Six Sigma=Innovation
This week BusinessWeek.com posted a story that spotlighted Six Sigma and how some companies like Home Depot and 3M are scaling back their Six Sigma and Lean efforts because their constant data measurement and paperwork can potentially drain quality time spent with customers and ultimately constrict innovation.
Tom Davenport, Babson College management professor, who was quoted in the article, said “process management must be leavened with a focus on innovation and customer relationships.” Davenport is correct. Some companies have promoted innovation by applying Six Sigma processes to improve the actual customer experience by listening to customers, bringing the customer insight into the measurement process, removing the root causes of problems, and applying steps to improve the customer experience.
Take Schneider Electric. The electronics distributor launched a program a few years back aimed to empower employees, listen to customers, and to enhance the customer experience. Part of that program involved the application of Six Sigma tenets to achieve success for the customers in three areas: on-time delivery, managing customer complaints, and reduction of field failures. Some improvements so far include cutting the time employees wait for materials from 40 days to 15 days and returning customers’ calls in 24 hours.
At business forms supplier Standard Register, the company applied Six Sigma to its selling processes to obtain insights about how customers perceive the organization. Results enabled the company to provide onsite concierges to help customers choose between desktop printers or offsite print centers. Standard Register has documented 30 to 70 percent savings for customers because of it.
And at digital printing company AVC Corp., the organization applied Six Sigma to increase value based on customer requirements. Not only has AVC reduced its turnaround time by 60 percent from a year ago, customer satisfaction scores have improved and the company has gained a better knowledge of the exact inventory needed for customers.
As these organizations have proven, Six Sigma isn’t a replacement for common sense nor does it constrain employees, but if tied with customer insight, the quality improvement system can definitely promote innovation. It can also help to apply preventative actions as well as much-needed solutions for customers. And who ultimately sees that in the end? The customers.
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Six Sigma is a useful mechanism for evolutionary improvement, but has little track record of success for revolutionary innovation.
The problem is that not all things are reductionist. Occassionally, there must be that flash of inspiration and vision that comes from nowhere to move us off our current plateau and on to the next higher peak.