More businesses are adopting practices like Six Sigma and Agile. And why not? For the last ten years, technology has made the news. We use technology in our lives whether at home or work. Businesses nowadays must be able to deliver their products quickly and at high quality. If they are not doing both, their customers will surely take their business elsewhere.
The Six Sigma and Agile methodologies help companies defy the forces and pressures of the consumer market and even become leaders in their respective industries. However, they both strive for different objectives and goals and are applied rather differently. Rarely have we seen collaborative implementation. Can businesses, however, apply the Six Sigma and Agile methods concurrently?
In the “Project Management Professionalism Using Six Sigma Course” offered by the British Academy for Training and Development, we shed light on the Six Sigma method in project management with an extensive study of some successful projects in which this successful theory was applied, which we express with the letters DMAIC, which stands for (Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve, Control).
What is Agile?
Agile is a mindset that promotes evolution in software development. It is opposed to the practices of the Waterfall project management approach, which had been the most common for software projects.
In 2001, 17 software development experts headed into the Wasatch mountains in Utah to reflect on how to improve the way software was developed and delivered. This birthed the Agile Manifesto. Yet it is to be noted that even before 2001, these experts were already brewing Agile practices and methodologies in their respective domains. What they reached as a conclusion at that informal convention in 2001 was a sort of consolidation of their learning, coming to the realization that there was, in fact, a better way to do software development and that way was Agile. It was a new way embracing change and responding to it while delivering value fast and with high quality.
So, Agile is not a methodology; it is an umbrella of value and principles to help guide software development teams in doing their work. Compared to stricter non Agile methodologies such as Waterfall, which emphasize rigorous process adherence, documentation, and upfront planning, Agile focuses on people working collaboratively with their customers and embracing change. Various methodologies exist that would conform to Agile values and principles: Extreme Programming (XP), Scrum, and Adaptive Software Development (ASD) are among the most popular.
What is Six Sigma?
Six Sigma is a methodology for process improvement that originated in the 1980s. The first to put Six Sigma into practice was Bill Smith and Bob Galvin at Motorola, who applied statistical quality control methods to minimize defects and quality related problems in manufacturing operations in order to increase revenues. Thus, the framework of Six Sigma is called DMAIC, which stands for Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control.
Six Sigma is aimed at controlling variations and removing defects. Getting to the root of problems is the first step to eliminating the causes of the quality issue. Thus, ensuring that Six Sigma organisations create a culture of consistency and quality, they can then be able to outdo most, if not all, in customer satisfaction.
The DMAIC process is clearly defined to guide themes in Six Sigma implementation. The Six Sigma projects are led by those who have acquired their Six Sigma belts as practitioners in Six Sigma. The most common spear heading categories for such projects are Black belts and Green belts depending on the magnitude.
Difference Between Six Sigma and Agile
When closely viewed, these methodologies, Six Sigma and Agile, can be called contradictory approaches. This is majorly attributable to the divergent goals they have. While Six Sigma aims at controlling processes and standardizing them through reduced defects and variation, Agile encourages a flexible and incremental change. Having documented and planned contents is the making of Six Sigma. On the contrary, Agile promotes freshness in change, interaction among teams, and customer collaboration.
However, both efforts are geared toward providing the highest value for customers. Indeed, this is what should concern organizations: how to deliver top level customer value consistently. The secret to making Six Sigma and Agile work together is to understand the fundamental principles of each and then see how they complement each other.
Agile Sigma Development
These two approaches, Agile and Six Sigma, are evidently significant independently, and they can be quite synergistic when combined in bringing more value. Six Sigma can deliver huge benefits and great, sustainable results, but typically it tends to take a while. Agile, on the other hand, is relatively fast and effective-rope in a team along with tribal knowledge, and voila it's another scrum based iterative approach to improved processes that meet users' needs.
Best of Six Sigma and Agile blended into one common methodology that became Agile Sigma to capitalise the synergy. The development of this new methodology was initiated in 2016, and it is now ready to be put in use by any kind of business to effectuate significant, rapid improvements in their processes for creating increased value for their clients.
Agile Sigma can enable businesses to deliver improved processes faster and more effectively.
Existing Process Improvement Methodologies, Including Agile Sigma
Agile Sigma was conceived as a tailor-fit add-on alternative for project managers. It embraces Six Sigma inspired improvements and provides timely benefits consistent with those of Agile. Whereas, Agile Sigma offers project managers and senior executives choices such that:
Quickly delivers results: Iteratively improving processes to satisfy the speed of necessityAllows data driven decision making based on statistics: You are making good decisionsDelight your customers: Focused on customer measures and methodology/toolsProvides financial integrity: To get on the books the real benefitsUtilizes the Knowledge and Skills of Existing Team Members: To generate improvements with real significance in a fast way.Combine Six sigma and agile
Six Sigma and Agile are not contradictions; but rather, it really depends on the way in which these two schools of thought view the other. Both, as I take it, embrace being tools through which an organization transforms its work processes to deliver better value for customers.
Adopting the two approaches simultaneously requires more profound acquaintance with and experience in the application of both techniques. The seasoned practitioner understands much better the principles of both Six Sigma and Agile practices as well as having had successes in project implementations achieved by using them both in isolation. Usually, they proceed directly to applying Six Sigma mechanics coupled with any Agile methodology; or a more superficial application, as we call it.
Less than successful teams observed using Six Sigma or Agile pay more attention to doing things the way they are done in the prescribed methods and less on what it really means or what its fundamental principles are. This does not mean that because you are doing DMAIC, you are doing Six Sigma successfully. Scrum, as popular an Agile methodology as it is, prescribes not only roles, like that of a Scrum Master, but also a number of ceremonies to be performed. In the same way, it is not necessarily Scrum because a team has their Scrum Master and conducts Daily Stand Up meetings (one of the Scrum ceremonies). Neither does it mean they are Agile themselves. For the blend to be most effective between the two methodologies, the foremost question the company should pose to itself would be, what does it want this approach to produce or address, and how might the combination of "Six Sigma and Agile" be useful in reaching this point?