Explaining Six Sigma? ... "Controlling the Inputs" ...

In my Lean and Six Sigma courses I teach the concept of Six Sigma with a story that helps my students to easily understand the concept. I tell them a story of a football coach that is evaluating five kickers as field goal kickers for an upcoming game. He has a GPS solution that tells him exactly where the ball crosses the field goal. He gives each of his kickers 100 chances to kick the ball through the field goal from the center of the field at 35 yards back. His first four kickers take their turns. Each kickers kicks all 100 balls between the uprights, but all four kickers were "all over the place", meaning that they never consistently crossed the goal post at the same point. The fifth kicker also kicks all 100 through the uprights but he consistenly "splits" the uprights.


I then ask the class, "Who are you going to choose when it comes time to kick a field goal during the game?". Most will choose the fifth kicker. Why? ... because he is more consistent. The fifth kicker will be more predictable because he has learned to have better control over the critical inputs when kicking the ball. If you were to film all 100 kicks that the fifth kicker made, you would see little variation in his kicking method which leads to little variation in his output, which is the ball "splitting the uprights".

This is a good segway into the discussion of the Normal Curve and how the Capability of the fifth kicker is more optimal that that of the other four.

If you want to learn more, contact me at kclay@sixsigmadsi.com  or call 479-739-4940. Check out my other blogs at http://www.sixsigmadsi.com/.