CHICAGO – Six Sigma is the quality approach that organizations like Motorola, GE, Honeywell and others have taken to improve the effectiveness and the efficiency of business processes throughout their firms.
It's the latest “flavor” of total quality management (TQM) practices that some major companies have implemented to gain a focus on incorporating quality with their business processes.
What They Don’t Teach in B-School
In a basic definition at any general management class, any TQM approach is described and viewed as a continual process. An interesting observation is that the applying of information technology to the organization is also a continual process. Both processes run in parallel, and both are critical to the viability of the organization.
If the executives at a company are so attuned to all of the buzz phrases like “best of breed, “best practices” and other process descriptions, they should also be cognizant of the “applying technology to the business” phrase, which is also a critical continuous function and not a “one-shot deal”.
Many companies pay lip service to TQM practices and provide a rah-rah approach that actually creates a negative morale with their employees. How many of you suffered from the rah-rah approaches to TQM a decade ago with slogans like “I am part of the quality team” or “I love quality” (using that red heart icon)? Did you get a hat with a slogan on it? Or a T-shirt?
There was one very “elite benefits company” in the northern suburbs that had a “building block of success” program using three square pieces of marble that would be placed on the desk. When they found out the marble pieces didn’t exactly match the cardboard base on which they were supposed to rest, they sent all of the marble squares out to slice off a quarter inch so they would fit into the square. Some of the employees wondered: If they have that much money to waste on this cutting marble operation, where is my raise this year?
So much for rah-rah TQM approaches; they don’t work and they turn workers that might have been at worst neutral into negative people. That is not what TQM was all about. Six Sigma is also not a rah-rah approach. It’s focused on the strategic, the tactical and the cultural aspects of the organization.
When You’re Into Real Quality, You’re Into Reaping Real Rewards
The problem is that few executives have made the connection of applying real quality approaches with applying technology to the enterprise. In this recessionary time, some companies like Household International are wisely adding to their technology infrastructure while others wring their hands in indecisiveness.
In a recent project at Household International that was first viewed a cost reduction, they actually realized a double-digit increase in revenue due to improving their edge technology (closest to the customer). Adding new integrated technology increased the performance of their branch offices. It also increased Household’s lead over its competitors significantly. Hmmm… Taking action while others aren’t seems to reap some big rewards.
How come some executives are risk-takers and some aren’t? In Six Sigma, the senior agent of change (or the quality leader) should be an executive with attributes that include being a risk-taker and not a politician. Most executives are just worried about keeping their job and bonus in these times and are not contributing to the viability of their organization.
Maybe this Malcolm Forbes observation sums it up best: “Any fool can handle the helm in calm seas.” Looking at the “captains” of many of the ships around here, it seems as though they’ve run aground in these turbulent seas of recession and stagnated their decision making. On the other hand, there are some, like Household, that are refreshingly moving ahead at full steam.
James Carlini is president of Carlini & Associates, a management consulting firm focusing on developing marketing strategies and applications of strategic integrated information, as well as litigation support. He is also an adjunct professor in the Communications Systems Program, Executive Masters Program at Northwestern University. He can be reached at carlini@northwestern.edu or (773) 370-1888.
