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50 August 31, 2006 2:55 Fortifying Six Sigma with OR/MS Tools
Operations research/management science (OR/MS) techniques have been exten-
sively applied to a wide range of areas, including transportation, manufacturing,
telecommunications, the military, financial planning, public services, and health care.
They are effective tools for improving the efficiency and productivity of organizations.
OR/MS techniques, as implied by the name, are concerned with the conduct and
improvement of ‘operations’ as well as the practical management of organizations.
Another important characteristic of OR/MS is that, rather than simply improving
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the status quo, its primary goal is to identify a best possible course of action. This
is also a fundamental goal of all Six Sigma projects, commonly exemplified by the
Improve phase. Consequently, it is quite natural to integrate OR/MS techniques into
the framework of Six Sigma.
As an approach to organizational excellence, Six Sigma as it has been practiced
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can certainly be enhanced. In spite of its success, Six Sigma can be made bet-
ter with OR/MS techniques. For example, mathematical programming and deci-
sion analysis techniques can improve project selection and planning; and queuing
and simulation techniques can improve the analysis and operations of transactional
systems. Mathematical programming techniques are also instrumental and essen-
tial in solving various optimization problems throughout the implementation of Six
Sigma.
This chapter attempts to explore possibilities of further enhancing the usefulness
and effectiveness of Six Sigma via the integration of OR/MS techniques into Six Sigma
deployment. A new roadmap for Six Sigma Black Belt (BB) training which contains an
expanded curriculum that includes new OR/MS techniques is proposed. A case study
to improve the efficiency of processes in the transactional environment through more
effective allocation of human resources is then presented to illustrate the usefulness
of OR/MS techniques within the proposed roadmap.

5.2 INTEGRATION OF OR/MS INTO SIX SIGMA DEPLOYMENT

Six Sigma is not only a performance target that applies to a single critical-to-quality
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(CTQ)characteristic, buthasevolvedintoastrategicbusinessimprovementapproach
that seeks to find and eliminate causes of mistakes or defects in business processes by
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focusing on outputs that are of critical importance to customers. The ultimate goal
of Six Sigma is business improvement, particularly in terms of bottom-line results,
customer satisfaction and market share.
Most Six Sigma tools are statistical methods and quality management tools, such as
design of experiments (DOE), response surface method (RSM), robust design, statisti-
cal process control (SPC), quality function deployment (QFD), failure mode and effect
analysis (FMEA), capacity analysis, hypothesis testing, analysis of variance (ANOVA),
and regression analysis. None of these tools are not new; it is their integration that is
unique and an important factor in the success of Six Sigma. Six Sigma is character-
ized by integrating a collection of statistical methods and quality improvement tools
in a purposeful, systematic and sequential manner to achieve synergistic results far
exceeding what is possible with the isolated application of single tools or methods.
This is an important feature of Six Sigma. It is not a simple ‘summation’ of a bunch of
tools but the systematic integration of these tools for problem-solving that produces
breakthrough results.