Overview

Six Sigma recognizes that we live in a rapidly changing and increasingly competitive world. Customers' needs and expectations are continually changing. Economies are also on the move. In the early 1900s, some 70% of UK workers were in agriculture, now there are less than 2%. In the early 1950s, just under 50% of UK employees were in manufacture or production, now the figure is just 20% or so. The UK economy is now becoming dominated by the service sectors and public administrations, which are claimed to have a higher proportion of waste than manufacture. This is not necessarily a reflection on relative management performance but rather on the nature of the process. For instance, the yield of a manufacturing process is generally expected to be high. The consequences of failure are immediately transparent. Not so, say, in a sales process. The proportion of actual sales to sales interest or enquiries is likely to be much lower. Failure to make a sale is not so transparent and obvious. In consequence, the scope for improvement is much higher than for the manufacturing sector of an industry or function of a single organization.

Change is a breeding ground for problems, inefficiency and lack of effectiveness in all business processes. This gives rise to an adverse impact on the 'bottom line'. The more pronounced the speed and extent...