top 5 or 10.

Since I am into data, I thought I would do a little research myself. While I was playing around with the data it dawned on me just how badly most people screw this type of analysis up.

MS Excel Fun

Typically, if someone wanted to see how consistent Favre was over his career, say for total passing yards, they would most likely find the data and dump it into MS Excel. Then they would get busy with the infamous chart wizard finishing with a graph similar to the one to the left (click to enlarge).

From here the debate would really begin. Favre haters would explain how inconsistent he was. They would say, “Just look at the data man! It’s all over the place.” Meanwhile, Favre fans would explain how these haters need to get their eyes checked. After five minutes of debating the two would eventually agree to disagree.

Adding Context to the Analysis

It doesn’t have to be this way. Instead of creating an old fashioned line chart as shown above, the two friends would be better served by adding some context to the analysis.

The easiest way to accomplish this is via a standard control chart. The simplest choice, and my personal favorite, is to create an Individuals chart as shown to the left (click to enlarge). The “context” is created by the addition of control limits and a measure of central tendency, namely the mean.

Once we have this graph in front of us it is pretty obvious that Brett Favre was one consistent passing machine! All the data points fall in between the control limits demonstrating good old common cause variation.

In this example, the Favre hater would likely walk away mumbling something under their breath as the Favre fan would sit back, smile, and remember just how much they loved statistics… and Brett Favre!

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Filed Under: Six Sigma Tagged With: control charts, football, Six Sigma

Free iSixSigma Salary Webcast

March 3, 2008 By Ron Pereira Leave a Comment

Our friend Michael Marx over at iSixSigma will be hosting a free webcast Tuesday, March 4 at 11:00 AM EST. As of this morning, more than 850 people had already registered for the event. Here are the details of the event.

Mark your calendars…Tuesday March 4th, at 11 a.m. Eastern…The iSixSigma Global Salary Survey webcast. Attendance is free of charge. Just register to attend with your name and an email address.

I’ll be your host along with Brad Hopper of Spotfire. Together we’ll dive into the Fifth Annual iSixSigma Global Salary Survey. This year we’ve loaded the salary data into Spotfire’s business analytics software which will be the vehicle to guide you through a virtual analysis that you just won’t see anywhere else.

We’ll slice and dice the data right before your eyes, showing you year to year salary trends broken down by Six Sigma role, regions, experience, education, and industry.

The best part about attending the webcast (besides getting to listen to me ramble) is you will have the chance to download a sample set of the salary data in the Spotfire application and play with it yourself.

Whether you’re an HR executive or deployment leader looking to benchmark salaries against the industry or a Black Belt working hard to become a Master Black Belt… the webcast and downloadable data will inform you and arm you with the data you need to make those salary decisions.

Register for the webcast here

Filed Under: Six Sigma

Long Live the King (Cash)

February 7, 2008 By Ron Pereira 4 Comments

If you are involved with a for-profit business in any way please remember one thing – cash is king. Of course respecting people is absolutely critical. But cash pays the bills. It buys things. It pays salaries. So without money in the bank all the respect in the world means little.

Sure, we can borrow money and hope to pay it back. But most executives I know would like nothing more than to see a nice pile of money in the bank. Further, if we are talking about publicly traded companies there are some nice people on Wall Street who also have vested interest in your financial stability.

While there are many ways of freeing up cash my all time favorite method is to increase the rate at which inventory turns.

Making Bicycles

The easiest way I know of to make people understand what we are talking about here is to take it to their garage.

Imagine you have started a business in your garage assembling bicycles. You have found your suppliers for the various components. You have negotiated the T’s and C’s (terms and conditions). And, lastly, you have spent most of your life savings – much to the chagrin of your significant other – on the inventory needed to start things up.

Reality Check

Let me put it another way – you’re broke. You have no more money in the bank. And if you don’t convert all the fancy bicycle frames and pedals (a.k.a. as assets on the balance sheet) into profit soon your kids grumbling stomachs will keep you awake at night.

It’s not a pretty picture is it? But for some reason most people don’t think of things this way. When it’s not our money, or our inventory, or our garage, or our children being directly impacted its easy to turn the other cheek.

Well, friends, I think its due time many of us take a more personal view over things like inventory and cash flow. For those of us in the west the survival of manufacturing as we know it may depend on it.

Stay Tuned

So, you agree, there is a problem. What to do about it? Please stay tuned over the coming weeks and months as I share some practical leadership, lean, and six sigma methods for attacking this serious issue head on.

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Photo by Tracy O

Filed Under: Lean, Six Sigma

Schofield Media Group Announces Acquisition of iSixSigma

February 6, 2008 By Ron Pereira Leave a Comment

Big news yesterday from Michael Cyger, owner of the extremely popular iSixSigma brand.

I am pleased and excited to announce that CTQ Media, owner of the publishing brands including iSixSigma, Real Innovation, BPM Enterprise and Sourcingmag, is on the verge of a new era of growth and expansion. This is because we have just been acquired by Schofield Media Group, a leading international business-to-business media company.

When it comes to six sigma brand recognition iSixSigma.com is at the top of the list. In fact, no one is even close. I liken it to the type of brand recognition ESPN.com enjoys with the average sports junky.

I wish Michael and the rest of the iSixSigma team all the best during these exciting times. And I look forward to seeing how things continue to improve and evolve with the iSixSigma brand.

Filed Under: Six Sigma

Just Do It

February 2, 2008 By Ron Pereira 3 Comments

“Talk doesn’t cook rice.”
-Chinese Proverb

While planning, checking, and acting/adjusting are of course crucial elements of the PDCA cycle I sometimes feel as though the “do” element is under-utilized. In a similar way the improve phase of six sigma’s DMAIC process also seems to get lost in the weeds from time to time.

Now, don’t get me wrong here. We must follow each step in both PDCA and DMAIC in order to get the best results. But, I personally believe if people acted and improved with a little more vigor than they do today the world would be a better place.

I once knew an individual who liked to plan and plan and plan. I mean this person was a planning machine. They had plans for plans. While this was refreshing in some aspects I felt it hindered their ability to actually get something done.

In the six sigma world, especially, I too frequently see people frozen with “analysis paralysis.” At times these soon to be green or black belts become so entranced by all the amazing and almost mysterious tools they lose focus on the only thing that really matters – solving a problem.

I am reminded of the words James Womack used towards of the end of the preface in his book “Lean Thinking.” Dr. Womack simply closed the last paragraph with three powerful words of advice – just do it!

I couldn’t agree more.

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Filed Under: Lean, Six Sigma

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