Bobby Aitken, Lean Six Sigma Deployment Challenges

The initial deployment of Lean Six Sigma in Western Power began in November 2008 as a set of discrete initiatives run by a group of trainee black belts under the supervision of external consultant MBBs.

From this early experimentation the organisation has learnt much which it has used to reshape the structure and the approach for deploying Lean Six Sigma into the organisation.

This case study will share the challenges, learnings and progress of the deployment to date. Go to Program or Go to Bio

Sia Evans
Integrating Safety in Lean / Six sigma at CCS (Computershare Communication Services) One for all and all for one

Computershare Communication Services (CCS) is part of the global Computershare group and was created to enable our clients to better communicate with their investors, employees, stakeholders or customers. CCS has 5 sites in Australia, located in 4 states (Vic, NSW, Qld and WA) with 650 employees. Our core activities are Clients Services/ Sales, Programming, Operations (laser printing and mail pack creation), Electronic communications, inventory, despatch and warehouse.

The primary driver for instigating a "Big Step" Improvement project was that we seemed to have reached a plateau in our improvement and were struggling to improve our overall quality and OHS. Secondly, as our business has grown, there are more employees and we needed to think differently about how we could improve quality and safety and also foster continuous improvement and needed a new strategy, it became critical to become: Better, Smarter, Faster and Cheaper while remaining safe .

In the past we had taken significant strategic steps to change, this included OH&S incentive programmes, fully committed HS and E committees, risk assessment of our machines and including OH&S as part of our integrated management system and our internal audit system, these resulted in a number of small step improvements. In the hope of achieving a big step improvement we decided to implement Lean /Six Sigma throughout the organisation at all levels. Within this programme we ensure that OHS was integrated as a core unit.

To carry out this programme we would require:

• Executive commitment
• Training resources
• Experienced trainers
• Commitment of people's times
• Budget to fund the programme

The scope of the project was to ensure that every single employee of CCS were to undergo this training and hence put everyone on a level playing field. This meant we would need to drive a project that spanned 4 states, 5 sites, about 10 departments and 650 employees. An investment of a lot of time and money was anticipated, so we researched the best way to do it.

At this point we discovered that by developing a partnership with a Registered Training Organisation (RTO) we had the potential of using their training expertise to develop modules that suited our needs and covered the areas such as quality and OHS we wanted to focus on, as well as utilising the availability of government funds that would fund the entire programme hence minimising our expenditure.

Once the external resources were established the programme had to be sold to our internal stake holders, being our leadership teams and all our employees. When we got the green light to proceed an internal driver was assigned to drive the project nationally and then a team of project managers was delegated to facilitate the project and coordinate all activities at each site.

An investment of a lot of time and money was anticipated, so we researched the best way to do it.

As this was a national problem a number of obstacles were encountered however these were overcome and the project continues to achieve:

• An informed work force that have either yellow or white belt Lean /Six sigma qualifications
• A culture that fosters safety and continuous improvements
• A company that in hard times continues to grow and offer security to all its employees.
• A programme that complied with work cover requirements . . Go to Program or Go to Bio

Ross Farrelly, Ten Common Statistical Mistakes (and how to avoid them

From putting too much faith in R2 to the fallacy of post hoc ergo propter hoc , Statistics is a minefield of potential errors.

Based on the experience gained by Minitab's technical trainers delivering courses on quality statistics over many years, this presentation outlines some of the most common statistical errors and how to avoid them.

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Roger Hilton,A Predictive Model for Successful Firm Performance and sustainable deployment of Lean Six Sigma

In this paper we examine the relationship between Lean Six Sigma program success measured by project success as the dependent variable and the four explanatory variables:

1. The technical skill level of the Lean Six Sigma program facilitator (LSSPF)
2. The interpersonal skill of the LSSPF
3. The role that the LSSPF plays
4. The organizational competence measured by the ability of the organization to allow project improvement teams to flourish

Data for this research is being obtained from a survey of 100 Black Belts and Master Black Belts currently employed in, or consulting to, Australian organizations or training in via course work in Lean Six Sigma or training in Lean Six Sigma as part of a degree at a University in Australia.

The hypothesis for this research is that there is a relationship between the success of a program measured by project success and the above four categories of factors.

During this presentation we will invite the audience to contribute to the research and we will workshop some of the constructs that comprise the above variables.

Approved by Monash University Ethics Committee

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Janeece Keller, Getting Grass-Roots Support for a Transformation Initiative in a Transactional Environment

A successful business transformation initiative requires leadership and grass-root traction to deliver sustained success.  Using Luxottica as a case study, this presentation explores the use of carefully selected tools to create a program of transformation that delivers operational and cultural improvements.

Dave Kelly, Program Management vs Project Management - Setting up Lean Sigma Programs for Success

Lean Six Sigma Programs require two levels of design, development, delivery and documentation from the Master Black Belt - Program Management and Project Management. Programs that have a concentrated emphasis on either program management or project management set themselves up for difficulties in implementation, delivery and success.

A well constructed lean six sigma program design will encompass the best aspects of quality management systems, educational frameworks, project management and the principles of lean six sigma itself to give the implementation of the program a clear view of timelines, requirements and success factors while delivering the practical requirements of organisational projects, business improvement, waste reduction and organisational capability uplift.

Structured lean six sigma programs with a balanced approach to both program and project management centre around transparency of program and project reporting based on Hoshin principles that deliver organisational requirements of the program through tracking and data decision making on program measureables aligned through project and training metrics at regular intervals. This includes acknowledgement of the unique requirements of the program as against that of the projects in planning, measures, risk, deliverables and reporting within the composition of a high touch and transparency low risk approach in favour of a low touch and hence higher risk process.

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Peter McDonald, Moving Lean and Six Sigma from Fad to Core Operational Practice

• Why Australian managers do not take lean sigma seriously
• How to move quality out of the back office
• Fundamental changes we have to make as a profession
• Working with HR to drive the change.
• The challenge for ourselves  to become leaders in operations management

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It is likely that in its early steps with Six Sigma an organisation will be able to make significant improvements with little use of statistics.

After the 'low hanging' fruit has been collected the organisation will go on to finding the 'hidden gold' changes needed to achieve a true 'Six Sigma organization'. This will require extensive statistical testing and analysis. This session looks at the role of statistics at each stage of the journey, how the organization can develop the necessary statistical expertise. Go to Program or Go to Bio

Mario Pennisi, AOQ-QLD

Mario will discuss AOQ-QLD, Lean Six Sigma Division as well as the Certification of Lean Six Sigma Professionals and the Register of Lean Six Sigma Professionals. Go to Program Bio

George Potamianakis, Continuous Improvement as a structured intervention strategy

Imagine if every single person in your organisation was focused on providing the best possible service and outcome for the customer.

Traditional business process improvement is associated with making step change improvements. An alternative approach focuses on making many small changes which over time, add up to significant improvements in customer service.

Learn how innovative organisations are using Continuous Improvement as a structured intervention strategy which engages all people in making day to day improvements in their work environment to provide a better customer & employee experience.

Integrating a culture of learning and leadership capability throughout all levels of the organisation that constantly challenges the way we do things and provides the capacity to re-align and adapt to ever changing customer and business needs thereby creating competitive advantage.

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David Vincent CEO, Breakthrough Training Group

Every interaction with other people within an organisation is an opportunity to either increase or decrease support for a project.

The common factor in any project deployment is people. Yet most organisations engage less that 20% of the capabilities of their people. The result can be stalled projects and lack of buy-in from those within and those stakeholders outside the project.

The number one problem that organisations face is that people communicate poorly. That is not to say we can't talk with each other but rather it is a lack of understanding of how another person behaves, communicates and processes information.

A survey of experienced Black Belts and Master Black Belts showed that they

• Find the people issues more challenging than those in the technical area, and
• Feel less well prepared to deal with these issues

Individually we look at goals, roles, procedures and interpersonal relationships differently. When we understand these differences we improve individual communication, increase project team work and overcome resistance to change.

In this paper we understand communication issues in depth and examine how successful organisations have addressed their number one problem, managed changed programs and created harmony in the workplace.

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