QUALITY AND COMPETITIVENESS: A LEAN SIX SIGMA APPROACH

Originally developed to improve the quality and production efficiency, Lean Six Sigma is now widely adopted in other non-manufacturing sectors such as financial, trade, services, etc. Lean Six Sigma is a hybrid of two concepts: lean manufacturing - to reduce waste, and Six Sigma - to reduce errors, and thus to help companies to achieve faster production processes with low cost and higher quality. From our research we've found that despite its increasing popularity and impressive results at some companies, Lean Six Sigma often fails to deliver expected results. However, research carried out has shown that the service companies analyzed, that operate within courier activities (unloading activities, data entry and labeling of shipments at the start) has succeeded in realize the benefits in terms of productivity and competitiveness by creating added value.