“Official” Governing Bodies

Our advice is to avoid any person, website, organization, or training program claiming endorsement from Six Sigma’s official governing body. As we’ve already mentioned, Six Sigma does not currently have an official, centralized governing body. That’s why, here at 6sigma.com, we do our best to educate the public and spread the good news about Six Sigma. Any decent practitioner should care about Six Sigma’s standing. Fake practitioners only interested in using the Six Sigma label to con you out of your hard-earned money are to blame for sullying its reputation.

Neglecting to Research

The best thing you can do is scrutinize the practitioner or the organization. Does anything seem off about them? Scour the web for testimonials and reviews. Look at what other customers have to say. This can help ensure you aren’t disappointed later.

We hear stories about good people like you all the time. People who jump on the first course they find, only to find out later they’ve made a mistake. Furthermore, even those who expend hours of their time searching for the right program are equally vulnerable. The one you settle on may seem too good to be true. It probably is. You might think you’ve got yourself a great deal. Only to realize, halfway through, with hundreds – possibly thousands of dollars – down the drain, that your Six Sigma certification program is complete rubbish.
You can prevent this from happening to you by seeking out only the most reputable Six Sigma organizations. Get in touch. Learn as much as you can. You can save yourself a lot of time and money. Plus, there are plenty of blogs and sites compiling the best legitimate Six Sigma organizations. Use these to your advantage in your search.

Missing the Warning Signs

It’s essential to be aware of the warning signs of illegitimate practitioners and fake Six Sigma certification. You never can tell when and where they might appear. Even professional Six Sigma conferences can also be at risk. Like a wolf among sheep, fake practitioners lie in wait everywhere. Don’t let them take advantage of you. Watch out for these key warning signs:

• A suspicious lack of employee bios on their website.
• Little to no contact information – Always suspicious.
• No blog – Serious organizations take the time to write about their Six Sigma work.
• Few or no client testimonials. Or, even worse, bad reviews.
• All talk, with no demonstration of Six Sigma knowledge or skills.

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Six Sigma’s lack of a governing body breeds inconsistent training standards, poor organization, zero transparency, and allows illegitimacy to spread. This all contributes to the smearing of Six Sigma’s good reputation. Misinformation spreads like a virus, and it is often difficult to perform damage control.

Like many legitimate Six Sigma organizations, we want to ensure Six Sigma remains favorable in the eyes of prospective clients. You can also lose money and time dealing with these swindlers, so simply don’t allow yourself to enter that situation. Be prepared for the inevitable day you cross paths with a fake practitioner. Learn what do in today’s article.

Knowledge is Power: Protect Yourself and Others

Firstly, the most important way you can protect yourself from illegitimate practitioners is by familiarizing yourself with the warning signs. Phony Six Sigma practitioners tend to talk the talk, but can rarely walk the walk. Just look at their resumé and record of accomplishment if you’re thinking of hiring a practitioner or are shopping around for certification. If something feels off, query them, test their knowledge. Give them a practical hypothesis to work with and see how they answer.  You can expect a legitimate practitioner to have a sound knowledge of business methodology as well. On the other hand, fraudsters only out to make a quick buck rarely know much of anything.

Still not convinced, then why not ask around? Find out as much as you can about the practitioner in question. This is especially important if you are an individual seeking training. Individuals, rather than corporations, are far more likely to be on the receiving end of a con artist’s money-making scheme. It’s easier to pull the wool over one person’s eyes, after all.

If you are certain of their illegitimacy, then, of course, don’t hire them. But don’t stop there. Spread the word about the so-called practitioner so that others won’t be taken in either. This is the only way to stop fake practitioners from getting the better of us.

Why Protect Yourself from Illegitimate Practitioners?

Businesses and corporations all over the world benefit from Six Sigma’s innovative process improvement strategy. As illegitimate practices continue to fester, potential customers are more and more likely to have a bad experience. This will negatively affect their view of Six Sigma, and keep them from maximizing their success. This is not just bad for Six Sigma itself, but also for the businesses it could be serving, were it not for the dirty deeds of illegitimate practitioners.

Furthermore, Six Sigma imposters and illegitimate practitioners are no better than common scam artists. If we allow them to keep doing what they’re doing, it will not only lead to loss of credibility for Six Sigma but potential financial losses for you as well. If you don’t make yourself aware of the dangers of fake practitioners, you won’t know you’ve met one till it’s too late.

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Participation and Responsiveness

The greatest governing bodies all play a role in the decision-making processes for the institutions they govern. This can be either a direct influence or an indirect one, but this level of governance is essential. A Six Sigma governing body should not only keep its organizations’ activities in check but ensure their presence is a tangible one.

It is also highly important for any potential Six Sigma governing body to serve all its stakeholders as well as the Six Sigma community at large. If careless actions or bad practices sully Six Sigma’s reputation, the governing body must act on this to resolve the situation. Again, ensuring Six Sigma practitioners and organizations work within established parameters is imperative. If this they enforce this, it will ensure the standardization of Six Sigma practices and frameworks.

Transparency and Efficiency

Six Sigma is all about information and how we can use it to solve problems and improve processes. The concept of corporate transparency is a relatively new one, representing the free flow of information. You should be able to query a Six Sigma governing body, to contact them directly, and have complete access to its central knowledge base.

A governing body would, rather than looking like the Vatican, resemble something closer to Norwegian gas and oil company, Statoil. As a matter of fact, Statoil’s largest shareholder happens to be the Norwegian government. Statoil actively makes its operations observable to the public, freely providing information about their practices.

A Six Sigma governing body should ideally commit to free disclosure, clarity, and accuracy of information. Furthermore, like Six Sigma itself, its governing body should promote high levels of efficiency in everything it does. In other words, it should practice what it preaches.

Strategic Vision and Accountability

All organizations, particularly those with an agenda, require a strategic vision to drive them forward. Six Sigma leaders all have their own ideas about what is best for Six Sigma. What a governing body should provide is a comprehensive strategic vision to satisfy all these disparate requirements.

The governing body should also implement strong accountability measures to ensure they keep Six Sigma’s best interests at heart. Think about how decisions get made in the government, the private sector, or even publicly-owned organizations like charities. The executive decision-makers are accountable to the public, whose welfare they should factor into all decisions made.

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Lack of Consistent Accreditation

There is currently a staggering amount of inconsistency between Six Sigma accreditation programs. You wouldn’t be wrong to assume all programs should operate using the same standards. Unfortunately, most simply don’t. Some programs, though they bear the Six Sigma name, bear no resemblance to it at all! Many training programs differ in their curriculums and course requirements. Our advice is to do your research. Educational institutions like universities are always trustworthy too. Provided they aren’t based on the internet.

Unreliable Training Institutions AKA Certification Mills 

Unreliable training institutions, or certification mills, are all over the internet. They tend to outnumber the reliable sites and organizations promoting Six Sigma certification too. Without a central governing body, these sites can make outrageous claims and charge extortionate prices. They are interested in making a profit, not providing great training or promoting the Six Sigma philosophy. It’s also important to note the difference between certification and accreditation. Master Black Belts certify individuals on Six Sigma training programs, whereas accrediting bodies provide accreditation to Six Sigma organizations. Therefore, if you lose your MBB, you can’t provide certification.

Multiple Organizations Claim to be the “Central” Governing Body for Six Sigma

There are many organizations out there claiming to be “central” certifying bodies for Six Sigma. The fact that there is more than one institution making this claim should be a clue not to trust them. It’s important to remember that pioneering Six Sigma companies like Motorola or General Electric have never claimed to be “central” certifying bodies. It is only recently that different organizations have been making this claim.

False and Contradictory Claims

They state that “the beauty of Six Sigma is it is very flexible […] there is no need for a one size fits all body of knowledge.” This is simply not true. Their website alone provides more than one red flag to the discerning Six Sigma practitioner.

Little to No Standardization of Practices

The lack of a central governing body to oversee Six Sigma organizations means there’s no one there to monitor standards. Ironically, many supposed “central” governing bodies will likely suffer from low sigma levels themselves, so they are doubly not to be trusted. Without anyone to regulate procedures and curriculums, it becomes difficult to view these institutions as reliable. Moreover, variation, waste, inefficiency, and under-utilization all arise from a lack of standardization. Six Sigma should eliminate these problems, not proliferate them.

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