Developing a Continuous Improvement Plan With Your Six Sigma Project

By Craig Calvin

Incorporating a continuous improvement plan into your Six Sigma project will help your business by providing the ability to make improvements to your process as business needs change, or unexpected events occur. Continuous improvement plans allow you to make adjustments to your process without having to undertake an entire new Six Sigma project, which can be costly and time consuming.

1. When you are examining a process, and trying to determine the ideal solution, you need to realize that this will be a continuous process. If you are only considering the current problems, and not considering future problems or improvements, then you will just be back in the same position in the not to distant future.

2. No matter how much you research and brainstorm, you will never come up with the perfect solution that will never need to be changed again. There are always unknowns, and something totally unexpected may happen in the future that could effect your process. If you continue to evaluate the process, however, and make changes as they become necessary, you will lower the chances of having to completely re-design the process again in the future.

3. CIPs (Continuous Improvement Plans) are designed so that people can effectively keep things working without redoing a whole process. Re-doing Six Sigma Projects when they stop working is counter-productive and cost-inhibiting.

4. While Six Sigma is useful in helping to eliminate the existing problems in your processes, the project team must also take into account the future of the business, and future improvements that may be needed. When the Six Sigma project ends, the process must be prepared to deal with any issues that may arise.

5. The priorities and focus of a business can change over time. When you incorporate a continuous improvement plan into your Six Sigma project it allows you to quickly make modifications to your processes, and helps to keep them aligned with the current priorities. Without a continuous improvement plan, your business may have to start a whole new Six Sigma project, just to make sure the processes are aligned with the new direction of the organization.

When you undertake a Six Sigma project you are trying to find a solution to the problems effecting your processes. This solution, ideally, should not be a quick fix, that takes care of the immediate problem, but it should be a long term solution that corrects the process for the foreseeable future. The best way to ensure this is to include a continuous improvement plan within the project. If you do not include a continuous improvement plan as part of your Six Sigma project, then you may have to go through the entire process again in the future, which is an unnecessary expense for your business. When you incorporate a continuous improvement plan into your Six Sigma project it allows you to quickly make modifications to your processes, and helps to keep them aligned with your current priorities. - 32538

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