Certifications play a crucial role in making your Six Sigma professional journey successful. You can start from a fundamental course and keep scaling to higher levels to get advanced industrial knowledge. Any company with a vision of continual improvement prefers hiring candidates who have a thorough understanding of Six Sigma principles. So, if you wish to enjoy a fruitful career, it is advisable to explore the courses on Six Sigma and complete one to upskill.
Six Sigma Black Belt is one such certification program that trains individuals to implement improvement processes in the workplace. Under the Six Sigma Black Belt syllabus, you will learn the tools and methodologies that can help in project improvement. Let us discuss the entire curriculum in detail.
Overview of the Six Sigma Black Belt curriculum
A black belt holder has a thorough understanding of all the crucial aspects related to project management. They understand the DMAIC model well and can take care of define, measuring, Analysis, and controlling operations with utmost efficiency. They learn all this through the online black belt Six Sigma courses and ensure effective implementation during their professional journey. Thus, the Six Sigma black belt syllabus gets sorted into these five categories. You will get sub-topics that teach you deep concepts at an advanced level.
Course Overview
It is the fundamental or the introductory part of the curriculum. In this section, you will learn what Six Sigma is, the different certifications under it, the DMAIC methodology overview and more. Topics under the overview section are:
Overview of Six Sigma
- DMAIC Methodology Overview
- Financial Benefits of Six Sigma
- The Impact of Six Sigma to The Organization
- The Six Sigma Language
1. Define
The next category is about define principles. Under this, the project management experts learn to develop a business case after understanding all the requirements. They practice studying the current setup to find places where there is a need to implement change. Topics included in this category:
- Project Management
- Project Definition
- Project Charter
- Developing a Business Case
- Chartering a Team
- Defining Roles and Responsibilities
- Gathering Voice of the Customer, Support for Project
- Translating Customer Needs into Specific Requirements (CTQs)
- SIPOC Diagram
- Define Phase Review
2. Measure
Mere knowing the operations that need changes is not enough. One must know how to create strategies to bring about that change. They should learn data collection plans, understand the concept of variations and much more. The topics included in this category are:
- Process Mapping (As-Is Process)
- Data Attributes (Continuous Versus Discrete)
- Defining Metrics
- Measurement System Analysis
- Gage Repeatability and Reproducibility
- Data Collection Techniques
- Calculating Sample Size
- Data Collection Plan
- Understanding Variation
- Measuring Process Capability
- Calculating Process Sigma Level
- Rolled Throughput Yield
- Visually Displaying Baseline Performance
- Statistical Software Training
- Measurement Phase Review
3. Analyze
Under the analysis category, the candidates learn about visual data display and value-added analysis. They practice drawing diagrams or different graphs for better project analysis.
- Visually Displaying Data (Histogram, Run Chart, Pareto Chart, Scatter Diagram)
- Detailed (Lower Level) Process Mapping of Critical Areas
- Value-Added Analysis
- Cause and Effect Analysis
- Affinity Diagram
- Data Segmentation and Stratification
- Correlation and Regression (Linear, Multiple)
- Process Performance
- Short Term V/s Long-Term Capability
- Non-Normal Data Distribution Transformations
- Central Limit Theorem
- Goodness of Fit Testing
- Hypothesis Testing
- Analysis of Variance, Two Sample T-Tests, Chi-Squared Test
- Design of Experiments (DOE) – Full, Fractional Factorials
- Verification of Root Causes
- Determining Opportunities (Defects and Financial) for Improvement
- Project Charter Review and Revision
- Statistical Software Training
- Analysis Phase Review
4. Control
The candidates learn about documenting the process and assessing the results of their project improvement strategies. Topics included under the control category are:
- Assessing the Results of Process Improvement
- Statistical Process Control (SPC)
- Rational Subgrouping
- Establishing Process Standards for Inputs, Processes, and Outputs
- Developing a Process Control Plan
- Documenting the Process
- Statistical Software Training
- Control Phase Review
That is all you learn in your black belt training course. Your course provider will also introduce you to the user stories to give you practical domain knowledge. It is significant to note that you should choose a renowned course provider with an excellent market reputation for effective learning.
Advanced Statistical Analysis and Tools
After checking the entire Six Sigma Black Belt syllabus, you must have a fair idea that this domain includes lots of statistical analysis. This domain involves data sets, and the idea is to read the patterns to see if everything works well! Hence, it is significant to be aware of the advanced statistical analysis tools that can help you bring value to your work.
- ANOVA: An analysis of Variance, or ANOVA, allows you to look at multiple variables simultaneously. Furthermore, it tells you if the means from two different groups have significant variation.
- Factor Analysis: This analysis technique is for situations where you do not have quantifiable variables. For example, you cannot understand usability unless you compare the type of experience your user has.
- Regression Analysis: It helps you understand which combination of variables would be apt to predict a factor like customer satisfaction. You can also use this to determine the time devoted to a particular task and more. Furthermore, you can use multiple advanced statistical analysis techniques, like logistic regression. The best way is to learn every analysis tool and see which can give you the expected results.
- Leadership and Project Management Skills: Learning the technicalities is never enough. One has to learn interpersonal skills as well that make them a valued addition to a company. Firstly, the black belt holder should have leadership skills. These experts usually have to manage teams. So, to ensure that everyone works in coordination and delivers the work to their full potential, managers need efficient leadership skills. Apart from that, they require a few other skills that they must have.
- Task Planning: Improvement happens only when you plan things in a well-planned manner. If everything happens randomly, there will be chaos, and you cannot expect productive outcomes. Hence, the expert managing the project should have task-planning skills.
- Problem-Solving: When we mention improvement, it clearly means something is wrong and needs to change! That is where problem-solving skills help. The expert should know how to react to a challenge and find apt solutions to overcome the issues.
- Risk Management: There are risks involved in everything! Especially, if you work in a multi-level company with countless projects, risks will also be higher. It is the duty of a project manager to work hard and ensure that the ill effects are negligible and the company can bear the consequences conveniently.
- Communication: There are countless people involved in a project. Some work in different teams under various departments, while others can be stakeholders or customers. The project manager has to keep them all in the loop. That is why his communication skills should be perfect.
- Change Management: Moving from one operational strategy to another is not as easy as it sounds. The entire process can turn smooth and seamless only when the project manager is skilled enough in change management.
If you enroll in any Six Sigma Black Belt certification course, you will surely learn to work on these skills along with the technical knowledge.
Designing and Implementing Improvement Projects
Company operations always get carried out through various processes. You can ensure successful project deliveries if you design and implement your strategies well. Moreover, only efficient designing and implementation can help keep the project quality top-notch and help earn maximum customer satisfaction. Let us share the tactics you can use for better project delivery.
1. Set Reasonable Goals
It would be a mistake to set unreasonable goals which you cannot achieve at any cost! Moreover, it will be a sheer waste of time and resources to even work towards those goals that are not achievable. So, the primary strategy is to set realistic goals.
2. Customer Satisfaction is a Priority
Your business is nothing without your consumers, so they should always be the priority. Train every team member to keep their sole focus on standing tall on the customer expectations. This way, more of your projects will turn successful, and you will earn an excellent market reputation.
3. Use Technology
Technology makes things easy and adds efficiency to every task. See which tools can help automate the project improvement tasks and use them to see visible changes in your growth. Ensure testing every tool or technology before introducing it into your company operations.
Implementation Tactics
Once you have designed a strategy, the next big thing is to ensure effective implementation. Some of the tactics you should keep in mind are:
- Start by identifying the areas with a scope for improvement. Study the business well and note the phases where you would put in extra effort.
- Keep your stakeholders informed about the processes and the strategies you use. If possible, keep the customer in the loop as it increases their trust in the brand.
- Design your process improvement plan strategically after fair analysis. Understand that implementation will only work if you have designed a productive strategy.
Case Studies and Real-world Applications
Studying real-world case studies is essential to understand any topic well. You will learn about the challenges one might encounter during effective project improvement and the right strategies to overcome them. Even the Six Sigma Black Belt syllabus curated by any course provider emphasizes case studies. Some of them are listed below.
1. Billable Time at Butterfly Increased by 20%
Butterfly is an Australia-based organization that offers digital solutions to their clients. They provide services related to website design, software development and more and their list of clients is never-ending. This increasing list of clients and services made it challenging for them to manage the projects well. To sail through this challenge, they switched to Mavenlink, and their billable time increased by 20%.
2. Utilization rates at Taylors improved by 15%
Taylors is a leading construction company that deals with civil engineering tasks. The company was using old techniques for their operations. It wasn’t contributing to revenue growth. It was restricting the organizational expansion, so their fruitful move was to move to Mavenlink. As a result, their global collaboration and utilization rates improved exponentially.
Conclusion
Project management is the need of the hour, especially with growing market competition. No organization would ever take a risk to deliver a sub-standard end product and allow its customers a chance to switch to another service provider. Hence, they will always look for experts who understand the significance of effective project management and can deliver excellent results. It clearly signifies that the demand for a Six Sigma certification holder will always be high! So, if you also want to build a career in this domain, explore KnowledgeHut's Six Sigma certificate programs or the training courses provided by other education bodies. Enrol in the one that aligns with your career goals and watch the exponential growth in your profession.
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