Page 159 - Design for Six Sigma a Roadmap for Product Development

Design for Six Sigma Project Algorithm 133

membership, and resources are best defined upfront, collaboratively, by
the teams. A key purpose of this step for the black belt is to establish the
core team and get a good start, with clear direction from the champion
and design owner. It is extremely important to “get it right” as early as
possible to avoid costly downstream mistakes, problems, and delays.
Once the team is established, it is just as important for the black
belt to maintain the team and continuously improve members’ perfor-
mance. This first step, therefore, is an ongoing effort throughout the
DFSS ICOV cycle of the DFSS algorithm of planning, formulation,
manufacturing, or production.
Design for Six Sigma teams usually share some common attributes
such as corporate citizenship, passion for excellence in customer rela-
tions, systems engineering thinking with thorough knowledge about
the design, and commitment for success.
The primary challenge for a design team is to learn and improve
faster than their competitors. Lagging competitors must go faster to
stay in the business race for customers. Leading competitors must go
faster to stay on top. An energetic DFSS team should learn rapidly,
not only about what needs to be done but also about how to do it—
how to pervasively implement DFSS principles and tools with an
adopted algorithm to achieve unprecedented customer satisfaction.
Learning without practicing is simply gathering of information; it is
not real learning. Real learning means gaining understanding, creating
new thinking (breaking old paradigms), and understanding how to apply
the new DFSS mental models in the big context—Six Sigma culture. No
Six Sigma deploying company becomes world-class by simply knowing
what is required, but rather by deploying and using the best contempo-
rary DFSS methods on every project. Therefore, the team needs to
project competitive performance through benchmarking of products and
processes to help guide directions of change, use lessons learned to help
identify areas for their improvement, for scoping and selection, and use
program and risk management best practices. The latter include finding
and internalizing the best practices, developing deep expertise, and
pervasively deploying the best practices throughout the project life cycle.
This activity is key to achieving a winning rate of improvement by avoid-
ing or eliminating risks. In addition, the team needs to apply design
principles and systems thinking, specifically, thinking to capitalize on the
total design (product, process, or service) in-depth knowledge.

5.3 Determine Customer Expectations
(DFSS Algorithm Step 2)
The purpose of this step is to define and prioritize customer expecta-
tions and usage profiles, together with corporate, regulatory, and other