Best Practices in Lean Six Sigma Process Improvement

Best Practices in Lean Six Sigma Process Improvement (Hardcover)
by Richard J. Schonberger (Author)

Book Description
Best Practices in Lean Six Sigma Process Improvement reveals how to refocus lean/six sigma processes on what author Richard Schonberger—world-renowned process improvement pioneer—calls "the Golden Goals": better quality, quicker response, greater flexibility, and higher value. This manual shows you how it can be done, employing success stories of over 100 companies including Apple, Illinois Tool Works, Dell, Inc., and Wal-Mart, all of which have established themselves as the new, global "Kings of Lean," surpassing even Toyota in long-term improvement.

From the Inside Flap

Best Practices in Lean Six Sigma Process ImprovementA Deeper Look

Among the most effective and robust improvement methodologies in the business world today, lean and six sigma offer sharp managers invaluable strategies and methods for achieving corporate goals. But the concepts behind lean six sigma, by now well-known, have proven highly susceptible to cherry-picking and avoiding difficult but higher-payoff elements.

Best Practices in Lean Six Sigma Process Improvement takes A Deeper Look at this high-potential science of success. Pitfalls and hidden opportunities are explained in simple terms that can help managers steer their companies' process improvement efforts toward sustained advantage in this era of global hypercompetition. Written by world-renowned best-practices pioneer Richard Schonberger, this eye-opening guide reveals invaluable benchmark data and guidance, prominently including long-term "leanness" data for over 1400 companies in thirty-six countries across thirty-three industrial sectors.

This broadly and deeply researched book provides the big picture and the details on what your corporation needs to succeed, including:

Proven pathways to lean in addition to those of the well-known "lean core"

How to re-energize the continuous, everyone-involved side of process improvement—as a potent complement to six sigma-based projects

Designs for plants, production flow, and jobs that maximize human involvement in best practice methodologies

What manufacturers should be learning from retailers and distributors about managing the supply pipelines

Making process data primal and numeric goal setting secondary as driving forces for improvement

Large numbers of graphs contrasting strong and weak performance of many well-known companies

Unique business models that some of the world's most innovative companies are using effectively to achieve customer-centric results even as they reach out globally

Addressing the question of why most lean/six sigma and other performance management initiatives undertaken by companies fall short of expectations, this indispensable book shows that sustained improvements in performance must focus on the customer, reducible to intentional dedication to continuously improving quality, response time, flexibility, and value.

Product Details

Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Wiley (December 4, 2007)