6 Habits of Six Sigma LEADERS

1. Delivering customer VALUE.

Six Sigma leaders have a passion for delivering real value to their customers, and consider their own organizations to be as much a customer of their services as the organization's customers.

EXHIBIT PASSION: How committed are you that your work contributes clear benefit to your organisation and its customers? If this is a deeply rooted motivation of yours, you may have the conviction it takes to be a Six Sigma leader.

LISTEN ACTIVELY: Are you skilled at questioning stake holders and using other methods of discovering their real needs and preferences? If you are able to see and hear what other folks are miss, you already have a trait that is critical to effective Six Sigma Leadership!

COMMUNICATE PARTNERSHIP : How open are you to finding solutions and collaborating with people whose views differ from your own? To deliver customer value you will earn their trust as needed.

2. Focusing on EXECUTION.

Applying the Six Sigma management system requires that leaders develop a laser-sharp focus on actions that are vital to the specific, strategic results their organization needs.

RESULTS DRIVEN? : A Six Sigma leader needs to keep the end goals foremost until they have been achieved. This will require purposeful, habitual attention to results that are defined in exact terms, due dates, milestones and checkpoints.

RESOURCE-CONSCIOUS? : As a leader, you'll need a master plan for managing people, departments, cross functional teams and other resources in a fashion that respects the rules and help you stay several moves ahead of the game.

PROCESS-ORIENTED? : Six Sigma is about process and it takes process to execute effectively on any Six Sigma initiative. Six Sigma leaders follow a blueprint for centralising information and making it readily available, including next steps, indicators of current status, and a data audit trail.

3. Making sound, DATA-DRIVEN Decisions

Six Sigma leaders are successful to the degree that they are able to make effective, appropriate, informed decisions that are in the best interests of their organizations, customers, and colleagues.


CRITICAL THINKING Six Sigma leaders ask for facts and they ask a lot of questions about the facts, seeking data not just for data's sake, but for the purpose of considering anticipated actions, prime benefits, what-could-go-wrong, scenarios, options and alternatives, and fall-back remedies.

DECISIVENESS In today's competitive environment, time is always of the essence. Six Sigma leaders know when due diligence requires more analysis, and when sufficient analysis has been conducted to warrant decisive action and follow-through.

ACCOUNTABILITY that leadership requires taking full personal ownership of their decisions and the outcomes their team produce. A no-excuses, no-blame mentality saves time and helps to keep Six Sigma teams on task.

4. Managing PERFORMANCE

Six Sigma is about improving performance, so Six Sigma leaders must be skilled at managing and measuring performance on a daily and weekly basis. This small but critical set of performance habits helps.


SET GOALS! Six Sigma teams need to know the goals they are expected to achieve and the metrics against which they can measure the effectiveness of their activities in pursuit of those goals. It's the Six Sigma leader's job to establich this discipline of strong metrics.

TRACK PROGRESS! Six Sigma teams need a system for staying current with projects, maintaining momentum, and getting early warnings of potential problems or roadblocks. It's the Six Sigma leader's job to establish a system of guages for tracking progress and to make sure it is effectively utilized.

MANAGE DETAILS! Measuring anything requires careful attention to detail. Six Sigma leaders need superior organizational skills to quantify and collect data, to keep their teams focused on tasts that matter, and to monitor progress toward their plan on a real-time basis.

5. Advocating BREAKTHROUGH Improvements

Where others might seek to make small improvements here and there, Six Sigma leaders play big, reaching out to achieve goals that require breakthrough performance and improvement.

ASSERTIVENESS : How assertive are you? The most brilliant idea left unspoken is useless, so Six Sigma leaders must be equipped to champion a cause and drive an idea from concept to implementation.

INFLUENCE : How skilled are you at influencing people and teams? Six Sigma leaders cannot rely on mandates alone to prompt action or to give their projects and improvements " staying power." They need to be gifted at inspiring and persuading others as needed to build lasting consensus and commitment.

TENACITY : How quickly do you give up? Leading Six Sigma projects and teams is not easy! Six Sigma leaders must not be deterred by obstacles and challenges that arise along the way, but exhibit persistence and resourcefulness to keep the initiative on track.


6. Supporting TEAM-BASED Implementations

Six Sigma leaders recognize that the greatest improvements come from cross-functional teams that leverage each other's knowledge and capabilities -- not from one employee who is a "super hero."

MANAGE TEAMS! : Are you good at allocating team resources and ensuring that whole teams collaborate and function effectively? It takes a whole team working together for a Six Sigma project to succeed!

REWARD TEAMS! : Can you see that rewarding and recognizing the efforts and accomplishments of teams rather than individuals produces more impressive results? Six Sigma leaders define goals and incentives with emphasis on team-based implementation.

Courtesy : http://www.motorola.com/motorolauniversity