Financial Analysis and Planning
Introduction Financial analysis and planning are one of the fundamental activities and responsibility for the finance department. Financial analysis and planning help an organization in achieving strategic tasks and objective within available resources. The key responsibility of financial analysis and planning team is facilitate management in formulating short and long-term objectives, carrying out cost-benefit analysis […]
Procurement and Quality Processes in Project Management
According to the PMBOK 3rd edition, A project is defined as a “temporary endeavour with a beginning and an end and it must be used to create a unique product, service or result”. Further, it is progressively elaborated. What this definition of a project means is that projects are those activities that cannot go on […]
Business Intelligence Architecture and Tools
Introduction Business intelligence is an important to ensure the following: Various decision-makers and analyst have a direct and un-interrupted access to data. The data been used across the organization should be non-disputable. Decision makers spend their time analyzing the data rather than collecting and formatting them. Decision makers are able to focus their energy in […]
Is Israel Really an Economic Miracle?
Israel is one of the youngest countries in the world. It has been in existence for only 72 years. While many of its peers such as India and Pakistan are still developing nations, Israel has quickly climbed the ladder. Israel is not considered a developed nation. This is because the per capita income in Israel […]
Value Analysis: An Applied Concept for Manufacturing and Service Industry
Introduction All organizations strive to create value for their customers. This value creates mind space for product and services. Value analysis, therefore, is a scientific method to increase this value. Value is a perception hence every customer will have their own perceptions on how they define value. However, overall at the highest level, value is […]
The mention of the Measure phase of the Six Sigma module brings into mind pictures of statisticians performing complex operations on data to derive meaning out of it. While this is true to some extent, the complexity of the process is highly over-rated. True, that there is a tremendous amount of statistics involved. However, in recent times, the statistics part is being taken care of by the software. Humans need to understand the logical part of the process and provide input to the software and interpret its outputs. The major objectives of the Six Sigma module are mentioned below:
The Six Sigma project team needs to come out with an explicit list of vital inputs, desired outputs and process metrics that they are planning to track. The fact that there are probably hundreds of metrics makes it important to identify and list the vital few. This decision has large scale implications on the performance of the project and is usually taken by the Project Lead on the basis of data provided by the Six Sigma team and the Process Owner.
There have been many cases of measurement bias in Six Sigma history. The bias may have its roots in the complexity of the calculation, the wrong method of data collection or the bias of the person performing the exercise. However, methods have been developed to get rid of all these errors. Measurements are taken automatically, calculated automatically and sent to the concerned managers automatically who use pre-defined rules to make a decision.
One of the biggest challenges of this phase is to validate the fact that the measurement system in place is good for the purpose. We have discussed this challenge in detail in the section titled Management Systems Analysis.
Measure phase also includes collecting the measures that the current process has. This includes measuring the defects per million. Once the defects per million are calculated, the current Sigma Level of the process is found out. This gives the team an idea of the effort that may be required out of them.
A common practise in the measure phase is to put a figure in front of the losses that the organization is currently facing due to inefficient processes. This helps the management valuate the process and the Six Sigma team can bargain for more resources to successfully implement the project. The financial numbers help re-iterate the project value in front of the Project Champion and the Senior Management.
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Characteristics of Data – Central Tendency and Dispersion
February 12, 2025
Steps Involved in Conducting a Measurement System Analysis
February 12, 2025
