Discussion

Week 3 Discussion

Discussion

The discussion assignment provides a forum for discussing relevant topics for this week based on the course competencies covered.

For this assignment, make sure you post your initial response to the Discussion Area by the due date assigned.

To support your work, use your course and text readings and also use outside sources. As in all assignments, cite your sources in your work and provide references for the citations in APA format.

Start reviewing and responding to the postings of your classmates as early in the week as possible. Respond to at least two of your classmates. Participate in the discussion by asking a question, providing a statement of clarification, providing a point of view with a rationale, challenging an aspect of the discussion, or indicating a relationship between two or more lines of reasoning in the discussion. Complete your participation for this assignment by the end of the week.

Six Sigma

The importance of quality has now been recognized by businesses for decades.  However, there are many philosophies and programs that have been proposed and used in the elusive quest for increased quality. One of the more recent (and more successful) attempts at formalizing the approach to quality improvement is the Six Sigma initiative that was developed at Motorola (and later adopted in many other companies). 

Identify a company that uses the Six Sigma quality improvement program other than the ones discussed in the textbook or the lecture pages (also, do not use the same company that you analyzed in W1 project, and that you will be discussing again in W3 project). For this company, answer the following questions: 

What element of the organization’s activities did they use Six Sigma to improve? 

What caused the company to undertake the Six Sigma initiative? 

What were the positive results caused by the implementation of Six Sigma improvement processes? 

Were there any problems associated with attempting to implement Six Sigma within the organization (this does not occur in every organization)?

Based on your research about this company and the readings for this week, would you say that Six Sigma is an important area of quality management? If so, why? If not, why not?

The final paragraph (three or four sentences) of your initial post should summarize the one or two key points that you are making in your initial response.

Your posting should be about 1 page (400 to 500 words) in length.

Justify your answers using examples and reasoning. Comment on the postings of at least two peers and state whether you agree or disagree with their views.