Lean Six SIGMA That Works: A Powerful Action Plan for Dramatically Improving Quality, Increasing Speed, and Reducing Waste

by Bill Trudell and Bill Carreira

Book Overview

If lean manufacturing moves your products through processes faster, and Six Sigma improves their quality, just imagine what combining these two powerful disciplines will do for you Lean Six Sigma That Works provides the key to transforming your results in any manufacturing environment, giving you detailed, practical processes that let you leave the conference room, and get right to work. A strong and sensible combination of the "why" and the "how,"...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0814473474
• ISBN13: 9780814473474
• Release Date: September 2006
• Publisher: Amacom
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 0.98 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.0"
• Age Range: 17 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 12 and higher

Customer Reviews

provides the missing a middle part between exposure and practice of Lean Sigma

In my initial foray into Lean and Six Sigma I read: Womack & Jones' Lean Thinking : Banish Waste and Create Wealth in Your Corporation, Revised and Updated Pande, Neuman & Cavangh's The Six Sigma Way: How GE, Motorola, and Other Top Companies are Honing Their Performance and then tackled: Pyzdek's The Six Sigma Handbook: The Complete Guide for Greenbelts, Blackbelts, and Managers at All Levels, Revised and Expanded Edition All of these texts were excellent, but I felt I was missing a middle part. Lean Thinking and the Six Sigma Way provide exposure to the concepts of Lean and Six Sigma. Pyzdek's book is a textbook, full of critical tools. What I felt I needed was a friendly walk through the approach and execution of a process improvement project. With pictures, charts, backgrounds and dialogs, Lean Six Sigma That Works: A Powerful Action Plan for Dramatically Improving Quality, Increasing Speed, and Reducing Waste proved to be very readable and gave me the confidence to begin using Lean Sigma tools in practice with groups. After the fact, I still like the book. It has a professional look on my shelf. I could loan it to a novice without the risk of insulting them with a 'Dummies' or 'Idiots' title.

Structured guide to Six Sigma: how to get flow, get lean, get rich

Many business books focus on theories and abstractions that real world businesses cannot implement. Bill Carreira and Bill Trudell provide a practical, action-oriented approach to eliminating waste and boosting quality. They use real-world examples from their consulting experience to show you how to create, measure and manage value. While some of their information may seem a bit technical, the authors present their method as clearly and as practically as they can. Lean Six Sigma can help you make dramatic improvements. getAbstract suggests this useful manual to engineers, and to manufacturing and operations managers.

A practical approach to eliminating waste while improving quality

This is a practical program for getting lean by removing waste and reducing nonvalue add activities while simultaneously removing defects, errors, and thereby improving quality. I like the way the authors discuss the principles without wallowing in theoretical abstractions. This is about getting to it rather than trying to talk it to death. The book is in two parts. The first part is called "The What" and provides an overview of Lean Six Sigma, why you need to view everything from the point of view of the customers, what waste is, what value added really is and why everything else is nonvalue added even if it is required (such as payroll). They also show you why you want a balanced flow manufacturing system rather than the traditional batch system. You are also given an introduction to concepts such as velocity, throughput, lead time, cost, and profit. Their note that cash flow can mask unprofitability for awhile is apt. As is their warning you that profitability with a negative cash flow is certain death. Part 2 is "The How". The authors show you the basic tool set for Lean Six Sigma, how to get a good baseline, how to do a lean engineering analysis, what to do about setups, what the 5S method is (it is about having a clean and well organized workplace) and the sixth S of Safety. I enjoyed the discussion of Total Productive Maintenance being everyone's job rather than just the maintenance staff and the costs of cheating proper maintenance. You are then taken through four practical exercises that remove indirect expenses, increase assembly line throughput, reducing warranty costs, and eliminating rework. The last chapter is the psychology of Lean Six Sigma, which is a passionate and tenacious commitment to relentless improvement. Good stuff. Reviewed by Craig Matteson, Ann Arbor, MI

Clarifying the chaos

Carreira and Trudell do a good job of explaining the one-two punch of Lean and Six Sigma. Waste and process variability adds billions of dollars to the goods and services we use every day. Ever get the feeling it takes two or three tries to accomplish any task or conduct any business ? Lean Six Sigma helps to 'de-hassle' any process and ensure a no-surprise outcome. Read the book, Carriera and Trudell show you the way.