six sigma


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INTRODUCTION

The main objective of any business is to make profit. For increasing the profit, the selling price should increase and/or the manufacturing cost should come down. Since the price is decided by the competition in the market, hence the only the way to increase the profit is to cut down the manufacturing cost which can be achieved only through continuous improvement in the company’s operation. Six sigma quality programs provide an overall framework for continuous improvement in the process of an organization. Six sigma uses facts, data and root cause to solve problems.

Wipro Limited was established in 1945 and commenced its operations in 1946 as a vegetable oil company. In the early 1980s, Wipro diversified into the Information Technology sector with Liberalization hitting India in the 1980s. This has been a fascinating transformation from a vegetable oil company into a global IT services giant.

Today, Wipro Technologies has become a global service provider delivering technology driven business solutions that meet the strategic objectives of clients. Wipro has 40+ ‘Centers of Excellence’ that create solutions related to specific needs of Industries. Wipro can boast of delivering unmatched business value to customers through a combination of process excellence quality frameworks and service delivery innovation.

A strong emphasis upon building a professional work environment, leaders from within, and having a global outlook for business and growth have led to innovation of people processes on a continued basis. Over the years, Wipro has significantly strengthened its competency based people processes and demonstrated innovative practices in talent acquisition, deployment, and development, based on strategic needs.


The history of Lean Flow

The Lean Flow process, also called Lean. Manufacturing, Continuous Flow, and more recently, Just-In-Time Manufacturing, was innovated by Henry Ford just after the turn of the century. He likened his concept of the assembly line to a river that flows continuously. Anything that disrupts the flow is waste that must be eliminated. Utilizing this methodology, Ford Motor Company could start and finish a Model T in just over 30 hours.

In the late 1940s, Toyota Motor Corporation based its production system on the Lean Flow process. Of course, Toyota built on Ford’s concepts, which were methodical and streamlined, but highly inflexible. Lean Flow, as employed by Toyota, linked its production system with real-time customer demands and material replenishment requirements—so only the exact quantity of products and materials needed were produced at any specific point in time. This is similar to the Just-In-Time manufacturing paradigm that changes the traditional “supply and- demand” model to a more efficient, responsive “demand-then-supply” model.


Lean Flow today

While Lean Flow began as a manufacturing model, today’s definition has been extended to include the process of creating an “optimized flow” anywhere in an organization. The only requirement is that this “flow” challenge current business practices to create a faster, cheaper, less variable, and error prone process.


Putting Lean Flow to work

Implementing a Lean Flow requires having the right data and knowing how to use it. There are a number of different approaches taken by organizations, but fundamentally, Lean
Flow is achieved by:
• Analyzing the steps of a process and determining which steps add value and which do not.
• Calculating the costs associated with removing non-value-added steps and comparing those costs versus expected benefits.
• Determining the resources required to support value-added steps while eliminating non- value added steps.
• Taking action.
(These implementation steps, which tie into a process called Value Stream Mapping, will be explained in greater detail later in this paper.)


Six Sigma today

While the concept of Six Sigma began in the manufacturing arena decades ago, the idea that organizations can improve quality levels and work “defect-free” is currently being incorporated by higher education institutions of all types and sizes. So what is today’s definition of Six Sigma? It depends on whom you ask. In his book Six Sigma: SPC and TQM in Manufacturing and Services, Geoff Tennant explains that "Six Sigma is many things… a vision; a philosophy; a symbol; a metric; a goal; a methodology.”