Six Sigma Tools Explained

Six sigma is now acclaimed to be a major breakthrough in the field of business management. It is the most powerful tool ever designed in business management. Its success can be gauged from the fact that business has become even more challenging in the recent times than it was ever before. Six sigma combines some of the best techniques of the past with the recent breakthrough in management thinking along with loads of common sense. The term six sigma refers to reducing defects to zero or near zero.

To achieve this perfect record of no errors, six sigma has various tools that can be utilized to make one’s business house a better place in all respects. All personnel in a business organization who have been trained in six sigma are taught to work within the DMAIC model of improvement. This model can be described as given below:

Define the goals of the improvement activity that has been undertaken.

Measure the existing system so that the progress made towards the defined goals can be monitored through valid and reliable metrics set for the purpose.

Analyze the system to identify ways and means which would result in the elimination of the existing gap between current performance and the desired goal.

Improve the system by being creative and finding new methods to do things cheaper, better and even faster.

Control the new system and institutionalize the new and improved system.

The six sigma software is so programmed that it performs actual mathematical work and so all statistical calculations are done automatically. The six sigma tools generally used are the following:

• QFD (Quality Function Deployment): This tool is utilized to understand all the requirements of the customer or the client. QFD rates customer preferences on a numerical scale. If the rating is high the greater is the customer’s need for that particular requirement or process or product.
• Design Options: The business house then takes into consideration the rating that the customer needs. The options that have the highest scores are the ones that the six sigma team would follow.
• Diagrams: Diagrams are drawn to visualize results created by certain specific inputs. The most favored six sigma tool in this regard is the fishbone or the “Ishikawa” diagram. This diagram is basically nothing but a graph of variables which require further looking into so that the team would be able to understand the problem.
• Cause and Effect Matrix: this is an extension of the fishbone graph. It helps the six sigma team to explore and find out the possible causes of the problem at hand, identify the root cause and eliminate it.
• FMEA (Failure Modes and Effects Analysis): This is a six sigma tool which deals with Murphy’s Law which states that whatever can go wrong will go wrong. This tool takes into consideration all the possible failures that can occur and find solutions for these problems.
• Pareto Analysis: The Pareto graph is a six sigma Black Belts best friend. It is the most effective method to analyze and attribute data as also to find a quick win solution to the problem at hand. According to this principle 80% of the output in a business organization comes from 20% of the inputs.

These above mentioned tools are some of the main tools six sigma uses. These and the various other tools are extremely helpful and are part of the six sigma training process.