QUALITY & RELIABILITY MANAGEMENT

Quality & Reliability management

Quality & Reliability management

Introduction

Six-Sigma is a technique, which was invented, by Motorola in 1986 (Tennant 2001) and today it is widely used in almost by every industry. Six-Sigma was developed with the key objective of improving manufacturing processes and eradicating deficiencies (Antony 2008). Slowly and gradually it started gaining popularity and was introduced in other forms of business. Bill Smith developed this technique at Motorola in 1986 for ensuring zero defects production and operation. Six-Sigma focuses towards improvising the quality by reducing the possibility of errors and variability. It helps in the application of quality management techniques, which result in creating experts in the company like Green Belts, Black Belts etc. Six-Sigma is a trademark of Motorola & since 1998, and the list of multinational's adopting six-sigma is increasing rapidly with several big names like B.T, Procter & Gamble, and Convergys etc. On the basis of a large sample studies, Connor state that from 2003 to 2007, 5% to 15% of the Organizations adopted Six-Sigma.

Discussion

The major difference of Six-Sigma with other quality management tool is that Six-sigma have a defined project with specified objectives, and it focuses on building human resource infrastructure for the organization defined as “Black Belts” and “Green Belts” who will lead the projects. Six-Sigma aims to integrate the statistical and quantitative data into the process for ensuring measurability of the outputs as verifiable and quantifiable. It is better than making assumptions or estimating the expected gain. Sharma suggested that the traditional approach for the quality management in the operations of manufacturing is that the workers in the production line are responsible for the assurance of consistent quality of the product produce. In- house statisticians performed the analysis for the completed goods for determining the actual defect rate. Six-Sigma leads the role of organization toward broader spectrum of professionalism.

The Premise of Six-Sigma

Sources of variation can be identified, quantified and mitigated by control or prevention. The elements of a process responsible for variation are what have been called the "6M's". They adequately describe the basic elements of all process, Man (people), Machine (equipment), Material, Method, Measurement and Mother Nature (environment). The Six Sigma Vision is focused on Customer Satisfaction, Cost of Poor Quality (taking into consideration hidden factory issues), Supplier Quality, Internal Performance and Design for Manufacturability.

The Six Sigma Players

Champions

These are normally senior managers who define the projects. They approve the projects, fund them and are able to trouble-shoot when called upon.

Master Black Belts These are normally full time teachers/instructors. These players possess heavy quantitative skills and teaching leadership abilities. One of their functions is to review and mentor Black Belts. The tutoring and mentoring courses range between two (2) to three (3) weeks.

Black Belts

These are full time quality executives who lead teams and focus on key processes, reporting the results to the champions. The leaders of these teams are responsible for measuring, analyzing, improving and controlling key processes that influence customer satisfaction and productivity ...