Rath & Strongs Six Sigma Team Pocket Guide

Our experience in helping companies implement Six Sigma has led us to an inescapable conclusion:

Having excellent technical skills and the best technical solution is not enough to ensure successful completion of your Six Sigma projects.

By “successful completion,” we mean:

• The process owner has accepted and implemented the improvement

• The project has been through the control phase

• The project realized the anticipated financial and/or effectiveness gains

• The project was completed in a reasonable period of time, with minimum adverse effect on the team

It’s not as easy as It sounds.

We asked experienced Black Belts, Master Black Belts, and other Six Sigma experts to describe the non-technical issues that get in the way of successful completion of their projects. Here’s what we heard:

Getting team members to show up for meetings

• Maintaining momentum on the team and keeping the team focused

• Getting data from people

• Gaining cooperation and support from various stakeholders

• Convincing process owners to approve the change

In describing their ability to deal with these challenges, Six Sigma experts told us that they find these issues more challenging than those in the technical area (such as DMAIC or statistics) feel less well-prepared to deal with the issues