True, there are many ‘fly-by-night’ online and offline Lean Six Sigma programs who are offering certification and training. There always has been, and always will be. However, here at Smarter Solutions we choose to give you more than a program, more than a stamp on the forehead and more than a just because you attended certification. We give your business a fully integrated system that effectively demonstrates how and when to utilize Lean Six Sigma tools, and interpreting defined metrics throughout your business on an enterprise level. Most importantly, our system, Integrated Enterprise Excellence (IEE), is a customized system that allows your true business needs to define and determine which projects will add the greatest value to your business’ bottom line.

Many may wonder, say, hear or have seen the following statements when it comes time to finalizing budgets and prioritizing annual projects for their company:

• Well, our projects are determined by Capital Authorization Requests (i.e. financial analysis which are not necessarily tied to the true needs of the business) performed by our finance function.
• My department or organization completed x number of projects last year surpassing our previous year by x percentage!
• I feel this makes the most sense, sounds and looks like the project to do because it will add value to the customer!
• Whoever yells the loudest and shows the greatest savings gets his or her project done.

Why some choose to operate companies in this fashion is beyond our scope, but what is in our scope as a differentiator is getting you and your company enterprise projects aligned to the needs of the business to drive ‘customer-centric value’ and not departmental projects that supposedly have unidentified significant savings or increased efficiency.

The importance of project selection is a key system component in driving enterprise excellence and business continuity in achieving more customers and cash. When your business has projects aligned to the true needs of the business, this assists in identifying focal areas for business improvement opportunities within the processes of your business that are tied to financial results. Your business needs will direct which enterprise-wide projects need to be challenged and highly prioritized. Remember, not all projects produce financial or increased efficiency results. As a part of our system, we help your company to determine project selection in its entirety. In addition, the IEE project selection process definitely provides greater awareness than a snapshot of the latest results told as a story using bar charts and percentages.

In closing, selecting and completing a large number of annual projects is not enough in effectively obtaining and attaining a strong customer base and profitable growth. If you and your company truly want a significant change in bottom line results with true value-add projects, join us in one of our upcoming courses or seminars to learn more about the Integrated Enterprise Excellence (IEE) system and how it establishes precedence in better positioning your business existence.

Next month, join me as I discuss the purpose of a Black Belt within your organization and how to go about finding and selecting a person to effectively execute the roles and responsibilities whether internal or external. Until Next Time...