Lean Six Sigma Academy

I bet the title of this post caught some of my Lean friends off guard.  Fear not I am not going to talk about how Lean is about eliminating waste and Six Sigma is about reducing variation.  I have said this before and regret it.  These are stupid statements and when someone says them you should smack them in the mouth.  Someone should have smacked me in the mouth when I said them in the past.  OK, so don’t actually smack them… that would not be too respectful.

With this said, there are times when I feel like a Toyota apologist.  You know acting as if Toyota is infallible.  Toyota is not infallible and after reading Jon Miller’s recent post: Toyota Number One in the World… in Recalls this was even more clear.

I am DEFINITELY not proposing Toyota run off and hire the hottest Six Sigma consulting firm and deploy Black Belts all over the world.  I am not even proposing they use the words “Six Sigma” at all.  Instead, I am just curious what would happen if a team of Toyota employees looked at some of their most recent quality issues with new eyes.

When I say new eyes I am not proposing “Lean” or “TPS” eyes are inferior to “Six Sigma” or “Deming” eyes.  But let’s be honest here… when was the last time you read about Toyota using Response Surface Methodology or Monte Carlo simulation?  Perhaps they do and this is just not written about. 

Six Sigma works when it is used the right way and for the right reason.  In fact, if someone claims otherwise they are just ignorant.  And guess what… TPS works when it is used the right way and for the right reason and if someone claims otherwise they are just ignorant.

But as I have tried to promote with this simple little blog of mine… TPS and Six Sigma are different.  Yes, they both attack problems, waste, variation, defects, etc.  But Six Sigma attempts to look at these problems in a slightly different manner and sometimes, without a doubt, is the best methodology for the job.

The problems with the bastardization of Six Sigma are many.  But at its core Six Sigma is amazing and borders on magic.  It is far more than creating a few process maps and calculating Cp and Cpk as so many sadly think.

I wonder if Toyota is willing to give this magic a shot.  We hear about President Watanabe wanting to focus on quality.  Don’t get me wrong the 5 Why’s and PDCA work.  But I would love to see Toyota add some more artillery to their guns as they press on and  confront these serious issues.

What do you think?

I had to travel Sunday for a Monday meeting. Since daylight savings time had just made us “spring forward” I needed to change the clock in my Toyota Corolla on the way to the airport. All I had to do was press the “H” button one time and the time was correct. Easy.Fast forward a few hours once I was in my rental car – a red Chrysler PT Cruiser. Now let me make one thing crystal clear… a red Chrysler PT Cruiser is not my style. I am more your silver Toyota Corolla type of guy but I digress.

Anyhow, when I got into the PT Cruiser I went to adjust the clock as it was off by an hour. I studied the clock for a few seconds and realized I needed to push this little button down while I waited for the STUPID analog arms of the analog clock move all the way around. The picture above was taken in the car. Well I had started to drive by this time (real safe I know) and was not paying attention so you can probably guess what happened next. I went more than one hour! So I had to press the button again, which had begun to hurt my finger, and wait for the STUPID analog arms of the analog clock go all the way back around.

It is entirely possible that you can make the arms move in reverse instead of just forward but I sure couldn’t figure it out. So I was forced to do it the hard (and painful) way.

It seems this is one more example of how a company like Toyota has taken the time to think of the voice of their customer while a company like Chrysler is more concerned with how some STUPID analog clock makes the dash more stylish. I was sure glad to be back in my nice little Corolla with my nice little analog clock.

Until next time, I wish you all the best on your journey towards continuous improvement.

Business Week recently interviewed Toyota’s chief, Katsuaki Watanabe. They discussed hot topics such as how Toyota is battling the “big company” disease, quality issues, and the potential backlash in America as they close in on GM.Until next time, I wish you all the best on your journey towards continuous improvement.

I’m not a NASCAR fan nor foe. I could really care less about the sport but this article bothered me. It seems two popular drivers, Darrel Waltrip and Dale Jarrett, have decided to drive Toyota cars and many NASCAR faithful are bothered by it.A young 17 year old fan reacted, “I think they shouldn’t be in here. It’s an American sport.” Words of wisdom from a young man of wisdom I am sure. Perhaps this young lad, in between his English class tutoring, would like to take a look at Baseball or Basketball and note that many of the players are not from the USA. Should we ship Dirk Nowitski back to Germany? I doubt Mr. Cuban would agree.

Toyota makes the best cars, invented the best manufacturing process known to man kind, and has every right to participate in NASCAR.

Until next time, I wish you all the best on your journey towards continuous improvement.