When looking at the Apollo RCA™ and Six-Sigma™ anatomy, it is very clear that both methodologies are based on defining the causes or variables associated with the process you are studying and/or trying to control. Both methodologies share the objectives of discovering the causes affecting the process or product and to take some type of corrective or preventive action to eliminate, change or control these causes in an effort to control your output.
In a Six-Sigma™ project, in order to achieve the desired improvement objectives (which is to eliminate the variation or reduce the defect level to an acceptable specification limit), the Project Leader (MBB or BB) needs to define the “Output” as a function Y = f(X), where “Y” represent the output, and “X” represent the process variables or input. Defining the variables is an important step in understanding any process and it is often the hardest step in any Six-Sigma™ project. Until these relationships are defined or understood, Design of Experiment (DoE) cannot be achieved with successful results. Hence, the Project Leader in many cases will revert to the “5 Why’s”, “Brainstorming”, “Fishbone”, “FMEA”, or to knowledge from a process expert, as means to identify these variables. But without understating the true correlation between these “X’s” and the “Y”, trying to implement effective solutions is like shooting in the dark. The Project Leader will typically have to wait to validate the effect of the corrective actions on the “Y” after the process changes have been made.
In the Analyze phase, Six-Sigma™ asks: “Where and why does the Defect Occur?” and directs you to perform a Root Cause Analysis (RCA). While this is the correct next step, most Six-Sigma™ programs fail to provide an effective RCA methodology as part of their curriculum. This gap causes Six-Sigma™ users to jump to solutions without a solid understanding of the causes of the problem. Identification of solutions is premature at this stage of the process because the problem is still not understood, and there is limited understanding of the causes effecting the output “Y”.
Stayed tuned for more on this topic....
In a Six-Sigma™ project, in order to achieve the desired improvement objectives (which is to eliminate the variation or reduce the defect level to an acceptable specification limit), the Project Leader (MBB or BB) needs to define the “Output” as a function Y = f(X), where “Y” represent the output, and “X” represent the process variables or input. Defining the variables is an important step in understanding any process and it is often the hardest step in any Six-Sigma™ project. Until these relationships are defined or understood, Design of Experiment (DoE) cannot be achieved with successful results. Hence, the Project Leader in many cases will revert to the “5 Why’s”, “Brainstorming”, “Fishbone”, “FMEA”, or to knowledge from a process expert, as means to identify these variables. But without understating the true correlation between these “X’s” and the “Y”, trying to implement effective solutions is like shooting in the dark. The Project Leader will typically have to wait to validate the effect of the corrective actions on the “Y” after the process changes have been made.
In the Analyze phase, Six-Sigma™ asks: “Where and why does the Defect Occur?” and directs you to perform a Root Cause Analysis (RCA). While this is the correct next step, most Six-Sigma™ programs fail to provide an effective RCA methodology as part of their curriculum. This gap causes Six-Sigma™ users to jump to solutions without a solid understanding of the causes of the problem. Identification of solutions is premature at this stage of the process because the problem is still not understood, and there is limited understanding of the causes effecting the output “Y”.
Stayed tuned for more on this topic....
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