Page 139 - Operations Strategy

114 CHAPTER 3 • SubSTiTuTES foR STRATEgy

Figure 3.9 Six Sigma elements in the four operations strategy decision categories

Resource usage

Emphasis on Improvement
Quality process control through a
Performance objectives Dependability cycle Market competitiveness
structured
decision-making
Speed
Strong evidence-
based
methodology
Very substantial
Flexibility
Emphasis on
Cost training required
process
knowledge
Development
Capacity Supply Process and
strategy network technology
organisation
Decision areas

Where does Six Sigma fit into operations strategy?

Figure 3.9 categorises some of the elements of Six Sigma in the four operations strat-
egy decision areas. It shows that Six Sigma is very much biased towards infrastructural
decision making. One could argue that Six Sigma’s emphasis on process control is a
function of how process technology is managed, but it is very much towards the infra-
structural end of process technology strategy. All the other elements of Six Sigma are
firmly in the development and organisation category. In other words, Six Sigma is more
about how the systems, procedures, organisational structure and routines of the busi-
ness are shaped, rather than how its physical presence is configured.

example Six Sigma at Wipro
There are many companies that have benefited from Six Sigma–based improvement, but few
have gone on to be able to sell the expertise that they gathered from applying it to themselves.
Wipro is one of these few. Wipro is a global information technology, consulting and out-
sourcing company, with 145,000 employees serving over 900 clients in 60 countries. It provides
a range of business services from ‘business process outsourcing’ (processing for other firms) to
‘software development’, and from ‘information technology consulting’ to ‘cloud computing’.
(Surprisingly, for a global IT services giant, Wipro was actually started in 1945 in India as a veg-
etable oil company.) Wipro also has one of the most developed Six Sigma programmes in the
IT and consulting industries, especially in its software development activities, where key chal-
lenges include reducing the data transfer time within the process, reducing the risk of failures

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