Overview/Description A process is a means of creating and delivering products and services needed by customers. According to Takashi Osada, Japanese author and quality pioneer, "if the process is right, the results will take care of themselves." By Six Sigma standards, a "right process" is one that creates and delivers precisely what the customer needs. By this logic, no Six Sigma effort can start without having a high-level picture of an organization's customers and other stakeholders, their needs, and the business processes meant to fulfill those needs. A thorough analysis of the existing...

Overview/Description In the final stages of the Six Sigma DMAIC methodology, once process improvement opportunities are identified and implemented, you need to make sure that the improved processes are controlled to sustain the process improvement gains. Statistical process control (SPC) provides tools which can be used to ensure that the processes are continuously monitored, that results are evaluated through the use of various control charts, and that each process is prevented from reverting to its previous state. The goal of this stage is also to develop a control plan to document and hold...

Overview/Description Six Sigma teams use measures of central tendency and dispersion to reveal key facts about process data and the existing processes. They summarize data and put forth the relationships between various data components for further analysis. The teams then present these relationships in easy-to-understand graphical forms that facilitate comparison and help to identify possible trends. This course deals with the basic concepts of descriptive statistics, such as measures of central tendency and dispersion, and their significance in Six Sigma data analysis. The course also shows...

Overview/Description In many situations your results are only as good as the tools you use. Knowing which tools to use, and how to apply them effectively, is the key to any endeavor's success. This assertion holds true for process and quality improvement strategies, and Six Sigma and quality improvement teams throughout the world use a set of management and planning tools to analyze and understand a variety of issues. This course will examine the tools used in Six Sigma to help organizations make decisions and plan and communicate findings. These tools include affinity diagrams,...