Customer Reviews

Rath & Strong's Six Sigma Pocket Guide

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I don't due encomiums very often (check out the rest of my reviews); but Rath & Strong's pocket guide simply floored me.

I bought a dozen several months ago to try out on my black belts and green belts. They snapped them up and refused to return them. My own copy is already dog-eared and tattered from overuse.

This is a wonderful tool. It breaks down the methodology in clear, concise steps and provides a desperately-needed matrix showing which tools are typically employed at each phase. It offers short, effective descriptions of the most commonly-used tools.

As someone who'd been given to lugging Breyfogle's "Implementing Six Sigma" to meetings, Rath & Strong's guide has been a welcome relief.

Pick yours up today.

Don't let the small size of this book fool you!! It is packed with great information. It gives a brief review of the tools used for Six Sigma. They are organized along the DMAIC model. A chapter covers each of the phases of the model. It covers the tools that are commonly used in each phase of the model along with why it is useful in this phase and a short synpopsis on how it works.

For example tools covered in Define are: Project Chater, Stakeholder analysis, SIPOC, Rolled Throughput Yield, Voice of the Customer,Affinity Diagrams, Kano Model, Critical to Quality Tree etc.

The chapter on Measure covers things like Control Charts, Frequency plots, Gage R & R, Pareto Charts, FMEA etc.

This book is an excellent introduction to the tools used in Six Sigma or problem solving techniques. It is also an excellent pocket reference for trained practioners to use to set up problem resolution steps!!

Rath & Strong's Six Sigma Pocket Guide is an easy to use, handy reference book for anyone starting out with Six Sigma. It is extremely well organized with an overview chapter and seperate chapters for Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control. It is packed with useful forms, charts, and examples that help the new Six Sigma Practitioner quickly recall information from his or her training. Each chapter ends with a very handy "Completion Checklist" that helps the reader understand what should be completed at the end of each phase of a Six Sigma Project.

I plan on making this book a standard handout in my Green Belt training classes.

Six Sigma Pocket Guide (12/15/03)

Although Rath and Strong do indeed provide a wealth of information about Six Sigma, their "pocket guide" can be of substantial value to all organizations (regardless of size or nature) which need to simplify, thereby improve the process by which they produce whatever they offer for sale. Products, of course, but also professional services (e.g. legal, accounting, management consulting), memberships (e.g. healthcare providers as well as trade and professional associations such as chambers of commerce), and charitable support (e.g. non profit, tax exempt 501 (c) 3 organizations such as college and universities). Chapter One introduces the book's core concept, DMAIC, an acronym for Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control. A chapter is then devoted to each of the five separate but related process components. Rath and Strong explain how this process will guide and inform efforts to increase the ROI of resources to achieve whatever the desired objectives may be. One of this guide's greatest benefits is its ease of use: It can easily be carried within an attaché case, coat pocket, or purse, always available for direct and immediate access whenever needed. Now more than ever before, decision-makers are under great pressure to produce more and better results in less time, and with fewer resources. Hence the importance of improving first pass yield and cycle time, for example. Hence the importance, also, of enabling everyone within a given organization to understand how and why her or his efforts can -- and should -- contribute to the organization's operational excellence. For most executives, Rath and Strong offer a concise, easy-to-access, and well-written source of guidance to effectively defining, measuring, analyzing, improving, and controlling various stages of production of ideas as well as products and services.

This pocket guide is wonderful for beginners and those more familiar with Six Sigma. It can be read one page or one tool at a time. Beginners can delay dealing with the statistical parts and still get a nice grasp of the how Six Sigma projects work. I have purchased quite a few for my collegues and they have purchased it in turn for the staff. I carry it with me everywhere and to every meeting. One page alone in this guide is worth the price!

Just went through the book. It looks like it would be a good reference guide to have but it didn't help me understand six sigma. Just a little too technical for me. I don't want to be an expert, and don't have time to try to become one, I just wanted to understand what people were talking about when they said six sigma. Once our company has done six sigma for a few years and everyone knows what it is, it may be helpful.

This is a great little guide to follow along with - either as you go through a Six Sigma course - or to hand out to all members of your team. We have used them and found them very helpful. Definitely recommend!

This book is everything it promises to be. It is not for people untrained in 6 sigma, but is a perfect reference for those that are. One note: it really is a pocket guide (it is pocket size). That surprised me at first-- it's a tiny little book.

Excellent pocket lingo guide to Six Sigma Terms - great for "translations" to trainees, managers, etc.

This book is everything it promises to be. It is not for people untrained in 6 sigma, but is a perfect reference for those that are. One note: it really is a pocket guide (it is pocket size). That surprised me at first-- it's a tiny little book.