It was recently my good fortune to be with some of those good people. I was that district’s keynoter for annual safety awards banquet of Texas Department of Transportation.

Both before and during meeting part of banquet, I received some good natured ribbing about my Barber-osophy outfit. The red and white stripped vest and arm garters, along with black bow tie, tend to stand out a bit. My shiny head also usually draws comments.

When it came time to speak, I felt compelled to respond in kind. First of all, I jokingly pointed out that if one of Austin TxDot guests, who preceded me at mic and who has a haircut like mine like mine, would stand beside me we’d look like two headlights. I then noted that Barber-osophy outfit was my version of an old country and western song. One line says, “If you’re gonna make a livin’ to gotta put on a good show.” In other words, outfit and lots of humorous stories were for purposes of entertainment and uniqueness. The uniqueness part, I believe, is needed in most businesses.

Six Sigma is a quality management program that is designed to achieve a “six sigma” level of quality for products. In mid 1980s, Motorola pioneered Six Sigma and it has since been adopted by many other companies and manufacturers. Service companies also implement Six Sigma strategies to improve customer service and relations. The idea behind Six Sigma is that failures in quality and customer satisfaction occur after sixth sigma of likelihood in a normal distribution curve. Hence, idea is that there are less defects per product or customer service. Motorola defines success of six-sigma quality in terms of number of Defects Per Million Opportunities.

Why Use Six Sigma?

Many companies and critics of Six Sigma believed that achieving six levels of quality was impossible, but many companies have proved critics wrong. Some companies even go beyond six-sigma. An example of this is GE Aircraft Engines, which operate at Nine Sigma levels of quality. Six sigma is practical because it reduces amount of errors in customer service and products. This leads to increased customer satisfaction, increased revenue, more returning customers, and acquisition of new customers. Companies that can implement six-sigma successfully have higher standards of quality and usually produce better products and services.

Why is it only Six Sigma?