Overview/Description Do you look at organizational opportunities and problems from a broad perspective? Do you keep in mind the potential impact your decisions and everyday business may have on other stakeholders in and outside the organization? Do you take a holistic view of the issues you face in your day-to-day activities? A strategic thinker does all these things and, by doing so, helps an organization reach its strategic goals. But strategic thinking isn't just for top executives. It's important that all functional managers, departmental leaders, and professionals in an organization...

Overview/Description Though a successful approach to error reduction and process improvement, Six Sigma can be difficult to implement and is not ideally suited to every business or task. This Challenge weighs the benefits of adopting Six Sigma and under what circumstances it is best applied. Expected Duration (hours) 0.2 Lesson ObjectivesDoes Your Business Really Need Six Sigma?

Overview/Description Worldwide markets provide access to increasing numbers of consumers and offer potential for production efficiencies. This Challenge looks at the requirements for an effective globalization strategy. Target Audience Mid- to upper-level managers and executives; all high potentials and fast trackers, including individual contributors. Expected Duration (hours) 0.2 Lesson ObjectivesEvaluating Globalization Opportunities

Overview/Description In the Analyze stage of the Six Sigma DMAIC process, you closely examine the output variable (known as y) and its possible causes or input variables (known as x's) collected in the Measure stage to get a deeper understanding of their relationships. The goal of this analysis is to narrow down the many possible x's identified earlier during the Measure stage, to a few probable ones. This analysis is generally conducted through the use of two important toolsets: exploratory data analysis and hypothesis testing. Methods and tools used in these broad toolsets help to identify...