http://www.asq.org/news/qualitynews/2005/03/11/20050311mcdoonaldssixsigma.html (http://www.asq.org/news/qualitynews/2005/03/11/20050311mcdoonaldssixsigma.html)

McDonald’s To Adopt Six Sigma

SOURCE: The Stamford Advocate (Connecticut newspaper)

McDonald’s is working with General Electric (GE) to learn about the Six Sigma management philosophy GE has found success with.

A group of McDonald’s management, including staff from finance, U.S. restaurant operations and U.S. business research, is taking part in the GE Commercial Finance’s Franchise (GEFF) program called, “At the Customer, for the Customer (ACFC).”

“The ACFC program does more than share knowledge,” said Tom Quindlen, president and chief executive officer of GEFF in Scottsdale, AZ. “It allows our customers to actively look at the GE processes and apply them to their own businesses to help them grow. More than 30 GEFF customers have benefited from the ACFC program since 2002. It’s been a home run for us.”

GEFF has given McDonald’s management a new perspective on their business, said Matthew Paul, senior executive vice president and chief financial officer of Chicago based McDonald’s. “Gaining access to GE’s management knowledge will help McDonald’s to continue to learn and grow,” Paul said.

“The two organizations are filled with smart people who like to learn from each other in service to our customers. That’s what Six Sigma is,” said Karin Teglia, corporate vice president in finance. McDonald’s has already incorporated some aspects of the philosophy. “It’s a disciplined approach to decision making.”

This just confirms what I have always believed about 6 sigma.

Why couldn't I have invented this useless but tremendous money making program!? (instead of Dogbert).

True story. One of my clients told me that the only improvement they got out of a similar program was to save money by reducing the number of deodorant cubes in the urinals.

After 12 Months of intensive training for all executives the Vice President of Restaurant Re-Engineering was pleased to announce the first improvements due to the MacSigma program.

"We have found a way of reducing the variation of our fries by having the growers send us only square potatoes. (this now matches the square fish that go into the MacFillet-O-Fish)

After 23 minutes 99.7% of our customers have finished their meals so our seats automatically tilt back after this time to drop them on the floor and let the next customers sit.

We now have the same number of "in" doors as "out" doors as studies have confirmed that as many people leave our restaurants as enter it.

Our recycling program now includes the toys in the MacHappy Meals which are retreived from the bins out the back."

GE is making money where the money is - Training...

Come on, Sidney. It's a couple more weeks until April Fool's Day.:lmao: You are starting too early!

IS it because
The move in the U.K., where McDonald's has operated for 30 years, came after its 770 restaurants saw their profits drop 71% to GBP23.6 million in 2003.
http://www.licenseenews.com/news/news279.html

I see they're reducing 'serving size'. I wonder if the meals will be cheaper...

It's been so long since I've eaten at a McDonalds I can't even remember when I last was in one (or at a drive-through). I have never been a big 'fast food' fan, but I particularly disliked McDonalds. In part that is because of their marketing strategy towards kids.

With respect to six sigma at McDonalds, I wonder how and where they will apply six sigma. What processes and measureables. Or - What part of six sigma (as a 'package') they will adopt. “The two organizations are filled with smart people who like to learn from each other in service to our customers. That’s what Six Sigma is,” said Karin Teglia, corporate vice president in finance. Well, now I know what Six Sigma 'is'...

My impression of McDonald's decision-making is from reading about the infamous hot-coffee lawsuit. This lawsuit is a target of endless derision, but I recall reading McDonald's quality manager had testified his employer had received over 700 complaints about the coffee's temperature--about 10 degrees over industry standards. The customer received 3rd degree burns and three reconstructive surgeries, and sued only when McDonald's Inc. refused her requests to help with the medical bills.

Given that and, for example, its failure to respond to public pressure to switch its cooking oils in a timely way, I'm not surprised if "Micky-D's" believes a big effort like 6S is necessary to respond to customers effectively and increase demand and market share.

Sigh.

I see they're reducing 'serving size'. I wonder if the meals will be cheaper...

Well, now I know what Six Sigma 'is'...
Does your knowledge of Six Sigma derive from the fact they will "create value from the 6S initiative" by giving the customers less for the same price? It certainly could reduce costs - I wonder if the customers will be smart enough to see they've been duped? Hersheys and Mars continue to shrink the size of the candy bars - do they have 6S guys, too?

I knew Ray Kroc and sometimes drank camel's milk (beer) with him after Shrine meetings. He really was not comfortable with targeting kids - he just wanted to offer cheap, simple, fast meals and not have to worry about complicated instructions for the workers. I do know he preferred steak to hamburger when we ate. What a shame his original premise of burgers and shakes got so complicated.

Keeping McDonald’s “Six sigma” intentions aside, Have we, as Quality Professional / and / or a Customer given our feedback on the Customer Satisfaction Sheet?

I do not remember visiting McDonalds. I visit Wendy’s. In my several visits, I have not seen a single individual filling up and expressing the “Voice of Customer”- “Customer Satisfaction”.

When I fill up and drop that sheet in the box, usually many turn their heads out of curiosity and look at me. I know that look…. Get a life? :confused:

Regards,
Govind.

What a shame his original premise of burgers and shakes got so complicated.

Except it was not "his original premise." Kroc changed almost nothing after buying the business from the McDonald brothers, until several years later. 1968, to be exact, when the Big Mac was introduced, and even that was not a Kroc innovation--it was created by a franchisee. Most of the legend that has built up around Kroc is, well, a crock.

Except it was not "his original premise." Kroc changed almost nothing after buying the business from the McDonald brothers, until several years later. 1968, to be exact, when the Big Mac was introduced, and even that was not a Kroc innovation--it was created by a franchisee. Most of the legend that has built up around Kroc is, well, a crock.
Ray never took credit for the original idea, only for exploiting the original idea of the McDonald family into a "reproducible" franchise - he did keep their name after all. Remember, Ray started his career as the guy who sold a bunch of milk shake mixers to the McDonald family. He didn't have a lot of money when he first started out. Ray was pretty much of a regular guy who spent several days every Christmas season standing on a corner, anonymously manning a kettle and ringing a bell for the Salvation Army (without newspaper fanfare) as did hundreds of other Shriners. He was one of the few rich guys I knew who donated time as well as money to the charities he supported. I never thought of Ray as a "legend" - he was just one of the thousands of guys who belonged to the same group I did and wore red fezzes to our meetings. He sat at the same round table with me, an apellate court judge, the sheriff of Cook County, a professional musician, and a guy who laid tile floors for a living and we all called each other by our first names and took turns refilling the pitcher of camel's milk (except the sheriff - he was on crutches and got a pass.)

Personally, I prefer Steak & Shake and a newer operation called Culver's Culver's reminds me a lot of the Big Boy operations - all food made to order, not precooked and then reheated in a microwave as McDonald's and Burger King franchises here in the Chicago area have taken to doing.

Steak and Shake is really geared as an eat-in place, food served on china and drinks in glasses (paper goods only go with take-out) - S&S has pretty good quality methodology - color photos to match color for toasted bun among other things.

I wonder if the McD people aren't just trying to return to their roots of sorts.

How many of us remember that organizations like McD's and Howard Johnson's were doing six sigma befere there even was such a thing. The american motoring public could go to these places and everything was the same from the size of the servings to the temp of the coffee to how long a fry or burger was cooked. They controlled their processes from start to finish.

In the early days of travel by motoring there was tremendous variation in quality of service in both food and accomodations. This derived from both general quality and in regional "cultural" differences. Today we deride the bland sameness of things, but back then it was a relief for travelers to know that if they stopped at one of these places, anywhere in the country, they knew exactly what they were going to get.

I find it interesting that we, as Quality Profesionals, find it so easy to overlook this tremendously successful quality effort by US firms in the 50's and 60's in such mundane industries as food and accomodation. We fall into the same trap of derision. At least these folks are trying.

Personally I try to stay home as much as possible.

James

P.S Wes, I prefer S&S also. Great atmosphere, good food, right portions and terrific service (at our local).

Ray never took credit for the original idea, only for exploiting the original idea of the McDonald family into a "reproducible" franchise - he did keep their name after all.

"Ray" might never have claimed originality in the concept, but the franchising of McDonalds was well underway before Kroc got involved. The McDonald brothers were both afraid of airplanes, and after the franchising was extended as far as it could go geographically without them having to fly, Kroc was instrumental in expanding the reach, but this was before he took control of the company. McDonald's was a well-established franchising concern before Kroc got there, contrary to the prevailing myth--that Kroc never did anything to discourage--that Kroc bought a little hamburger joint from a couple of rubes in California and turned it into an empire.

I would be remiss if I didn't give credit where it's due; Kroc and his wife were very generous with their money and made huge contributions to a lot of very worthy causes. He also established the standardization of McDonalds, perhaps to a fault (he personally specified the amount of wax to be used in the wax paper that separated frozen hamburger patties) but he was hugely successful in setting up a system that could be duplicated ad infinitum. Of course there were some gaffes along the way. I worked at a company-owned store in 1968 when the Big Mac was introduced, and I was impressed, even as a 16-year-old, how seamless the integration of the new product was. But at the same time, we tested an automatic fry-bagging machine made by AMF which was a Rube Goldberg device if I ever saw one, and it should have been obvious to anyone with eyes and a brain that the thing wouldn't--couldn't--work. All it did was slow things down for the two weeks or so that we had it. But the success of McDonalds speaks for itself, I think, and should serve as a prime example of how standardization and rigidly-enforced procedures can work. Most of that was Kroc, and he deserves credit for it.

"Ray" might never have claimed originality in the concept, but the franchising of McDonalds was well underway before Kroc got involved. The McDonald brothers were both afraid of airplanes, and after the franchising was extended as far as it could go geographically without them having to fly, Kroc was instrumental in expanding the reach, but this was before he took control of the company. McDonald's was a well-established franchising concern before Kroc got there, contrary to the prevailing myth--that Kroc never did anything to discourage--that Kroc bought a little hamburger joint from a couple of rubes in California and turned it into an empire.
Well, maybe you are correct. The guy I ate and drank with for years and years could have been a stone liar and turned a completely different face to his fraternity brothers than the face you know so much about.

He never said every idea at McDonald's was his creation to us as we swapped tales for an hour or two once or twice a month. He freely admitted "dopey" ideas which didn't work out. He seemed genuinely saddened that one idea which didn't work out was the proximate cause of the bankruptcy of Sealtest Ice Cream company in Chicago.

We all pretty much agreed at the time that success in business depended on having successes outweigh losses; that you had to be open to new ideas and give folks the chance to fail or your operation would die from stagnation. We all laughed at one of the "buzz phrases" making the rounds in the late 70's - "analysis paralysis," but we all agreed that a severe case of analysis paralysis was nearly always fatal to the business that caught it.

If Ray were alive, I don't think McDonald's would have continued using the original cooking oil after announcing the change to a new one, but that's just my opinion of the guy across the table with a plastic cup of camel's milk in front of him.

Well, maybe you are correct. The guy I ate and drank with for years and years could have been a stone liar and turned a completely different face to his fraternity brothers than the face you know so much about.

I'm not sure that the sarcasm is necessary. You knew him and I didn't. Remember, I originally responded to your statement (and restatement of the myth) about "his original premise of burgers and shakes..." (Emphasis added).

Personally I wish we had stayed more on the topic - discussing six sigma and McDonalds rather than running off on this tangent. Anyway, let's get away from being too personal here...

Personally I wish we had stayed more on the topic - discussing six sigma and McDonalds rather than running off on this tangent. Anyway, let's get away from being too personal here...
Assuming the the suppliers are TS16949 registered, the customer specific requirements specify zero defects to be included in the control plan and implementing documents.

Personally I wish we had stayed more on the topic - discussing six sigma and McDonalds rather than running off on this tangent. Anyway, let's get away from being too personal here...

Agreed. Mea culpa.

You Quality types, always looking to put down 6 sigma...


Look on the bright side, at least they'll only poison 3.4 Customers per million.

And it's about time someone had a go at experimenting with the taste of those burgers.

I can only assume that the motivation for MacDonald’s executives to be interested in 6s is the alleged potential for tremendous cost savings. As far as I can tell, they wrote the book in variation reduction and standardization of procedures.

Sure, they have many detractors, but when you find yourself hungry, in places so remote that not even Indiana Jones would venture, and you have the option of a “native diner” and the McD, at least you know what you will get at the golden arches.

McDonalds has a highly developed Corporate Social Responsibility policy, including labor policies flown down to the suppliers.



PS. The Fast One. What about 3.4 burgers (in a million) either over or undersized? Why does it have to be food poisoned?

Is one to assume that you either work for or are in the process of applying for a job with MacDonald’s……

Six sigma, quality, re-engineering; call it what you will, just as an opinion I think one of the greatest threats to their profits is the knee jerk reaction to the alleged link between obesity and ‘fast foods’.

In England MacDonald’s have started selling various ‘healthy’ foods: salads, bagels etc as well as the existing product ranges.

Cut the sugars and fats in current products, that’s probably one starting point.

It doesn’t take a black belt in origami to work that one out…

Six sigma, quality, re-engineering; call it what you will, just as an opinion I think one of the greatest threats to their profits is the knee jerk reaction to the alleged link between obesity and ‘fast foods’.Let's focus on the aspect of 6 sigma and McDonalds rather than stray again into a bash McDonalds mode or the value of 6 sigma debate.

McDonald’s is working with General Electric (GE) to learn about the Six Sigma management philosophy GE has found success with.

A group of McDonald’s management, including staff from finance, U.S. restaurant operations and U.S. business research, is taking part in the GE Commercial Finance’s Franchise (GEFF) program called, “At the Customer, for the Customer (ACFC).”

“The ACFC program does more than share knowledge,” said Tom Quindlen, president and chief executive officer of GEFF in Scottsdale, AZ. “It allows our customers to actively look at the GE processes and apply them to their own businesses to help them grow. More than 30 GEFF customers have benefited from the ACFC program since 2002. It’s been a home run for us.”

GEFF has given McDonald’s management a new perspective on their business, said Matthew Paul, senior executive vice president and chief financial officer of Chicago based McDonald’s. “Gaining access to GE’s management knowledge will help McDonald’s to continue to learn and grow,” Paul said.

“The two organizations are filled with smart people who like to learn from each other in service to our customers. That’s what Six Sigma is,” said Karin Teglia, corporate vice president in finance. McDonald’s has already incorporated some aspects of the philosophy. “It’s a disciplined approach to decision making.”

In reviewing the article, it implies that McDonald's is a customer of GE Finance. From the title of the group, GE must provide financing to franchise businesses. If that is true, then GE has a vested interest in helping McDonald franchises to become more profitable.

If you wanted to implement Six Sigma or any other quality initiative, it would be dependent on how much independence there is in a franchise. The individual franchises appear to be only as good as the local manager. Whether the local manager needs to be trained in Six Sigma to be a good manager is open to question. McDonald's finance staff also attended the training so maybe there are some corporate processes that need fixed.

The problem with these articles is that they make good press about doing something to improve quality or customer service but give little information about what specifically is being done. It would be nice to know what the representatives from the operations area will do. The Columbus ASQ section has no members from McDonald's. Wendy's headquarters is here and there are two ASQ members with one having the title quality assurance and the other product compliance.

Bill Pflanz

The discussion of what McDonalds customers want is now in this thread: McDonald’s - What do customers want? (http://elsmar.com/Forums/showthread.php?t=11250)

In reviewing the article, it implies that McDonald's is a customer of GE Finance. From the title of the group, GE must provide financing to franchise businesses. If that is true, then GE has a vested interest in helping McDonald franchises to become more profitable... Etc... Which brings us back to - What are they measuring? Where and how are they applying six sigma.

I agree - Articles like this are so devoid of detail that it's difficult to ascertain whether what they're really doing even makes sense.

Which brings us back to - What are they measuring? Where and how are they applying six sigma.

I agree - Articles like this are so devoid of detail that it's difficult to ascertain whether what they're really doing even makes sense.

On the other hand, Marc, I remember a newspaper article where an insurance company had just announced it was embarking on the TQM path and was going to save $2M. The article then went on to list projects it was doing.

Half of them were outsourcing, the other half cutting staff numbers.

Funny I never saw a follow-up. They were taken over two years later though.

Which brings us back to - What are they measuring? Where and how are they applying six sigma.

I agree - Articles like this are so devoid of detail that it's difficult to ascertain whether what they're really doing even makes sense.
Not to worry, Marc. This last one is very illuminating. Now, 6s is a quality control system. All of this from the ASQ website
http://www.asq.org/news/qualitynews/2005/03/18/20050318supermarket.html
Supermarket Chain Cutting Costs With Six Sigma

SOURCE: The Associated Press

The second largest U.S. supermarket chain, Albertsons, is cutting costs by implementing Six Sigma.

“We plan to focus on our consumer demand chain initiatives, coupled with savings generated through our recently launched Six Sigma program,” said Danielle Killpack, an Albertsons spokeswoman.

CEO Larry Johnston brought the quality control system to Albertsons from his former employer, General Electric.

The grocer will cut costs by focusing on better planning, inventory management and reducing prices from suppliers, Killpack said.

Ah, yes! "We're gonna do six sig-mah! We're gonna do six sig-mah!"

Let us all chant in unison!

Look - Don't get me wrong. As a set of tools, a quality system or whatever - It's OK by me. If the tools are used (even though they are common to many other Programs of the Year), great.

Unfortunately there's a lot of hype out there and I don't believe six sigma will necessarily cure a sick system where there is what I refer to as 'Poor Personality' management. They can tell us of the wonders and announce to the world that they're embracing six sigma (or whatever) but that doesn't mean much. To me these announcements are a way to influence stock prices and people's perception.

I would like to see some good six sigma discussions here. I'd like to see what believers have to say. But I fear this forum is an enclave of pragmatists who see six sigma as more hype than substance (myself included) and we chase believers away. I don't know if that's good or bad.

'Poor Personality' management
Oh man - I'm going to use that one. :agree1:

I would like to see some good six sigma discussions here. I'd like to see what believers have to say. But I fear this forum is an enclave of pragmatists who see six sigma as more hype than substance (myself included) and we chase believers away. I don't know if that's good or bad.

Yeah, I'd like to be able to see good discussions here about sick er, six sigma myself, but after seeing where our management went with the program they just had to have (kind of like your "We're gonna do six sig-mah! We're gonna do six sig-mah!" statement...) it makes it really hard for me to get excited about it. Send a person to be a black belt, send a bunch of people to be green belts, then ridicule every effort they make to improve our processes until they either stop trying, or grab the first transfer out they can find even if it is not a "six sigma" job. and they wonder why I don't want to be the chief cook and bottle washer in the analysis of data diner?

I typically call it 'Bad (vs. Good) Personality' management - Same thing though.

Six Sigma can be applied to any measurables that can effect product quality and most important, a company's bottom line. Examples: jobs quoted vs lost; quotng errors; print errors; failure to follow procedures; Return on investment to name a few.
You need to use paredo, Who sez you need green and black belts? Small Ma and Pa companies who spent thousands because their customer has their belted personnel creating problems when they can,t find them. The small companies have closed their doors because they could not increase the :nopity: cost of doing business to off-set their ROI.

Thought you guys may want to bite on this. McD's pie and biscuit supplier, The Bama Companies is my former employer. They won the Malcolm Baldrige in 2004!

Consistently delicious!

Bama has been using Six Sigma with excellent results. They never looked at removing deodorant cubes that I can recall - but they looked extensively at hand sanitizing solutions. Sorry - cant go there - proprietary! ;)

Steve

I will take the bait offered up by sulkinsf. First, the disclaimer - I work for The Bama Companies. We have been implementing Six Sigma since late 2000 because it was driven and personally supported by the CEO. I cannot imagine that it would have been successful without that level of support. Hard dollar project savings (the kind that a Financial Controller would sign off on) have amounted to over $18 million. Soft savings and capacity gains far exceed that amount. We followed the TQM line for many years, but without a major focus on improving customer satisfaction, product quality, efficiency and operating cost reduction we realized limited benefit. TQM was a great vehicle for emphasizing that everyone is responsible for quality and changing the culture of the organization. However, without the project focus that we now have with Six Sigma, TQM and its tools were relegated to the handful of quality practitioners - of which I was one. In the TQM days, I personally trained hundreds of people in the use of Deming's PDSA cycle and basic quality tools - with only limited application after the learners left the training sessions.

With Six Sigma, there is a completely different environment. We have 11 Black Belts, and upwards of 75 Green Belts (out of about 1000 employees). Needless to say, we constantly have many projects going - all of which are important enough to have resources dedicated to them. Potential projects are reviewed and must be championed by the owner of the resources. Progress towards completion is tracked for each project. In ISO 9000 language, we have a thoroughly deployed corrective AND preventive action process. What is comes down to is that we are getting better at many things much faster these days.

I will add that our implementation of Six Sigma is being constantly improved - in training methods, selection of training candidates, project selection and execution, coaching of less experience practitioners, progress tracking, communication, integration of Lean concepts.... Six Sigma is so important here that 2 of the top 5 measures in our Balanced Scorecard are directly linked to it. If you don't measure it, you can't possibly know how you are doing.

The bottom line is that Six Sigma works for us. It is not the hammer we apply to every situation - a lesson we have learned only through the experience of trying to make it useful for us.

I read with amused interest the preponderance of writers who relish the act of Six Sigma Bashing. Sure, Six Sigma has some squirrelly stuff with the 1.5 sigma shift. My response? Just quick debating it and talk in the language people understand - dollars, percents, failure rates and so on. Quit wringing your hands and bemoaning your lot in life and DO something that is intensely focused on fixing something that is broken - and that is also important to the business. If your current employer is the problem, change. If you are the problem, change. I am more interested in what I can do to make things better. If this forum is for the exchange of ideas that can help us make that happen, great. If not have a happy Dilbert-style life that is filled with little rays of bitter sunshine.

In my opinion, those who prefer to bash Six Sigma have either:
1) had an unpleasant experience with a Six Sigma implementation that has gone bad,
2) have not yet become proficient practioners of making things better faster through the wise application of the Six Sigma process and tools,
3) already work in an environment where MANY processes are being radically improved quickly and they do not need the structure that Six Sigma provides,
4) work in a frustrating environment that is common among us quality professionals - where it is a continuous battle to not only get other leaders to understand the exorbitant waste of time, money and customer goodwill associated with poorly designed and run processes, but to also make the "constancy of purpose" commitment to changing how to run the organization, or
5) find it easier to take potshots than to get off the pot and be the change agent you should be.

I am confident that I have ruffled group 5's feathers. You're welcome.

Mike

Mike:

A few questions - and I really want to know because I don't have any experience with six sigma except for reading a few articles.

What, exactly, is in Bama's six sigma tool kit, in other words what do your BBs learn?

Is your training internal or external?

How many of your BBs and GBs are full time?

Was it initiated by the top manager/executive?

Are you one of the Black Belts?

Finally,
How much resistance was there by process owners when someone tried to get them to accept a project?

Well, I said finally, but your answers may provoke more questions from me. Thanks!

After reading the last few posts I had a look at the Bama web site.

I was impressed with the whole tone of the site.

My cynicism regarding six sigma is that many organisations embark on these sorts of programs without the right "culture".

If you have the right people leading then anythings possible.

Thought you guys may want to bite on this. McD's pie and biscuit supplier, The Bama Companies is my former employer. They won the Malcolm Baldrige in 2004!

Consistently delicious!

Bama has been using Six Sigma with excellent results. They never looked at removing deodorant cubes that I can recall - but they looked extensively at hand sanitizing solutions. Sorry - cant go there - proprietary! ;) Great to hear. Can you tell us a few measureables you used or other info on how six sigma is used in Bama?

Sounds to me like the 'Bama' company has a 'Good Personality" culture. That said, I'm not convinced Six Sigma is the reason Bama produces excellent products.

I would like to see what they pick for their six sigma projects, six sigma projects are to improve the company's bottom line AND benefit the customer.......this should be interesting. :confused:

Oh.........

Thanks for the interest. I will try to address several posts at once.

I am a full-time Black Belt. Apparently I have been one for about 20 years, but now know that's what my job title could have been back then. I completed my training in 2002. Black Belts are trained externally. We started with ASQ, but now use Smarter Solutions in Austin, TX. The basics of BB training is learning the DMAIC (Define-Measure-Analyze-Improve-Control) process, the decisions that need to be arrived at during each step and associated tools. You also learn Minitab so that you don't have to calculate everything by hand the way we did back in the slide rule and calculator days.

The tool kit includes both quantitative and qualitative methods, with some Lean thrown in too. The quantitative list includes standard hypothesis testing methods (t-test, ANOVA, F-test) and a host of others including correlation/regression, gage R&R, control charting, extensive coverage of DOE, and more. It is about 160 hours of in class training. A more detailed course description is at www.smartersolutions.com. I plug them because I like their stuff, and Forrest Breyfogle (the founder) has written the best reference book on Six Sigma out of the many that I own. Qualitative tools include the standard Pareto and fishbone type stuff, and also includes some more advanced/complex tools such as FMEA. The ASQ Six Sigma Black Belt Body of Knowledge gives you a good idea of what should be covered in BB training.

All Green Belts are trained internally by our BBs. We have one person assigned to training full-time, plus he also coaches many of the students (as do the rest of us). Their training is a subset of what BBs learn and is 32 hours - a 4 hour session every other week for 8 weeks. GBs must have and work a project during training.

We have 7 full-time Black Belts, and 6 that have been re-deployed back into the organization, all at the Manager level or above. (I miscounted in my original post.) We have 1 full-time GB.

Six Sigma was initiated by our CEO-owner. Several of us quality types dragged our feet for a few months, claiming that it's just TQM rehashed, it's all hype, etc. The CEO finally told us that if we didn't want to implement it, she would hire someone that would. We, the recalcitrant, stepped up the pace.

In terms of resistance, we have experienced a wide range. The first round of BB projects met with substantial support because there was real pain associated with the problem. Our advantage now is that we require a Senior Management Team members authorization (and support) for any Black Belt project. There has probably been more resistance to Green Belt projects. They are smaller in scope, sometimes more difficult to quantify any financial benefit, and at times we have over-taxed the resources of a facility or work group due to inadequate resource balancing.

Regarding measurement - one of our 5 top level measures in our Balanced Scorecard is the results from a monthly Six Sigma Cultural Assessment Survey. The population surveyed is about 100 people in the management & professionals group. We sample 25% of the population each month. It includes 11 questions that address both the Quality of SS systems and the Acceptance of SS within the culture. We believe that one of our biggest opportunities is to improve our folk's ability to effectively use data and information for decision making. Using some of the tools in the SS toolbox can help that. I've gotten goose bumps from making presentations to our Senior Management Team and have the conversation suddenly centered on P-values and whether 90% or 95% confidence is sufficient for the decision that needed to be made. The goose bumps are because I was not participating in the conversation.

Marc - you are correct is believing that Six Sigma is not the only reason we make great products. We have been working at this stuff for years and have comprehensive quality systems in place that address everything from the way we build our facilities to process control to the color of band-aids that are allowed in the facility (blue!). Although we were pretty good, Six Sigma has helped us make significant progress in defect reduction. We implemented a product quality tracking system in 2002, and have experienced between 50% to 80% reduction in defects in 3 years depending on the facility. Some processes even operate at the infamous 6 sigma level (<3.4 defects per million) - which our benchmarking indicates is rare in the food industry. (And is also rare based on prior experience in the automotive sector.) You are also correct in believing we have a good personality culture. The easiest way to find yourself "seeking other opportunities" at Bama is to mistreat people. Makes for a nice work environment.

Our approach to Six Sigma is project focused. We usually know where there is pain, so we define one or two high level measure of that pain as the key project metric. There are almost always secondary metrics for balance. For example, if the pain is higher than desired raw material costs our key metric might be cost variance to the standard. The secondary level metric might be something like product quality and line efficiency. We do a lot of projects that sound like they are only focused on money - but we have not raised our prices for our core products of pies and biscuits since 1996. There's some customer focus for you!

Hope this helps.

. In my opinion, those who prefer to bash Six Sigma have either:
...
4) work in a frustrating environment that is common among us quality professionals - where it is a continuous battle to not only get other leaders to understand the exorbitant waste of time, money and customer goodwill associated with poorly designed and run processes, but to also make the "constancy of purpose" commitment to changing how to run the organization, or...
Mike

I also do not understand the passionate opposition SS generates.

Like you say, if it works...

I do think you are very fortunate.

According to your web site your CEO is unique. I note she is a Scientist and not an MBA. Hmmmmmm

I think ANY kind of improvement would work at Bama - because of the boss. Six Sigma works for you - so go for it...

I realize I have a role to work to make change happen, even in the face of opposition from above. But, look how much more successful it is when leaders "lead".

Thanks Mike - reading your web site has recharged me to keep up the fight...or perhaps look for a new leader.

I think that most of the people that 'bash' six sigma (myself included) do so based upon the understanding that the 'six sigma' package encompasses existing tools and because of the hype. When I hear things like 'Six Sigma Tool Kit' I cringe - Nothing new in there. They do not belog to six sigma. They're the same tools I learned over my 'career in quality', yet many six sigma promoters insinuate that these are some how different with the six sigma 'name' plastered over them. I again suggest that six sigma works best at 'Good personality' companies and is not going to save or be much help in a 'Bad Personality' company. Good Personality companies are analyzing and using data to make decisions already, typically including 'six sigma' tools (whether or not they label them as six sigma tools).

As for Black Belts and all that - I relate it to any training. You can't have too much of it. In my view six sigma training is like going for an associates degree in a focused field. In fact, a gal I know asked me about my thoughts on six sigma a couple of months ago. She asked if going through the training would be worth it. I told her I felt it would be worth it for several reasons, not the least of which is it's another proficiency she can both use and point to when raises and such come up.

"When I hear things like 'Six Sigma Tool Kit' I cringe - Nothing new in there. They do not belog to six sigma. They're the same tools I learned over my 'career in quality', yet many six sigma promoters insinuate that these are some how different with the six sigma 'name' plastered over them."

I know that the 'marketing package' around Six Sigma was a big part of my initial resistance. I learned very little about new tools in BB training (due to my CQE background) - but I did learn how to use Minitab and the appropriate method to do much more analysis in much less time than was previously possible. The other thing I walked away with was a very prescriptive series of events for working a project. The DMAIC approach - at least the way we apply it - provides inexperienced people with a roadmap for project management. It also defines tools and decision trees that might be appropriate at each step along the way. That way they don't have to be quality geeks like us to know when it is appropriate to use a one-way ANOVA or a logistic regression analysis.

Putting all the Six Sigma hype aside, what I have found in talking with practioners in companies that are successfully using this methodology is that these organizations really needed help. They needed a systematic approach to identifying problems important to the business, getting the right resources in place, and maintaining the focus on improving the process to the point that you can legitimately say the difference is statistically significant. We have also made a concerted effort to provide many people with a common language for discussion and decision making. We have made substantial progress in changing the way that people think about problems - you have to figure out a way to measure the situation so that you can prove that it is better after implementing changes. For us, this is perhaps the most profound benefit from our Six Sigma path. I never thought I would hear so many people quoting Dr. Deming... "How do you know?" Is that cool or what?

Mike

I think that most of the people that 'bash' six sigma (myself included) do so based upon the understanding that the 'six sigma' package encompasses existing tools and because of the hype. When I hear things like 'Six Sigma Tool Kit' I cringe - Nothing new in there. They do not belog to six sigma. They're the same tools I learned over my 'career in quality', yet many six sigma promoters insinuate that these are some how different with the six sigma 'name' plastered over them..

I agree.

It sure does make me cringe also when I hear some CQE talk about the "quality tools". For example, they act like control charts are a quality thing when they were invented by a by God “PHYSICIST" who worked as an "INDUSTRIAL STATISTICIAN." And don't even get me started on ANOM which was invented by another "INDUSTRIAL STATISTICIAN ", Ellis Ott and perfected by my old mentor Ed Schilling. Where DO they get off claiming those tools as theirs? When I hear things like "CQE BOK" I just nearly turn inside out. These are things from "INDUSTRIAL STATISTICIANS"

Marc- I love you like a brother and you and this site are a great help to many, but please try to understand this use of sarcasm. Why does the term bother you? Put aside the hype you perceive from some 6 Sigma proponents and do as Mike F. suggests looking for the good things in this methodology.

I was actually p***ed off when I was selected for the training. I looked at the curriculum and said "What's all this? I can teach these things, I don't need this".

However, when I saw the DMAIC roadmap I realized that in the past:
When I had been successful ; I had followed it (in its alter ego as PDCA) and had been fortunate in my use of tools at the right time.
When I had not been so structured, my results were not so good.

The Six Sigma training reinforced and solidified all my previous experience and gave me a framework to effectively train many others with disparate backgrounds.

So, where is the bad in that?

By the way, I’m not sure who the promoters and hypsters are. Most of what Six Sigma material I have read (which is a lot) is reasonably balanced and objective and pays tribute to the many who went before. Possibly Mikel Harry is an exception as he is a lot over the top on everything!

Again, sorry for the sarcasm, which I don’t usually indulge in, but I truly don’t understand your point. All knowledge is accumulative to a great extent and it is best to ignore those (interested in who you perceive them to be) who try to say otherwise.

BTW – I hold 4 ASQ certificates (CQE,CRE, CSSBB and as of yesterday CQM); so I am not in anyway disparaging them. But the BOK for each are also all built on previous work from many different fields. So if it’s OK for ASQ to talk about the BOK and quality “tools” why is it not OK for others?

Note that I'm not saying six sigma is bad. I said what I think - That many people are turned off by the hype. I also stated that I in no way think the training is bad. Any training is good. If I had reason, I'd take the course my self. And I'm sure it would be good for me as it was for you.

That still doesn't mean it will be the saviour of 'Bad Personality' companies. Most of the 'Good Personailiy' companies I have been in already use most or all of the tools, when appropriate, already make decisions based upon analysis of data, and use what is being called DMAIC (I didn't learn it under that acronym, but I learned the same thing back in the 1980's).

So - I'm not actually 'bashing' six sigma - Just saying it's not a cure-all elixer.

According to your web site your CEO is unique. I note she is a Scientist and not an MBA. Hmmmmmm

I do recall that Paula has an MBA.

I no longer work at Bama, but can make some notable points about Paula and her top Managements support of quality.

:agree1: First, since the late 80's she has consistently made decisions that demonstrate not only her passion for quality, but for "helping people be successful."

From a Quality perspective that means that although your department may be responsible for an area or measureables, the companies values come first. So the departmental strife is more about whats right for the company rather than meeting targets.

The company history is filled with stories of Paula making decisions that support values over profit, forcing management out that do not follow values, Paula publicly thanking or encouraging behavior that supports the values and management publicly reversing decisions and apologizing for mistakes. People who would have been terminated for costly mistakes were retained and some even promoted. Any who was leaned out of a job was promised job security. So quality initiatives were easier because you didnt have employees worried they were going to be improved out of a job.

Second, the values were supported by the business plan and other systems. We used to show that business objectives would be met, but would also relate back to one of the values. The company also used internal customer surveys and performance reviews were tied to employeed development (not pay).

I do recall that Paula has an MBA.

I no longer work at Bama, but can make some notable points about Paula and her top Managements support of quality.

:agree1: First, since the late 80's she has consistently made decisions that demonstrate not only her passion for quality, but for "helping people be successful."

From a Quality perspective that means that although your department may be responsible for an area or measureables, the companies values come first. So the departmental strife is more about whats right for the company rather than meeting targets.

The company history is filled with stories of Paula making decisions that support values over profit, forcing management out that do not follow values, Paula publicly thanking or encouraging behavior that supports the values and management publicly reversing decisions and apologizing for mistakes. People who would have been terminated for costly mistakes were retained and some even promoted. Any who was leaned out of a job was promised job security. So quality initiatives were easier because you didnt have employees worried they were going to be improved out of a job.

Second, the values were supported by the business plan and other systems. We used to show that business objectives would be met, but would also relate back to one of the values. The company also used internal customer surveys and performance reviews were tied to employeed development (not pay).

This sounds like the company I have been looking for all my life, didn't think one existed. I would have loved to make a positive contribution to such a company, and work my rear end off to make sure they were successful.
Bravo :applause: