In earlier, when Six Sigma was introduced to the market, it was misconceived that Six Sigma was only for large and corporate companies. Though no such restriction was ever envisioned in its functional scope, it was rendered this status since only big businesses initially adopted and applied the strategies to improvise their business processes. But now, the experts think that Six Sigma is equally productive for the small businesses also. Its features of Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve, and Control, have the capacity of regulating work with proper standards irrespective of the size of the businesses.
Let’s take a look at how Six Sigma is beneficial for the small businesses.
A better customer service and support: A small business needs its customers more than the large businesses. A company like Motorola or Samsung can afford to lose a few because of an inefficient process, but if your customers shift their interests, then you will meet a huge loss. A small business always gives more priority to its customers. Thus, a Six Sigma approach will help you to improve the processes within your company and make your success much better so that you can serve your customers in a better way.
A healthy work environment and training: If a small organization implement Six Sigma, then it can speed up the implementation of Six Sigma strategies. In small businesses, individuals who are trained as Six Sigma Green Belts and Black Belts can be used as trainers for coaching other employees. This helps in achieving more since the trainers and trainees work in the same environ and the former can demonstrate live execution of Six Sigma procedures. In such an environment, employees who were initiated into Six Sigma implementation are able to see for themselves, the process errors being made and are able to often come up with innovative solutions to overcome those and improve productivity.
Decreases cost and improve revenue: A plethora of statistics has claimed that when a company (irrespective of the size) apply Six Sigma approaches, their Cost of Quality decreases to one to two per cent of revenue. The reason for this cost saving is their quality costs move from failure costs such to prevention costs. The wasted failure costs go directly to the bottom line of the Six Sigma organization, to be re-invested in value-added activities that boost sales. Thus, the organizations who adopted Six Sigma strategies can fully utilize its resources in revenue generation. This infusion of capital helps the sales side of the equation, so Cost of Quality as a per cent of revenue drops that much quicker.
Six Sigma is very beneficial for the small organizations if you have implemented it properly. Don’t get fooled by those who used to tell that Six Sigma is very expensive and it won’t work. You don’t have to spend a lot to hire a consulting team to complete the Six Sigma projects and you will certainly see ROI within 4 to 6 months. This sound quite interesting and amazing if the projects are completed properly. Alternatively, you can motivate your employees to get a professional Six Sigma training so that your business can grow rapidly and you will earn a humongous revenue from it.