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Lean Six Sigma moet de norm worden

By on January 16, 2012 in General @nl, Uncategorized

LEON WESTHOEVE: ‘NU Al MEETBARE RESULTATEN IN HARDE EUR01S’

Het begon in de jaren tachtig bij bedrijven als Motorola, Toyota en General Electric. En het bleek zulke indrukwekkende besparingen op te leveren, dat tal van ondernemingen ermee aan de slag gingen. Codenaam: Lean Six Sigma.

Ford, Philips, Dupont, Dow Chemical en handerden andere organisaties omar· men de LSS·methodiek inrniddels. Doel:
hun bedrijfsprocessen daarmee te verbeteren, te versnellen en goedkoper te make11.
Definieer – Meet – Analyseer – Verbeter – Controleer

Hoe? Datdoenze meteen vast hulpmiddel dat typisch is voor de LSS aanpak namelijk ‘DMAIC’. Wat staat voor Define, Measure, Analyse, lmprove, Control. Of in goed Nederlands: definieer, meet, analyseer, verbeter en contro· leer. Door deze specitieke denkmethode, want dat is lean Slx Sigma in feite, toe te passen op een probleem in je bedrijfsvoering, wordt het gemakkelijkeromdezwakkeplekkenteidentl· ticeren en de efficientste oplossing te vinden.

‘Alle soorten werkprocessen Zi)n in principe geschikt om op de LSS·operatietafel te wor· den ontleed’, vertelttrainer Rene Vlsser. ‘Denk aan productle, logistiek, verkoop, onderhoud, admlnlstratie, ontwikkeling van medewerkers en zelfs het coachen van teams. Altijd geldt bij LSS, dat je vanuit een kraakheldere probleem stelling teewerkt naar een duidelijke doelstel long.’

Een kwartier vies water ‘Eigenlijk is Lean Six Sigma een metafoor voor werken zonder fouten’, vult collega·trainer Yong Yap aan. ‘De methode is erg populair onder bedrijven. Het LSS-denken helpt hen m aan de hoge eisen van de samenleving te voldoen. Vroeger was 99 procent foutloos al goed genoeg. Dallijkteen mooiescore, maar als er 99 procent van de dag schoon water ull de kraan strooml, heb je nog altijd een kwar· tler vies water. Dat is onacceptabel voor de hedendaagse consument. LSS kan dergelijke marges met een factor duizend verbeteren: dat zijn 3,4 fouten op een miljoen handelingen. Daar heb je wat aan als organisatie.’

Drie ervaringen E.ON adopteerde de gestructureerde lean Six Sigma·aanpak een paar jaar terug. Dit jaar is atweer een nieuwe lichtlng LSS·getrainde col lega’s atgeleverd. Zij noemenzieh ‘Biack Belt’,
‘SilverBelt’en’GreenBelt’- afhankelijken de behaalde graad fn kennis. Zo ontstaat een steeds groter netwerk van medewerkers die deze werkbenaderlng goed in de vingers heb· ben. Visser en Yap (zelf ‘Masters Black Belt’) hebben al 69 Nederlandse en 33 Belgisehe E.ON·medewerkers in de banken gehad.

Om Greenbelter ot Silverbelter te worden, ls een trainingvereist van enkele dagen tot een week. De intensievere training van een Black belter duurt vier weken en wordt afgerond met een concreet project dat een besparing van mmstens anderhalve ton perjaar moet opleveren. Of dat lnderdaad lukt, en hoe ze uit eigen ervaring tegen de trainingen aankijken, verteilen drie collega’s. …

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LEON WESTHOEVE, hoofd von het Reet Management Center Benetux, is coördinator van het LSS·programma
inde Beneluxenzelfeen ‘Executive’ en ‘Champion’: ‘Wal wij vanuit de Steam Fleet zo sterk vinden aan LSS, is dat deze werkbe· nadering perfect past in onze nieuwe strategie. Ze ondersteunt belangrijke doelen, zoals concurre· rend werken, omzetgroei, kwaliteitsverbetering van organisatie en mensen, en constante verbetering. Wat nu al leidt tot meet· bare resultaten in harde euro’s. En dat is exact waar we naar op zoek zijn.’

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Lean Six Sigma training is focused around 3 core elements

By on January 10, 2012 in Lean Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma @de, Uncategorized
The Black Belt – Lean Six Sigma  programme contributes toward your companies strategic vision.
  • The Lean Six Sigma deployment structure involves all layers of the organisation, Champions, Sponsors, Black Belts, Green & Yellow Belts.
  • The Black Belt training provides a significant Return On Investment by ensuring that attendees deliver real improvement in the organisation
  • The  improvement methodology, DMAIC, is a holistic approach that encompasses the best practices of  Lean (waste) & Six Sigma (variation) techniques
The training is focused around 3 core elements:
  1. Technical problem solving
  2. Project management
  3. Change management
We define Change Management as the processes to take into account all human and social aspects of the change from the launch of the project to its end…
  • It ensures the adequate involvement of the people concerned in the definition, communication and implementation of the new solution to secure “Buy-in”.
  • It covers a range of activities tightly embedded with Project Management activities.
  • Listen to the people concerned and continually communicate.
Change Management in a Lean Six Sigma improvement project is about gathering the critical mass to make the change irresistible by creating a shared need for change
  • Find and leverage the best allies
  • Removing any barriers blocking or slowing down the change
  • Coping with resistances to change

The Black Belt training will focus strongly on Change Management Skills

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Where a Lean Six Sigma project selection and definition can go wrong.

By on January 10, 2012 in Lean Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma @de, Uncategorized

Where can a Lean Six Sigma project selection and definition go wrong…?

Starting with the solution:

You must go backwards to find the problem that your solution is trying to fix. Any improvement project including the words ‘implement’, ‘roll-out’, ‘harmonise’, ‘unify’, ‘consolidate’, ‘merge’ or similar are likely to be starting with a solution.

In these cases ask yourself: What is the problem that causes me to do this solution? What do I hope to achieve by implementing this solution?

Your replies will help you to answer the 3 key questions.

  1. What is the problem that needs to be fixed?
  2. Why is it important?
  3. How will I know when I have succeeded?

 Scope is too big and/or Timescale too long:

Lean Six Sigma projects are restricted to 6 -8 months for good reasons – they are more likely to succeed if they are a ‘manageable’ size. Try to reduce the scope of the project. Here are some possibilities: Focus on fewer products/product lines/sites/people.

Aim to achieve an earlier milestone in a longer project/program Reduce the number of objectives you are aiming to achieve. A note on the 6 month rule: implementation of the solution should be finished within 6 months, but it may take longer to be able to prove that your project delivered the results. This is OK.

 

Other dangers that will be covered during the sessions of the training, include:

  • Low sponsor commitment
  • Lack of time
  • No team, or too few on the team
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How to choose a good Lean Six Sigma project.

By on January 10, 2012 in Allgemein @de, General, General @fr, General @it, General @nl, General @pl, Uncategorized

Selecting and defining an Improvement project:
3 key questions

Question 1 – What is the problem that needs to be fixed?

What must be improved? (not how to improve it). Clear focus on the issue that is to be changed (not the solution).

Question 2 – Why is it important?

Why are you going to spend time and effort to improve the situation? Clear focus on the importance of this project.

Question 3 – How will I know when I have succeeded?

What can I measure that will show me I have finished the project? This measure should be a measure of ‘quality’, ‘waste’, ‘on-time’, ‘Euros’ or ‘customer satisfaction’. Clear focus on the ‘measurable benefits’.

Defining the problem, is the first step to take…
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Black Belt training? Why is it different to previous improvement initiatives?

By on January 9, 2012 in Lean Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma @de, Uncategorized

Black Belt training? Why is it different to previous improvement initiatives?

With in-company training one actually aligns process improvement to customer requirements and business objectives. It can be applied to service and business processes, not only for production processes.

With a Black Belt program in-house one establishes a standard language and problem solving methodology across different business functions.

The improvement goals are all bottom line focused and will provide the company  a significant return on investment, i.e.  improvement  of  On Time Delivery,  structural financial benefits through efficiency and cost savings, increased customer confidence.

Black Belt project manager must ensure team work, this includes the coaching and training of Green and Yellow Belts. A proper change management project should not take longer than 6 – 8 months. Black Belts are trained to make use of DMAIC.

An organisation can relatively easy grow improvement competences and culture on a massive scale through in-house training, the purpose of the qualification and coaching of Black Belts is to engage all of the people in this drive for continual process improvement.

Deploying one unified methodology, language and tool kit will support companies to promote integration and common ways of working with respect to performance improvement and to progressively reduce its  dependence on external consultants.

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Six Sigma – Analysis: Landing planes

By on January 9, 2012 in Lean Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma @de, Uncategorized

Example: Landing planes

One of the best ways I have seen the six sigma concepts introduced uses the example of landing planes.

Observing a pattern

Consider a run-way where planes are landing. If you would observe enough planes, you would see the following happening:

  1. The bulk of all planes land in the safe ‘green zone‘ away from the borders of the runway.
  2. Most planes actually do land closely to the middle of the runway (the mean), some of them a bit further away to the left or right from the middle, and only a few quite far away from the middle.

Plotting Results

If you would measure long enough the distance in centimeters from the exact middle where each plane touches the ground on the tarmac, you can see that the pattern observed in time forms a normal distribution. A pattern with a mean (the middle line) and a standard deviation (the extent to which planes land further away from the middle line.) This is called the Gaussian Bell Curve with on the vertical axis the number of planes landed and on the horizontal axis the number of centimeters from the middle.

Normal Distribution

All data is now subdivided in segments called standard deviations (sigma) both to the left and to the right of the mean. The bulk of the landings are within 1-sigma from the mean, in a normal distribution this is about 34% of landings to the right and 34% of landings to the left. Outside the 3-sigma borders we can find only a small remainder of landings representing 0.27% of all landings.

Failure Criteria

The actual width of the runway combined with the skills of the pilots determine a successful or failed landing. It is obvious that we will have more crashes on narrow runways and when dealing with inexperienced pilots. Now we have a choice. We can decide that we for example align the left 3-sigma border with the Lower Specification Limit (LSL), and the right 3-sigma border with the Upper Specification Limit (USL).

This is equivalent to accept only those pilots who have consistently proven to be able to land within the borders 99.73% of the time. Alternatively, we could make sure that the runway is wide enough to land planes safely 99.73% of the time. The question now is: is this really good enough?

In reality, the above measure corresponding to 3-sigma, simply means that we are prepared to let 2.7 planes, out of 1,000 planes crash. This is of course not acceptable and therefore, the so-called Six Sigma criterion has been established.

Six Sigma

By definition, Six Sigma means that only in 3.4 cases per million a crash may occur. Although statistically not completely correct (as 3.4 cases per million correspond to 4.5-sigma rather than to 6-sigma), this metric has been established as an acceptable measure for designing boundaries and optimizing processes.

Six Sigma is all about influencing the process or designing the boundaries in such a way that the variation can be controlled within given specifications.

If we have a runway that is 80 meters wide, we will have to train our pilots and trim our planes in such a way that only 3.4 out of 1.000.000 landings would slip or crash. We can turn this around of course, in our runway example, if we know that from 1 million landings, 3.4 of them will land outside 80 meter, we will design the runway 80 meters wide.

During our training events, we will focus on practical examples and implementations taking the business objectives as the starting point. These are the given boundaries, we need to measure and find ways to ensure the Six Sigma criterion can be met by the process that is target of the optimization project.

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Change Management in multinational organisations is a critical success factor for the lean implementation

By on January 7, 2012 in Lean Six Sigma, Lean Six Sigma @de, Uncategorized

Intercultural Management.

We are all product of our environment in which we grew up and in which we make a daily living. In some cases, the way we see the world, or the way in which we make decisions is not the same as perceived in other cultures or countries.

For example, did you know that during a meeting with French managers hardly any decisions are made? For an English businessman, this may sound strange as the entire purpose of a meeting is getting actions ‘ticked off’…

If you were counting on a private meeting, a ‘one-on-one’, with a manager in Poland, don’t be surprised if at least 5 others will show up!

Although these are generalizations, I have been in situations where exactly these kind of misunderstandings led to frustration and threatened to become an inhibitor to communication.

Fortunately, this is not necessary by anticipating what can be expected when dealing with other countries and cultures.

Basic Concepts

A well-known study performed at IBM during the 70’s by Geert Hofstede over 70 countries yielded the so-called Cultural Dimensions that characterize each country and culture.

It is still used as a foundation to work with when studying the ways of management, communication, decision making and styles.

Cultural Dimensions

(Geert Hofstede)

Below the cultural dimensions with some examples. (Full overviews can be found by searching on-line for Geert Hofstede.)

Power Distance Index – PDI

To what extent do the members of the organization who have less power accept that power is unequally distributed?

Austria, Denmark —
India ++

Individualism – IDV

This is the level of integration of the individual into groups. Does the society (or organization) consist of individuals or is it a coherent group? High score indicates high level of individualism.

Netherlands, UK ++
China —

Masculinity – MAS

Masculinity versus Feminity indicates how different roles are distributed amongst men and women.

Masculinity can be associated with the level of assertiveness and competitiveness while Feminity represents values like caring for others.

Arab countries ++
Netherlands, Norway —

Uncertainty Avoidance Index – UAI

A measure to which extent uncertainty and ambiguity are tolerated in society. Can also be interpreted as to which extent the Truth is felt to be important in society. When the Truth is felt to be really important, we can expect strong laws, avoidance of insecurity or unusual situations, security measures and a relatively low tolerance for different opinions.

Belgium, Portugal ++

Long-Term Orientation – LTO

Principal values associated with Long-term are perseverance, thrift, while Short-term orientation can be recognized by respect for tradition, not losing face.

China ++
USA —

Having lived and worked for longer periods of time in other countries, I know that these type of categorizations can be ‘a bit dangerous’ when radically applied in daily situations. However, a large number of additional studies have been performed to refine and make practical use of the work of Mr. Hofstede that have helped cross borders for many business people operating globally.

 

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Was ist DMAIC?

By on January 4, 2012 in Lean Six Sigma @de, Uncategorized

DMAIC ist eine Methode, die man für sich entwickelt hat, mit Anlehnungen aus Plan Do Check Act, 8 Steps usw. DMAIC bezeichnet die 5 Phasen einer strukturierten Problemlösung.

So, wie jede andere Methode auch, bedient sich DMAIC aus einem Werkzeugkasten, der für die einzelnen Phasen unterschiedliche Werkzeuge bereitstellt. Alle diese Werkzeuge arbeiten nach dem Prinzip, eine Fragestellung oder Aufgabe beim Problemlösen zu strukturieren und eine Leitlinie vorzugeben.

  • Weder ergibt sich aus den Werkzeugen automatisch eine Lösung,
  • Noch sind diese Werkzeuge jedes für sich immer passend.

Die Kunst besteht darin, die geeigneten Werkzeuge auszuwählen und sie geeignet anzuwenden. Es ist den Erste Schritt in die Einordnung in die Entwicklung zu einer “Lean Organisation”.

  1. Verständnis von Lean und Führungsverhalten
  2. Standards und Planung
  3. Sichtbarmachen von Problemen
  4. Problem Lösung
  5. Kontinuierliche Verbesserung

Phasen:

  • DEFINE: Das Problem definieren
  • MEASURE: Die IST Situation erfassen
  • ANALYSE: Die Ursachen aufzeigen und Lösungsmöglichkeiten finden
  • IMPROVE: Die Lösungen zu einem neuen Standard entwickeln
  • CONTROL: Den neuen Standard einführen und den Erfolg überprüfen und weitere Verbesserungsmöglichkeiten finden
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Strukturiertes Problem Lösen mit DMAIC: Was ist das?

By on January 4, 2012 in Lean Six Sigma @de, Uncategorized

Strukturiertes Problem Lösen heisst im Wesentlichen:

  • mit einem klaren Auftrag
  • mit umfassendem Verständnis der aktuellen (Ist-)Situation
  • Ursachen für Probleme zu finden
  • Lösungen für die Ursachen zu finden
  • die Lösungen einzuführen

… und zu überprüfen, ob die erwartete Wirkung eingetroffen ist.

Mit anderen Worten: kein Feuerlöschen, kein Kurieren an den Symptomen, keine “Missions Impossible”! Bei vielen Organisationen wird dazu typischerweise die DMAIC-Methode verwendet.

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Kunden stehen auf Lean

By on January 4, 2012 in Lean Six Sigma @de, Uncategorized

Ja, dass stimmt; Die Ansprüche der Kunden auf prompte Lieferung, hohe Qualität und besten Preis werden weiter steigen. Um die Kosten niedrig und Erträge profitabel zu halten, darf erst dann produziert werden, wenn der genaue Bedarf gegeben oder zumindest höchstwahrscheinlich ist. Dann aber muss sofort geliefert werden, da Kunden ungeduldig sind.

Sofort mit hoher Qualität und geringen Kosten zu liefern gelingt aber nur, wenn die Abläufe und Operations so nahe wie möglich mit den Kunden verbunden sind. Und, hier sind ja auch kreative Lösungen möglich, wie die Integration der Kunden und deren Ideen in das Design; oder, Kunden können sich ihr eigenes Produkt konfigurieren.

Diese veralteten Praktiken müssen den modernen Ansätzen der Bedarfs-orientierten Produktion (Just-In-Time, JIT) weichen. Damit werden Investitionen in Produktion/Kapazitäten erst dann getätigt, wenn Kunden dies auch kaufen wollen – nicht auf Basis schöner Prognosen.  Denn: Produktion minus Verkauf = Schrott.

Ein Kernprinzip des Lean besteht im Respekt für alle Mitarbeiter, Lieferanten und Kunden. Wie zeigt sich dieser Respekt im Falle von schweren wirtschaftlichen Verwerfungen, die Kündigungen notwendig machen?

Das wegen bieten wir eine Lean Seminar für die Geschäftsführung (ca. ½  Tag)

Fachkundige und engagierte Führung ist für den Erfolg der Lean Initiative wesentlich. Ohne diese aktive Führung verläuft Lean Management im Sand, so wie andere gutgemeinte aber nicht diszipliniert umgesetzte Programme.

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