Six Sigma was merely used as a statistical term before the year 1987. It was only then that Motorola branded and initiated the Six Sigma crusade, which spread to other companies as well that were striving to improve performance for decades. From a problem solving technique, Six Sigma soon became a Management philosophy.
In the year 1991, Motorola release its first set of “Black Belt” experts, which marked the beginning of qualified training of Six Sigma concepts.
Mikel Harry is called the Godfather of Six Sigma even though he did not invent the concept. This is because the way this philosophy is presently being practiced bears the inimitable marks of Harry’s character and individual history.
Though started and initiated by Motorola, it was only Allied Signal (now Honeywell) and General Electric that popularized the Six Sigma concept.
Lawrence Bossidy trained by Jack Welch at General Electric had quit GE to join Allied Signal as he wanted to place his own stamp on the management there. It wasn’t long before that Bossidy produced noteworthy enhancements with Six Sigma improving effectiveness and efficiency by focusing on the customer measures of effectiveness and at the same time generating better efficiencies. Within a few years, Allied Signal saved millions of dollars and improved their status with customers without cost cutting through downscaling or laying-off.
In 1995, general Electric took the plunge of implementing Six Sigma with its processes, impressed by Bossidy’s accomplishments using Six Sigma. In 1998, Jack Welch, then Chairman and CEO of General Electric declared that using this management philosophy had generated over three-quarters of a billion dollars of cost savings. This was the moment that made Jack Welch a global advertiser of Six Sigma.
The General Electric’s way of implementation of the Six Sigma methodology basically led to two important contributions – Firstly, Welch established the great example of leadership and secondly, he sponsored the Six Sigma program with strong rewards and Recognition system to emphasize his commitment to it. Not only this, Welch was so overwhelmed with this management philosophy that he changed the incentive plan for the entire organization, making as huge as 40% of the bonus payable on Six Sigma results and 60%on financials. It wasn’t late enough when all the employees had fallen to adopt Six Sigma in their own processes. Green Belt training was emphasized for anyone climbing up the success ladder.
By the mid of 1990’s Six Sigma was regarded as a transferable corporate management philosophy in majority of the organizations including GE. By 2000, Six Sigma became an established industry involving training, implementation and consultancy of the methodology in almost all class of organizations.
