Six Sigma and Best Practices

The Exxon Mobil Corporation has around 80,000 employees working in multiple countries around the world. Headquartered in Texas, they’re also no strangers to the benefits of Six Sigma in the workplace. Their 2013 Annual Report made the following statement: “Operational Excellence begins with exceptional employees.” This is above all, on the most intrinsic level, a Six Sigma statement. Its meaning is pretty clear.

Just as in Six Sigma, Exxon Mobil demands the best of the best. Without talented, change-driven individuals to conduct their work, neither Six Sigma nor Exxon Mobil would be able to function. This Six Sigma consciousness filters through every level of operation. When a new employee begins working for Exxon Mobil, the company provides them with extensive best practice procedures training. This ensures their new staff stay within guidelines, but it also helps to promote efficiency and productivity. Key agents in Six Sigma work. By reinforcing the need for best practices, employees are also less likely to cut corners or become wasteful.

Moreover, best practice procedures like standardization can also help reduce variation which leads to defective products, as well as to streamline processes. All these things mirror Six Sigma perfectly. In fact, they are in many ways the same, because Six Sigma is all about encouraging process improvement culture in the workplace.

Positive Results

Six Sigma practices have benefited Exxon Mobil to the point that it achieved a 17% return on capital employed in 2013 alone. Moreover, they were also able to reduce refinery cast operating costs thanks to energy-efficiency improvements. These results have only improved over time. Once you have completed your Six Sigma implementation, there’s no going back. These ideas and practices stay with employees, burrowing down to the deepest levels of your company’s infrastructure. Just as with Exxon Mobil, who, alongside Amazon and Apple, have cited “operational excellence” as the driving force behind their positive change.

Exxon Mobil has managed to save billions of dollars in operating expenses thanks to its implementation of Six Sigma principles. Six Sigma is a science all its own, and Exxon Mobil takes its use of Six Sigma a step further than the rest. Utilizing a detail-oriented, science-based approach to performance improvement, they employ measurement, data collection, and analysis, as well as risk management. These practices allow them to gain new insights into process issues and create improvements to correct them. Six Sigma’s influence is clear here, and we can trace it across every facet of Exxon Mobil’s operations. If you want your business to achieve a similar level of success, take a close look at how they run theirs.

The post Six Sigma Case Study: Exxon Mobil appeared first on 6sigma.

Drive Energy Efficiency with Six Sigma Projects

When it comes to running a business, electricity is an essential resource. It powers the lights, computers, machinery, and allows production lines to keep running. Some companies produce energy, but all of them use it. As such, it’s important for us to conserve electricity wherever we can. Through error or inefficiency, we often end up wasting vast amounts of power performing everyday actions. Furthermore, big businesses and small have a responsibility to monitor and control their energy usage. Six Sigma projects are a valuable tool if you wish to increase your energy efficiency.

Streamlining Your Processes to Reduce Energy Usage

Without a streamlined organizational system, you are likely to waste energy where it need not be wasted. Poor energy efficiency tends to take on a snowball effect. Once it starts rolling, it will increase with time. Without safeguards in place to monitor your systems and cash flow, you will suffer significant losses through insufficient maintenance. Six Sigma projects can target problems and eliminate them. Using Six Sigma, you can replace inefficiencies with more practical solutions or excise the issue altogether. None-value-adding processes contribute to over-processing waste, which drains power and bloats your energy usage. It also saps your funds, minimizing cash flow.

Creating a Six Sigma Project to Target Energy Efficiency

When creating a Six Sigma project, ensure you have multiple Yellow, Green, and Black Belts on your team. Additional team members such as White or Orange Belts will complement the project, but this powerful trio provides all you need to make effective process changes. When drafting your project charter, ensure your team is fully aware of all the implications. Use techniques like DMAIC to define, measure, analyze, improve and control your energy efficiency problems. It’s always helpful to identify the origins of certain issues. Root Cause Analysis is a critical tool in Six Sigma work as it allows you to locate the underlying source of your process issues.

Where Does Poor Energy Efficiency Come From?

Poor energy efficiency may be the result of many problems, such as faulty machinery, over-processing, or human error. Applying Six Sigma tools to this problem allows you access to a different perspective, which makes correcting your inefficiencies much simpler. Similarly, affinity diagrams will help you identify connections between issues, allowing you to trace one problem back to another. Moreover, Design of Experiments enables you to create effective testing parameters so you can design more energy efficient operations. Energy efficiency is critical to modern business operations. Don’t hold back progress, and don’t hinder your own. Use Six Sigma to make lasting and needed changes for your business and the planet.

The post Six Sigma and KPIs: Energy Efficiency appeared first on 6sigma.