Lean Six Sigma

Aligned with Carnegie Mellon’s strategic focus of improving processes and efficiencies, the Lean Six Sigma program is a hands-on way to learn how Lean Six Sigma principles can help you achieve continual process improvement.

On this page:

• About the Program
• Program Goals
• Program Outcomes
• Nomination Requirements
• Timeline
• Project Criteria
• Finding a Project
• Past Projects and Cohorts

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About the Program

The Lean Six Sigma program at CMU provides two types of participation opportunity:

• Individual participants can take advantage of the opportunity for professional development and growth.
• Campus partners can propose a team project. Through these projects, program participants gather hands-on experience, and project sponsors get the opportunity to have cross-functional teams explore potential improvement or cost savings for their process or service.

Program Goals

• Implement a continual process improvement program using the principles of Lean Six Sigma
• Align the program with Carnegie Mellon’s strategic focus of improving processes and efficiencies
• Provide a practical experience for participants to apply the principles learned in the classroom to a team-based project under the guidance of a subject matter expert/consultant
• Provide participants with support to pursue the Lean Six Sigma Green Belt certification at the end of the program

Program Outcomes

• Contribute to establishing a culture of process improvement 
• Provide university employees from various departments and divisions with the skills and tools essential to solving problems at various levels 
• Reduce costs, raise productivity and enhance overall customer satisfaction
• Standardize the tools and techniques used to improve processes

Nomination Requirements

The nomination period is open through mid-April of each year, with 30 spots available to motivated staff who meet the following requirements:

• Some understanding of statistics
• Inclination toward analytics (nice but not necessary)
• Interest in Lean Six Sigma and process improvement
• Initiative; not easily swayed from doing the work
• Displays "stick-to-it-ive-ness"
• Support from manager to dedicate time for training and working the project
• Works well with others; ability to influence
• Can draw insights from everyone on the project team
• Mix of individual contributors, managers, technical and non-technical
• Can synthesize customer expectations into measurable outcomes
• Wants to grow and learn with a team of colleagues beyond department

Timeline

• February/March: Socialize the program with leadership and stakeholder groups and solicit nominations
• April: Confirm program participants and identify potential projects/sponsors; share participant and project lists with university leadership
• May: Begin pre-program communications; finalize projects/sponsors and match participants to projects; distribute training materials as applicable
• June–July: Participants attend in-person and virtual training sessions. The 2025 training schedule is:
  • June 10 - 13, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (In Person)
  • July 14 - 15, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (Virtual)
  • July 28 - 29, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (Virtual)
• August–November: Project teams meet for work and research; monthly team touchpoints with consultant and HR learning and development team; individual touchpoints as needed
• November–December: Teams present their project findings (in person, hybrid or virtual, depending on circumstances)

Project Criteria

Table with participants, title, department/division and project

Characteristics of "Good" Projects

Characteristics of "Bad" Projects

Type of Problem: Repeating process Data available and reliable Defined defect Appropriate scope Organizational Support: Project aligns with organizational key performance indicators (KPIs) Sufficient access to the project sponsor and related subject matter experts Strong interest in seeing a solution (i.e., leadership support for team and for identifying a solution) No pre-planned solutions Customer is defined and accessible Project team has ability to influence / impact the implemented solution

Lack of project team support: No leadership buy-in Limited access to subject matter experts Data Issues: Dependence on confidential or hard to source data Limited data available or data is unreliable Project Issues: Large scope Project used to justify an existing, pre-established solution No control over process of interest

Finding a Project

1. Start with high level organizational goal.
2. Determine how to measure progress toward that goal.
3. Baseline that metric:
   1. Look at metric performance over time.
   2. Focus on a goal that is falling short of the desired result.
4. Brainstorm key drivers of that metric.
5. Determine how to measure the key drivers.
6. Baseline the key drivers.
7. Repeat this process until you find an appropriately scoped problem to solve.

Past Projects and Cohorts

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019