Marine Corps Base Quantico -- Those concerned about government bloat and red tape will be pleased to learn that Marine Corps Base Quantico offers training in Lean Six Sigma, a performance improvement system used to help organizations become more efficient and effective.
“The government has seen that it needs to be more efficient — it doesn’t have unlimited money,” said Sion Weaver, Lean Six Sigma specialist in the Business Performance Office (BPO).
The BPO provides Lean Six Sigma to divisions within MCBQ and to tenant commands as well.
“It’s designed to remove waste from the process and to save time and cost,” Weaver said. “It helps companies progress professionally as well. By 2009, 82 percent of Fortune 100 companies were using it.”
Six Sigma is a methodology created by Motorola in the 1980s when the company was facing extinction due to the many defects appearing in the Quasar televisions it was manufacturing. Through Motorola’s development of the Six Sigma process improvement system, it was able to approach the six sigma measurement level of 3.4 defect opportunities per million. After using this system, Motorola was one of the first winners of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award for performance excellence in 1988.
Six Sigma was further developed by General Electric so that it can be applied to finance, logistics, or virtually any industry.
Lean, or the Toyota Production System, is a methodology that focuses on identifying areas of waste. Waste can exist in the form of transportation, waiting and excess production, motion (for example, when a printer is located near the desk of one person but everyone else has to walk across an entire building to use it).
An example of Lean is Toyota’s practice of manufacturing cars as they are needed by the customer, instead of factory-producing thousands of cars that need to sit in inventory until they are sold.
“With not as much inventory, you reduce cost, need for real estate, and so on. It spirals,” Weaver explained.
One of Lean’s basic tools for creating and maintaining an organized, clean, high-performance workplace is 5S+1: sort, straighten, shine (clean), standardize, sustain, and safety.
“You think about the usefulness of an item, the frequency of its use, the quantity needed,” Weaver said. “There’s a place for everything and everything is in its place.”
“When there’s waste, it becomes a safety issue, too,” Weaver added.
Over the years, industry has combined Lean and Six Sigma. Combining the two methodologies to form Lean Six Sigma provides organizations with a tool set to provide higher quality products and services faster and cheaper.
Weaver said the Navy and Marine Corps got into Lean Six Sigma around 2006. Weaver has been aboard MCBQ since 2009. He came to government service from private industry.
“It’s been interesting,” he said. “Both Marines and civilian Marines have gotten into this much more enthusiastically than I’ve seen in the private sector.”
Two units that have embraced Lean Six Sigma are Marine Corps Operational Test and Evaluation Activity (MCOTEA) and the Regional Contracting Office (RCO). Weaver said MCOTEA has been able to build its own organic Lean Six Sigma capability that is sustainable and evident throughout the organization. And RCO has used Lean Six Sigma thinking to make files that customers need more visible and accessible.
“Everyone depends on the RCO,” Weaver said. “They’ve implemented improvement efforts and they continue to work with customers to help them procure mission needs. I’m amazed at what they’ve done. They have a feel for it and they want to help their customers.”
Weapons Training Battalion, Headquarters and Service Battalion, Installation Personnel Administration Center and Safety Division are several other commands that send Marines and civilians to be trained in Lean Six Sigma.
There are different levels of certification within Lean Six Sigma. Individuals can obtain a Yellow Belt certification after attending a one-day course to learn the basic concepts. Weaver said Yellow Belt training enables personnel to make improvements to their own work areas or work as part of a Lean Six Sigma team.
Green Belt courses are five days long and empower participants to start on process improvement projects with guidance from a Black Belt, the highest level. Black Belts and Master Black Belts provide training and mentoring.
“Black Belts aboard Quantico have supported each other in providing training and other activities,” Weaver said.
The next available Yellow Belt training courses will be held on May 23, May 25, June 20 and June 22. Contact 703-784-6787 with questions.
— Writer: auphausconner@quanticosentryonline.com