Posts Tagged ‘project selection’

Free Webinar – 11 Ways to Sink Your Six Sigma Project

Thursday, January 26th, 2012

Join us for a Free Webinar on February 1

Peter Bersbach

No matter what your knowledge of Lean Six Sigma, come join us in a one hour lively discussion on “11 ways to Sink Your Six Sigma Project.” Master Black Belt Peter Bersbach will give an overview of each way, then open the session to a discussion on how to avoid that particular failure mode. No ideas are wrong, but we will learn different approaches we might use to avoid each of the 11 ways and have a very successful project.

 


  1. Poor Project Selection
  2. Defining Defects
  3. Training Variation
  4. Statistical Training
  5. Shoddy Certifications
  6. High Attrition Rates
  7. Relying on GEMBA
  8. Tool Application
  9. Sustaining Results
  10. Estimating Benefits
  11. Six Sigma or Lean

Update 2/1/2012:
Click here to view the recording of the webinar 11 ways to sink your six sigma project. Length 44:17. This was a great webinar with a lot of input from the audience.

Update 2/8/2012:
Click here to view the recording of the webinar 11 ways to sink your six sigma project-the sequel. Length 221:48. Click here to see the chat log. This webinar covers points 8-11.

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Selecting Winning Projects

Wednesday, September 16th, 2009

Software helps select the best projects.

In a previous column I discussed how Six Sigma projects should be selected using the theory of constraints (TOC). After attempting to do so, most discover yet another constraint: money. In most organizations there are more opportunities for improvement than one can afford to pursue. If it isn’t money, some other resource will be in short supply, such as talent. And as if that weren’t bad enough, the task is further complicated by uncertainty of the payoff from the projects and their probability of success.

An exciting computer software product known as Crystal Ball Pro by Decisioneering makes it possible to select winning projects by factoring in all of the relevant factors. It does so by simulating various scenarios thousands of times, then choosing those that perform best.

For example, the research and development group of a major public utility has identified eight possible Six Sigma projects. A net present value analysis has computed:

  • The expected revenue for each project, if it’s successful
  • Its estimated probability of success
  • Its required initial investment

Using these figures, the finance manager has computed the expected return and the expected profit for each project. Unfortunately, the available budget is only $2 million, and selecting all projects would require a total initial investment of $2.8 million. Thus, the objective is to determine which projects will maximize the total expected profit while staying within the budget limitation. Complicating this decision is the fact that both the expected revenue and success rates are highly uncertain. Figure 1 shows a spreadsheet model for this problem.

Figure 1: Project Selection Spreadsheet

The decision variables in column H are binary; that is, they can only assume the values zero (do not fund the project) and one (fund the project.) The assumption variables are in the “Expected Revenue” and “Success Rate” columns. Crystal Ball Pro will use simulation to evaluate a range of values for these two columns. The total profit, shown in cell G19, is a forecast variable whose values depend on the assumption and decision variables. The idea is to find the combination of projects (determined by the decision variables) that maximize total profit, taking into account the variation in expected revenue and the probability of success.

The project selection spreadsheet isn’t quite good enough given that the number of possible sets of projects is too large to identify by trial-and-error. Crystal Ball Pro can help here too. It includes a
program, called OptQuest, which will perform a search to find the optimal package of projects (see Figure 2).

Figure 2: Progress Toward a Solution

The best solution OptQuest found (in a search that I limited to 10 minutes) is to fund all projects except 3 and 5 (see Figure 3). The expected net profit is $1.54 million. Note that the distribution of total profit includes a number of scenarios that would result in a net loss. This occurs because OptQuest was asked to find the solution that maximized expected (average) total profit, but it can limit searches to profitable software solutions too.

Figure 3: Results

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Project Selection – Getting a good one!

Thursday, September 3rd, 2009

Bersbach Consulting LLC provides Six Sigma training coaching and support across Arizona, including the Tucson, Phoenix, Scottsdale, and Glendale areas. At this time we would like to thank our friends and clients for their support. If you have landed here looking for our Six Sigma training, coaching or support services in Tucson, then please follow this Six Sigma Training link.


Project selection is critical to project success.  To insure you have the right project let me give you nine areas that you should think about and if any you do not have then I’d find another that has all nine as they ALL are important.

  1. Project Sponsorship – The project needs a High Level individual that is committed to seeing this project completed. Not just interested but a real need for him/her to see success.
  2. Benefits – You need to make sure you have well defined and measurable benefits agreed upon by you your team and your sponsor.
  3. Available Resources – You do not have a crystal ball so at this point you will not know all the resources that you will use but you do have an idea of some of the resource that it will take. Make sure that they will be available during the project when you need them.
  4. Scope in terms of your (the black belt) effort – Do you have the time to do the project and will it return a big enough benefit for your level of expertise.  This is really asking will it take to much of your time and you will need other Black Belt help or is it something that is a “go do project” that really does not need your Six Sigma Expertise to accomplish.
  5. Deliverables – Have the things that you need to accomplish well defined. This is not the benefits but the things you have to put in place to get the benefits. Think of this as the vision of the state you are trying to achieve.
  6. Time to Complete defined – Usually for a Black Belt project it should take more than 3 months but less than 12. Like some else said if the project is to big, break into pieces and make your first project one piece. BUT avoid making the problem a “Job”. You have to complete hand off and move on.
  7. Team – Do you have a true cross functional team? What I mean is do you have someone from every function that works the process you are trying to improve.
  8. Project Charter – This is where you have the project well defined. As mentioned by other if you do not have this you will not succeed.
  9. Approach Value – Like the Scope in terms of your effort ask yourself if this project really needs a Six Sigma approach to solve? Or can a group just go do it. Usually if the project has been suggested by someone who understands Six Sigma it will be and will need the DMAIC process to solve. But I have projects given to me to “Clean the lab”. In reality they just did not have time themselves to clean it. So hire someone to do that for less than you make and you use your talents on a project fitting them.

Well I hope that is help.

Good luck! Let me know if I can help any more.

Peter Bersbach

If your business is located anywhere in the World including the US, Tucson, Oro Valley , Oracle, Phoenix, Glendale, and Scottsdale, Marana, Green Valley Arizona or beyond and you would like to learn more about our Six Sigma training, coaching and support services please call  Bersbach Consulting LLC at 1-520-829-0090  Now!

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Project Selection for DMAIC | Quality Digest

Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009

Project Selection for DMAIC | Quality Digest.

As a Quality Digest columnist I tend to be a reader of their other authors, too. This month’s Inside Six Sigma article from Steven Ouellette, The Six Sigma Heretic, provides a pretty good overview of important things to consider when choosing a Six Sigma project. But there’s one big oversight that I noticed. Steven fails to include as a criteria that the project should address a problem or opportunity where the connection between the desired outcome and the causes driving it are unclear. Projects can have every other attribute mentioned in the article and still not be good Six Sigma projects if they’re missing this vital attribute. The reason is simple: if the causes of the outcome are known, you don’t need the Six Sigma skill set to successfully complete the project. It is, essentially, a “Just Do” project. The training provided to Six Sigma Black Belts or Six Sigma Green Belts will be wasted. There are probably better projects for them to undertake.

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Project Selection for DMAIC | Quality Digest

Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009

Project Selection for DMAIC | Quality Digest.

As a Quality Digest columnist I tend to be a reader of their other authors, too. This month’s Inside Six Sigma article from Steven Ouellette, The Six Sigma Heretic, provides a pretty good overview of important things to consider when choosing a Six Sigma project. But there’s one big oversight that I noticed. Steven fails to include as a criteria that the project should address a problem or opportunity where the connection between the desired outcome and the causes driving it are unclear. Projects can have every other attribute mentioned in the article and still not be good Six Sigma projects if they’re missing this vital attribute. The reason is simple: if the causes of the outcome are known, you don’t need the Six Sigma skill set to successfully complete the project. It is, essentially, a “Just Do” project. The training provided to Six Sigma Black Belts or Six Sigma Green Belts will be wasted. There are probably better projects for them to undertake.

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