The Story of Six Sigma - past, present and future

The Past:

Motorola faced major business problems with quality consistency of products in the 80's. The mass manufacturing of electronic products had yield problems from defects in production (units not working to specifications) and consequently reduced output. This had adverse consequences which led to repair, rework and delayed shipping products. This affected the bottom line - customers only pay for delivered working products to specification and contractual delivery promise, or else nothing. Quality consistency was a common phenomenon which affected (particularly Western) manufacturing organisations at the time.

Motorola had strong engineering focus organisation in designing, developing and manufacturing. This emphasized on discipline, getting data and evidence for making decisions. Opinions or gossip was not an option. Bill Smith was an engineer who proposed the concept of Six Sigma to Motorola Chair Bob Galvin who approved Six Sigma to go-ahead and created history. In 2005, Motorola attributed $17 billion savings to Six Sigma.

Motorola won the Malcolm Baldrige Quality Award in 1988. "But glowing in the spotlight of success could be a prescription for complacency. Not so at Schaumburg, Illinois-based Motorola, says George Fisher, President and CEO. The Baldrige competition, in fact, was only considered a way station on a route to an even tougher challenge." (Ref: Electronic Business October 16, 1989)

Motorola actively pursued with process Cycle Time Reduction as another Corporate objective which became synonymous with Lean methodology. One may construe Six Sigma (defects and variation reduction) & Lean (time and waste reduction) evolved into Lean Six Sigma. Lean Six Sigma together offers 2-in-1 powerful set of tools and techniques which may apply beyond manufacturing, e.g. into services, planning, supply chain. Today this is commonly associated as business process and quality improvement.

The Present:

Advancement in Technology created reliable machinery and automation in manufacturing and services that were unavailable in the past. Manufacturing practices improved and efficiently produced goods and services world-wide. The availability of low-cost manufacturing in Asian countries helped in mass production of goods at cheaper than before costs.

The advancement in miniaturising electronic chip technology hardware enabled further advancement. Microprocessor technology which started with humble 8-bit and matured into multi-core 64-bit processor devices. The enhanced hardware capabilities allowed software development to immense computing power.

This has facilitated innovation with new products and services technology amidst worldwide competition. Speed to product launch and market share is a huge incentive.

The Future:

Technology advancement continues unabated and created tools which facilitate more time-saving features and controls into new products and services. Automation, Artificial Intelligence, inter-connected computer power are increasingly available. How about Air Traffic Control systems? As with all human creations, there may be risk of defects and erroneous interpretations due to intricacies, complexities and complications inherent with complex systems.

The analytical power of Six Sigma into data analysis with human creativity and insight provides an assurance, check and balance, with trained human professionals "on a route to an even tougher challenge". Data definition, measurement, analysis, improvement - all bread and butter for Six Sigma practitioners.

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