Lean Six Sigma is an altered form of the Six Sigma process. Although it has the basic fundamentals of Six Sigma, Lean has a few differences that set it apart from basic Six Sigma Training. Knowing the difference can prove to add more to your quality improvement projects then you would have ever thought possible.
There are eight elements of waste that Lean Six Sigma focuses on. It has been proven that once these areas are removed from a company, their quality has improved. The following is a list of what the Lean process considers to be waste and examples to each area.
-Wasted Human Talent: Anyone that is without a specific job function or who's work may be slowing the process down.
-Defects: This can be products or processes that are not right. These obviously need solutions to fix them before they can be eliminated.
-Inventory: This refers to an over sized "To Do" list of work. You never want to have to much product waiting to be worked on. A doctors office, for example, does not want to have to many patients in the waiting room at one time.
-Overproduction: You never want to have to much of something before it is needed. This can get in the way of a well-organized operation.
-Wasted Time: The amount of time that is spent waiting for a product. Any down time should be spent on needed areas of various activities or process. For example, you should never have five employees just standing around waiting for a supply truck to arrive, instead find other areas that they can be useful while they wait.
-Motion: Simply put, too much unnecessary movement by people. For example, a clinic that sends patients to triage when they have booked appointments is wasted movement because they can go straight to the exam room.
-Transportation: Ineffective transportation that moves people and products can be wasteful when it isn't needed. Imagine a warehouse using a forklift to deliver items across the factory to a truck, when the production line could be streamlined to deliver right into the truck off of the line.
-Process Waste: Things that have to be done, but don't add value to the process, product, or service at hand. For example, a bank manager has to process a lot of paperwork, but this doesn't help customers or increase the banks ability to serve those customers in most cases.
Understanding these waste products will enhance the quality improvement projects that you approach using Lean Six Sigma processes.
There are eight elements of waste that Lean Six Sigma focuses on. It has been proven that once these areas are removed from a company, their quality has improved. The following is a list of what the Lean process considers to be waste and examples to each area.
-Wasted Human Talent: Anyone that is without a specific job function or who's work may be slowing the process down.
-Defects: This can be products or processes that are not right. These obviously need solutions to fix them before they can be eliminated.
-Inventory: This refers to an over sized "To Do" list of work. You never want to have to much product waiting to be worked on. A doctors office, for example, does not want to have to many patients in the waiting room at one time.
-Overproduction: You never want to have to much of something before it is needed. This can get in the way of a well-organized operation.
-Wasted Time: The amount of time that is spent waiting for a product. Any down time should be spent on needed areas of various activities or process. For example, you should never have five employees just standing around waiting for a supply truck to arrive, instead find other areas that they can be useful while they wait.
-Motion: Simply put, too much unnecessary movement by people. For example, a clinic that sends patients to triage when they have booked appointments is wasted movement because they can go straight to the exam room.
-Transportation: Ineffective transportation that moves people and products can be wasteful when it isn't needed. Imagine a warehouse using a forklift to deliver items across the factory to a truck, when the production line could be streamlined to deliver right into the truck off of the line.
-Process Waste: Things that have to be done, but don't add value to the process, product, or service at hand. For example, a bank manager has to process a lot of paperwork, but this doesn't help customers or increase the banks ability to serve those customers in most cases.
Understanding these waste products will enhance the quality improvement projects that you approach using Lean Six Sigma processes.
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