Common types of process improvement projects for Lean and Six Sigma certification programs

One of the biggest challenges to those pursuing a Lean or Six Sigma certification is deciding what real-life improvement project to work on.

There are 6 main categories that can be used for Lean Six Sigma certification projects that many people do not realize are viable projects for their certification.

Improve Quality
Reduce Speed and Time
Reduce Cost and Consumption of Resources
Reduce Risk
Improve Capacity and Flow
Improve Experience and Satisfaction Ratings

I’ll walk through each of these in more detail, and include some examples of projects from four areas: manufacturing, office, government and healthcare.

1. Improve Quality

There are two main approaches to improving quality depending on the type of problems. One problem is that the measurements do not meet a specification or tolerance and result in a failure or rejection. The other is that there is an error or defect in the product or service and it is not measurable, but can be categorized such as missing, incorrect, damaged, wrong, broken, etc.

1A. Reduce errors and defects – These projects are the most common projects implemented in Six Sigma Green Belt projects. These projects focus on reducing mistakes, defects, omissions, incorrect transactions, or nonconforming outcomes that are counted as occurrences or percentages. Common tools used include mistake proofing (poka yoke) and root cause analysis.
- Manufacturing: Assembly department reduces defective product shipments caused by developing a template to organize components to prevent any from going missing.
- Office: Continuous Improvement department improves success rate of candidates going through Green Belt certification with a completed project by adding weekly reminders and due dates for key project artifacts.
- Government: City agency increased participation from 10% to 64% in utility assistance program by reducing errors and mistakes in application form from 40% to only 5%. (watch video)
- Healthcare: Hospital pharmacy reduces medication dispensing errors for patients by physically separating similar named medications and changing the font on the label to highlight critical letters.

1B. Improve capability of meeting specification limits – These projects improve how consistently a process performs within specification limits by reducing variation and/or shifting the average toward the target. Statistical analysis, capability studies, DOE, Gage R&R studies and control charts are commonly used (mostly Six Sigma). These projects can also help establish tolerances based on past performance, or challenge the validity of the existing tolerances.
- Manufacturing: Machining process improves shaft diameter consistency and shifts average closer to target to increase probability of meeting customer tolerances. Customer works with supplier to better assess specification limits that help supplier improve yields while meeting customer performance needs.
- Office: Call center improves average customer response time consistency to remain within service-level agreements of answering and addressing customer needs.
- Government: Public works department improves consistency of pothole repair completion times to meet the city’s required service-level target of 3 days turnaround.
- Healthcare: Laboratory reduces blood test measurement variation to provide more accurate test results to physician for adjustments to patient’s dosing. (watch video)

2. Reduce Speed and Time

These projects reduce delays, waiting, cycle time, lead time, setup time, or response time. Lean principles such as flow, pull systems, and waste reduction (DOWNTIME) are often central to these efforts.

Manufacturing: Production team reduces waste and inefficiencies in machine setup time between product changeovers with dedicated changeover teams and mobile carts for each machine that boost productivity and output.
Office: Human resources (HR) reduces employee onboarding time from offer acceptance to first day readiness by standardizing onboarding process and developing checklists for hiring managers.
Government: Building department reduces permit approval turnaround time for residential construction applications by simplifying form and creating a work cell with dedicated resources.
Healthcare: Cancer clinic reduces new patient wait time until their first appointment from weeks to days by dedicating one hour per day for new patient appointments, and moved the bulk of the paperwork needs until after the appointment.

3. Reduce Cost and Consumption of Resources

These projects lower the use of labor, materials, energy, inventory, space, utilities, consumables or other resources while maintaining required performance levels. These costs are assumed to be “part of doing business” and not usually seen as opportunities to improve.

Manufacturing: Plant reduces electricity usage by analyzing past usage and building employee support for off-hours setback of office temperature. (watch video)
Office: Finance department at nonprofit reduces budget costs through data analysis and standardization. (read more)
Government: Fleet management department reduces fuel consumption and vehicle idle time across city-owned vehicles with new GPS driving directions that eliminate left turns and driver training is provided to give fuel-saving tips.
Healthcare: NGO teaches team about Lean Six Sigma and runs projects that reduce medical expenses and supplies by over $1 million. (read more)

4. Reduce Risk

These projects reduce the probability or severity of failures, accidents, compliance issues, cybersecurity threats, environmental incidents, or operational disruptions. Risk assessments like Process and Design FMEA’s, along with mistake-proofing techniques are commonly used.

Manufacturing: Maintenance department reduces the risk of machine failures through performance monitoring with SPC to prevent unplanned downtime.
Office: IT department reduces the risk of former employees retaining access to company systems after termination.
Government: Water utility department reduces the risk of residents receiving unsafe drinking water by improving monitoring and response procedures for water quality testing failures.
Healthcare: Surgical team reduces the risk of wrong-site procedures through standardized verification protocols.

5. Improve Capacity and Flow

These projects increase throughput, output, utilization, or the ability to handle demand while improving process flow and reducing bottlenecks. The demand may not be seen yet, but these projects can help prepare the teams for this increase before its too late. Lean flow principles, Theory of Constraints, and workload balancing are frequently used.

Manufacturing: Packaging line increases daily production throughput without adding labor by removing sensor glitch in equipment that caused 5 second delay every minute.
Office: Loan processing department increases the number of applications completed per week by simplifying customer application and building dashboard to visualize applications in the workflow and highlight those that need attention.
Government: Unemployment claims turnaround time decreased from 5 days to same-day service after implementing a dedicated work cell, creating a simplified form and reordering the process steps. (watch video)
Healthcare: Cross-functional operating room team increases the number of surgeries completed per day through improved scheduling and quicker time to clean and turnover surgeries.

6. Improve Experience and Satisfaction Ratings

These projects improve how customers, patients, employees, or stakeholders perceive the process or service. Voice of the Customer (VOC), journey mapping, and service design techniques are often applied, along with cross-training of staff to fill in during spikes in demand and staff shortages.

Note: Before launching a project for improved ratings, ensure that you have an opportunity to send out at least one before and after survey to measure progress within a short time frame. Many companies complete an annual survey of employees, and that might be too infrequent to see if progress is being made. You will want to prioritize so you can work with a smaller team and send monthly surveys (at a minimum).

Manufacturing: Customer service team improves satisfaction scores with higher % of first call resolutions due to improvements to support documentation and streamlining of warranty claim handling process.
Office: Human resources improves employee satisfaction by providing supervisors and managers with easier access to giving out gift cards and providing lunches for their teams.
Government: Motor vehicle agency improves citizen satisfaction and wait times with the driver’s license renewal process by removing ticketing system, annoying overhead speaker and earlier open times. (watch video)
Healthcare: Clinic improves patient satisfaction with addition of text confirmations, online appointment scheduling and improved communication with patients when scheduled appointments are running behind schedule.

If you’d like more ideas for projects, check out more specific examples by industry and department

MORE PROJECT EXAMPLES

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