{"id":256,"date":"2018-01-30T23:02:01","date_gmt":"2018-01-31T04:02:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/?p=256"},"modified":"2018-01-30T23:02:01","modified_gmt":"2018-01-31T04:02:01","slug":"the-history-of-six-sigma-and-general-electric","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/2018\/01\/30\/the-history-of-six-sigma-and-general-electric\/","title":{"rendered":"The History of Six Sigma and General Electric"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Six Sigma Process Improvement Model, as defined by our textbook, is a five step procedure that leads to improvements in process performance.\u00a0 The following five steps compromise the model: Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control.\u00a0 This extremely popular and effective method of process analysis and improvement was first conceived by engineers at Motorola in 1981.\u00a0 Over 40 years later, the Six Sigma approach has been adopted by about half of all Fortune 500 companies.\u00a0 Its universal principles can be applied to any business anywhere on the globe.\u00a0 The company that famously made Six Sigma central to their business strategy and core processes was General Electric.\u00a0 More specifically, Jack Welch was the man who changed the entire culture of General Electric, starting in 1995, by insisting on a complete overhaul of General Electric\u2019s process analysis techniques as well as fundamental changes to the company\u2019s business operations.<\/p>\n<p>Interview with Jack Welch:<\/p>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/aNMULFcLuIM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; encrypted-media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Jack Welch became aware of a great deal of defects that had gone unnoticed and\/or unreported which were costing the company a lot of money and hindering its productivity.\u00a0 Drawing inspiration from the process analysis pioneers at Motorola, Jack Welch underwent a five year process of implementing Six Sigma into General Electric\u2019s core business processes.\u00a0 His monumental efforts saved the company a reported $12 billion in the first five years.\u00a0 Other companies, such as Samsung, Ford, Boeing, Amazon, and GlaxoSmithKline, took note of General Electric\u2019s sudden culture change and staggering savings and began to implement Six Sigma into their own business models.\u00a0 Because of General Electric\u2019s widely publicized success, \u201cSix Sigma\u2019s present day success is rooted in that of Jack Welch and General Electric.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>General Electric was so successful in its implementation of Six Sigma because it outlined and focused on four key steps: Training, Mentoring, Leadership, and Focused Implementation.<\/p>\n<p>Starting in 1995, General Electric required its employees to complete a 100 hour course and complete a Six Sigma project by 1999.\u00a0 Throughout this training process that covered all five steps of Six Sigma, employees learned how to define and identify processes, measure process output, analyze criticality of process inputs, devise improvements through modifying the inputs, and finally, learn how to control processes by controlling the relevant inputs.\u00a0 Additionally, employees underwent follow-up training to sharpen and ingrain their newly acquired Six Sigma skills.\u00a0 General Electric also hired Six Sigma experts, known as Master Black Belts, to help implement Six Sigma within the company by training and mentoring employees.\u00a0 Strong leadership was critical to General Electric\u2019s success in completing this operations overhaul.\u00a0 CEO Jack Welch made sure that he had full support amongst his fellow senior executives and also his lower-level managers in implementing this strategy.\u00a0 Lastly, General Electric utilized Focused Implementation, a term that encompassed three slogans: \u201c\u2019Show Me the Money\u2019 meant GE focused on the bottom line, cutting costs to compete in price-sensitive markets.\u00a0 \u2018Everybody Plays\u2019 meant that even outsourced suppliers were expected to participate in the Six Sigma initiative to make sure that the quality was assured from start to finish for each product.\u00a0 \u2018Specific Techniques\u2019 meant GE used process maps and other Six Sigma tools to rank and associate projects to overarching business goals.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In conclusion, the stories of General Electric\u2019s success and Six Sigma\u2019s rising popularity in the business world are intertwined as a result of the ambition and vision of General Electric CEO Jack Welch.<\/p>\n<p>For more information on General Electric\u2019s approach to Six Sigma, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ge.com\/sixsigma\/SixSigma.pdf\">this PDF offers much more detail.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Sources:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/mysixsigmatrainer.com\/how-general-electric-used-six-sigma-to-transform-their-company\">https:\/\/mysixsigmatrainer.com\/how-general-electric-used-six-sigma-to-transform-their-company<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.6sigma.us\/ge\/six-sigma-case-study-general-electric\/\">https:\/\/www.6sigma.us\/ge\/six-sigma-case-study-general-electric\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ge.com\/sixsigma\/SixSigma.pdf\">https:\/\/www.ge.com\/sixsigma\/SixSigma.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Six Sigma Process Improvement Model, as defined by our textbook, is a five step procedure that leads to improvements<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2366,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[71161],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-analyzing-processes"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2366"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/mgmt340-05\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}