Browse Ideas with tag 'six sigma':

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  Reduction of Federal Workforce Through Attrition

  As the baby boomers retire and leave federal service, do not replace them with additional personnel. Use existing personnel to cover the workload of these people leaving. Get serious about and agressively implement the continuous improvement techniques of Lean Six Sigma (LSS) to streamline business processes and literally get more done with less. This policy should be implemented by Presidential mandate and apply to ...more »

  As the baby boomers retire and leave federal service, do not replace them with additional personnel. Use existing personnel to cover the workload of these people leaving. Get serious about and agressively implement the continuous improvement techniques of Lean Six Sigma (LSS) to streamline business processes and literally get more done with less. This policy should be implemented by Presidential mandate and apply to ALL federal agencies.

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  5 comments for Idea: Reduction of Federal Workforce Through Attrition

  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Process improvement - attack the root cause, not the symptoms

  The federal government should adopt a very simple process improvement paradigm that every employee can relate to, is easy to understand and fits on one printable page. The book, The Power of Six Sigma by Subir Chowdhury, is what motivates the idea I'm suggesting. I used the technique he describes and it helped me to improve information security and employee satisfaction regarding resource availability. I have a more ...more »

  The federal government should adopt a very simple process improvement paradigm that every employee can relate to, is easy to understand and fits on one printable page. The book, The Power of Six Sigma by Subir Chowdhury, is what motivates the idea I'm suggesting. I used the technique he describes and it helped me to improve information security and employee satisfaction regarding resource availability. I have a more detailed case study and statistical performance results to demonstrate it works.

  All too often, people run around working solutions that attack the symptoms or a problem, rather than determining the root cause and then working to fix it.

  A simple paradigm based on six sigma, as Chowdhury describes, would be easy for people to understand. Here is the framework that should be promoted.

  - *Define* the problem from the customer perspective. The Chowdhury book uses the example of a pizza shop trying to resolve customer complaints about burnt pizzas and employee complaints about being burned by the ovens.

  - *Measure* where we are now and where we'd like to be (performance goal setting) in the future.

  - *Analyze* the current process for providing the product/service. Look not just at the symptoms of problems, but determine what is causing them.

  - *Improve* the process for creating/providing the product/service. Following on the previous step, look to find the root causes of problems, rather than trying to throw a fix the symptoms. Using the pizza example, the answer is not to provide the cooks with more safety gear and ask them to better monitor the pizza cooking time. This only yields limited improvements and is a band-aid solution. The answer is to use a better oven that cooks evenly and is safer.

  - *Control* the results. Validate that product has improved the outcomes and continue using the overall process to refine things until you achieve your performance goals.

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  1 comment for Idea: Process improvement - attack the root cause, not the symptoms

  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Fix the Hiring Process

  It takes too long to hire employees even from internal sources. Options in the process allow organizations to prevent all candidates from applying need to be eliminated through manipulation of the process. Other suggestion to unify Federal hiring process will help solve this problem for all agencies; please support those ideas as well! I've observed the hiring process take up to 8-12 months from development of job ...more »

  It takes too long to hire employees even from internal sources. Options in the process allow organizations to prevent all candidates from applying need to be eliminated through manipulation of the process. Other suggestion to unify Federal hiring process will help solve this problem for all agencies; please support those ideas as well!

  I've observed the hiring process take up to 8-12 months from development of job description to the job being filled and this is unacceptable; this is regardless of whether this is an internal of external fill. A project should be undertaken to reduce this process down to 1-2 months which would be much more reasonable.

  Currently hiring organizations are able to manipulate applications by posting the job over a weekend and closing it very quickly. In this way they can brief candidates in who they are interested to apply and other candidates that don’t watch postings on the weekend will be unable to apply. Any policy which allows manipulation to limit or reduce the possible applicants can be used for unethical purposes and should be standardized. Postings should be left open for at least one or two weeks to allow candidates who might be on travel or vacation to apply. If postings require shorter open periods it would be required to have more public and organizational announcements for those positions.

  Other hiring processes, which allow organizations to tailor a job description to a particular candidate’s experience, skills, and knowledge that nearly guarantee them the job, should be abolished. These can be eliminated by requiring organizations to develop job descriptions for their current employees and when someone is needs to be replaced, this description needs to be pulled off the shelf with almost no modification. When a new position and job description are established, it will need to reviewed by an anonymous third party panel to ensure there is no manipulation in the process. Anytime there is a candidate which meets 100% of the requirements, the descriptions should be flagged and reviewed by this panel for unethical business practices.

  There are many other problems with this process so a comprehensive enterprise-wide Lean Six Sigma project should be undertaken to fix it.

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  4 comments for Idea: Fix the Hiring Process

  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Government Process Re-engineering, Six Sigma, etc.

  Implementing better management practices such as re-engineering, six sigma, Theory of Contrains, etc., across the United States Government would generate eficiencies which may result in long-term savings.

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  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Lean, Six Sigma and Theory of Constraints

  Create a culture of process improvement by providing basic Continuous Process Improvement/Lean Six Sigma training to all new hires and enlistees and requiring each person in the government to find a way to save one minute of time in their processes each week. CPI/LSS is about being better tomorrow than we were today, small incremental changes that over time, lead to significant improvements in efficiency and effectiveness. ...more »

  Create a culture of process improvement by providing basic Continuous Process Improvement/Lean Six Sigma training to all new hires and enlistees and requiring each person in the government to find a way to save one minute of time in their processes each week. CPI/LSS is about being better tomorrow than we were today, small incremental changes that over time, lead to significant improvements in efficiency and effectiveness. Let's make process improvement the way the government does business not a special project.

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  Add your comment for Idea: Lean, Six Sigma and Theory of Constraints

  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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  Six Sigma cost savings program

  The Government should train every manager and adopt the Six Sigma program to elimate waste and restructure all federal programs. By adopting, training, maintaining the program at different levels it will continuely shape and maintain a lean government. One of the most distinct differences between Six Sigma and other quality management systems is the financial benefits of potential process improvement. Projects are quantified ...more »

  The Government should train every manager and adopt the Six Sigma program to elimate waste and restructure all federal programs.

  By adopting, training, maintaining the program at different levels it will continuely shape and maintain a lean government. One of the most distinct differences between Six Sigma and other quality management systems is the financial benefits of potential process improvement. Projects are quantified and used to help select and prioritize process improvement projects. Financial benefits are re-evaluated during the analyze phase to ensure that the cost of improvements suggested will be supported by the benefit of the project. And finally, the financial benefits are verified once the project enters the control and verify phases.

  Six Sigma projects helps connect everyone within the agency. The entire organization, including the highest ranked, Directors, managers, and employees looks to Six Sigma to increase cost savings and productivity. It also helps differentiate substantial process improvements from insignificant 'fluff' projects that have little long-term benefit for the agency.

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  1 comment for Idea: Six Sigma cost savings program

  Submitted by Community Member 2 years ago

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