Six Sigma and how the methodology is relevant to designing a

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The fundamental roots of Six Sigma can be found as early in history as 1777. It was at that time that Carl Frederick Gauss was in the process of developing the normal curve as a measurement standard. The more common method of Sigma as a measurement standard was founded in the 1920's by Walter Shewhart. Shewhart developed a quality measurement standard that focused on product variation and established the basis of a three sigma deviation from the mean in a process equals the point where corrections must be made. This standard evolved into the many measurement standards commonly used in today's quality analysis such as zero defects, Cpk, etc. (Keller, 2001).

With these processes being applied through the early 19th century it was only a matter of time before the concepts were pulled together to create what is now Six Sigma. The actual term Six Sigma was created by Bill Smith. Smith was an engineer for Motorola in the early 80's. Smith, along with a team of engineers at Motorola under the leadership of Bob Galvin decided that the standard quality measurement levels that measure defects in thousands of opportunities was not clear enough and needed to be expanded to capture defects in millions of opportunities (Pande, 2001).

The team took several years of dedicated focus on the task of developing the complete system of Six Sigma and the tools necessary to implement this type of thinking into a business and change the culture. Through collection of data, multiple tests of theory and practice, and determination, Motorola was successful in fully creating and implementing Six Sigma as their new standard for excellence in quality. The result as measured by their bottom line cost improvements documented a savings to the company over those years of 16 Billion dollars (Keller, 2001).

Obviously results that powerful cannot go ignored and it was not long before the theory of Six Sigma began to spread into other organizations across the globe. CEO's such as Jack Welch of GE fame and Larry Bossidy of Honeywell, fully embraced Six Sigma as the future of their companies and they aggressively pursued implementation of the principles as a way of life at their organizations. Their companies also saw great results, especially GE's turn around through the 80-s and 90-s (Pande, 2001).

So, what is the secret to Six Sigma and how do you apply it to your organization? That question has been poised by many managers who are unsure of how to proceed when trying to make positive changes in their organization. In order to effectively implement Six Sigma there are some standard questions ...