One of the fundamental principles of Six Sigma is to solve problems, efficiently and effectively. The focus is on meeting and exceeding the Customer's Critical Criteria, which, as shown in >Figure B.1, can be requirements and/or enhancers.

The purpose of the various tools and techniques is to allow you to better meet or exceed the Customer's Critical Criteria. Anything that fails to meet the Customer's Critical Criteria expectations is considered a defect. Defects can occur in the product or service, human interaction, advertising, delivery, accounts

Figure B.1 Customer's Critical Criteria. receivable, sales, marketing, R&D, and so on. Everything in the organization has at least one opportunity for a defect, and most have many opportunities. Again, one of the fundamental principles of Six Sigma is to solve problems, efficiently and effectively. Figure B.2 shows the relationship of customers to our business and to our suppliers.

Figure B.2: Supplier and customer relationship.

Defects can come from a variety of sources, essentially anywhere in the supplier-to-customer chain. There are significant benefits from eliminating the defects that are important to the customer and those internal to the organization. All too often these are not considered as part of the Cost of Poor Quality. Figure B.3 shows some of the...