I Survived Lean Six Sigma!

Going into the Lean Six Sigma Green Belt training, while skipping White and Yellow Belt (which are scheduled at a later date), I knew I would need to work double time to catch up. I was very excited to be part of the class but I also felt anxious since I didn't have enough time to do the pre-work, cramming around 20 hours of pre-work over 6 hours and barely getting halfway done. What made it even more daunting was that this was only the 3rd LSS Green Belt F2F class since 2007.

I was right to feel anxious, Day 1 was not much of a problem since I was familiar with the DMAIC process cycle, but by Day 2 I was already feeling overwhelmed. With terms getting thrown around, new concepts and tools being taught at a pace much faster than I was comfortable with, and all the maths involved - damn, it was probably the math that really got to me,

But thanks to simulations, entertaining and informative classmates, and other welcome distractions, I managed to hang on and learn. I did my best to participate as well, volunteering, providing inputs and challenging scenarios whenever possible. If only just to keep my head above water (and stay awake) most of the time.

Things started to clear up again on Day 3, possibly because we did less math and statistical analyses and more RCA and impact analysis, I grasped those concepts fairly well, but there was a whole lot of information to digest. Learning was further reinforced on day 4 after teachbacks and summaries, seeing how everything fit together and realizing that the mastery will come with practice. I guess I needn't have worried at all.

And when we shortened the Sigma Station simulation cycle time from 8 minutes to less than 30 seconds, when at first we deemed 1 minute impossible? That was just freaking awesome, and leaving your instructor at a loss for words with the process improvements your team did, priceless.

I know I'll need to keep reading, re-reading and practicing the concepts I learned to fully say I know Lean Six Sigma, but I definitely know I already learned a lot. Thanks to my awesome and cool instructor, Mr. James Love, Master Black Belt, and my equally awesome classmates who made the learning fun and interactive, and my Sigma Station teammates, we totally owned that simulation. We definitely proved we're "the best class ever." :)

This was, one of the best trainings I've attended in my career, making it worth the extra day at the office and inevitable extra work days to catch up on missed deliverables over the papal visit holidays. I only hope I get to implement a project that's LSS applicable so I can get my certification sometime soon.

[caption id="attachment_718" align="alignleft" width="300"] Souvenir pic with Mr. Love and my former teammates[/caption]