Implementation of quality management is very important for hospitals to improve processes, solve problems, and reduce variations and errors in service, including through the implementation of popular Total Quality Management (TQM) and Six Sigma (SS) as new quality management strategies to increase profitability, effectiveness and efficiency of the organization's operations to meet customer’s needs. This study aims to develop an integrated hospital quality management model from the practice of TQM and SS to provide synergy in improving hospital performance. The study design was cross sectional through a survey using a questionnaire on 863 respondents, namely all employees ranging from doctors to administrative personnel at 8 hospitals. The TQM and SS practice integration model identified as “Quality Management Alliance Model (QMA)” consists of 6 variable constructs, namely: Management Practice (MP); TQM Infrastructure Practice (IPTQM); SS Infrastructure Practice (IPSS); Core Practice TQM (CPTQM); Core Practice SS (CPSS); and Hospital Performance (KRS) with 12 structural equations hypothesized. Data analysis are performed using Structural Equation Model through 2 tests, namely analysis of measurement models using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) second order approach and structural model analysis. The results of the first order confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) analysis, after issuing invalid indicators (SLF≤0.5 and t≤1.96), obtained constructs of latent variables with models fit, valid, and reliable. Then in the second order CFA analysis on the overall model after being simplified through LVS (latent variable score) the study obtained construct model fit, valid and reliable. The results of the structural model analysis obtained a model fit with 11 structural equations that are positively and significantly related (t> 1.96). This study proves that the QMA model is feasible and can be applied to measure the implementation of hospital quality management. Hospital management is recommended to implement the QMA Model optimally to improve performance.

This paper presents a case study on how Six Sigma methodology can be used to improve student academic performance in three main subjects (Math, Arabic, and English) in a private secondary school located in the Middle East. The Six Sigma methodology of Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control (DMAIC) was used to improve student performance along with several improvement tools such as Fishbone diagram, Pareto charts, and Critical-To-Quality (CTQ) tree. Introducing quality improvement concepts and tools resulted in a series of improvements leading to an increase in student academic achievement quantified by Sigma Quality Level (SQL). The SQL improved in Math from (2.01) to (2.37) and in Arabic from (1.86) to (2.38). On the other hand, English grades did not increase from baseline. The results of this study provide a clear, step-by-step approach to systematically approaching and solving educational problems using the DMAIC model. Practically speaking, the results of this study provides clear evidence that the DMAIC can be used in the educational sector by school administrators and teachers to improve student grades.

In the present scenario, the Six Sigma tools and techniques are used by various manufacturing industries, exporting industries and even service organizations. It focuses on improving the quality of the products, cutting down the extra costs, reducing the variations and satisfying the customers. This case study follows the Six Sigma tools called DMAIC methodology to identify and analyze various root causes of the capacitors rejection problems, which influence the performance of the company and suggests solutions to counter with it. The issue not only causes financial loss to the company but also hinders future growth in form of customer dissatisfaction. The results of the implementation indicate significant improvement in the quality of the product and cost reduction.

Six Sigma approach is based on decreasing defects and variations in the products and processes, and it provides important benefits to healthcare organizations. This study aims to identify managers’ opinions, who work in private healthcare organizations, about the reasons behind not using Six Sigma in their organizations. The research was performed between December 2016 and March 2018 in private healthcare organizations (private hospitals and medical centers) operating in Turkey and not using Six Sigma approach. Data were collected from managers, who have knowledge about Six Sigma, through using surveys. In this study, survey methodology was used to collect data. According to the results, the biggest barrier related to not using Six Sigma is based on the lack of knowledge about Six Sigma. The other important barrier about the diffusion of Six Sigma within this organizations is related to the lack of support from top management and leaders. Another finding about the reasons of not applying Six Sigma approach is that there is not a statistically significant difference among managers in terms of their managerial position. In order to overcome the lack of knowledge about Six Sigma, it is advised that managers should take steps in the direction of promoting Six Sigma within their current organization, and provide necessary support and leadership about the process.

Six Sigma is recognized as an essential tool for continuous improvement of quality. A large num-ber of publications by various authors reflect the interest in this technique. Reviews of literature on Six Sigma have been done in the past by a few authors. However, considering the contributions in the recent times, a more comprehensive review is attempted here. The authors have examined vari-ous papers and have proposed a different scheme of classification. In addition, certain gaps that would provide hints for further research in Six Sigma have been identified. As a results the rela-tionship between Six Sigma, Design for Six Sigma (DFSS), and how these two concepts support the quality system for organizational learning and innovation performance have been discussed that would help researchers, academicians and practitioners to take a closer look at the growth, devel-opment and applicability of Six Sigma in Design.

Today energy is directly related with progress or growth of any country and every event requires a huge amount of energy. In today’s global competitiveness, demand for energy is very high and India is facing a problem of very poor energy supply. So, researchers and planners are worried about very poor productivity of thermal power plant and the most critical cause for this problem is high capacity waste at these plants. This paper focuses on causes of capacity waste and for this, DMAIC approach is adopted. The study also clears some myths of Six Sigma compatibility at process industries (thermal power plant) for performance improvement. After implementation of the first phase i.e. “Define”, the study confirms the competence of Six Sigma in defining the issue of capacity waste.

Six Sigma is a statistics-based approach focusing on minimizing defects and variations in prod-ucts and processes. Although it is used generally in production-based businesses, Six Sigma has been used in service sector businesses in the recent years as well. The aim of this study is to de-termine healthcare and banking sector managers’ perceptions related to Six Sigma, and compare healthcare managers and banking managers in terms of their opinions about six sigma. The study was done between February 2016 and October 2016 in private healthcare organizations and pri-vate banks operating in Turkey. The intended population of the study involves the managers working in these organizations. To compare perceptions of healthcare sector managers and bank-ing sector managers, Mann Whitney-U test was used. According to the statistical tests per-formed, there is not any statistically significant difference between healthcare sector managers and banking sector managers in terms of their view about Six Sigma. However, managers from the both sectors noted that Six Sigma could provide important advantages to their organizations. This result was considered as important because it indicates that Six Sigma can offer benefits for different and distinct parts of service sector, such as banking and healthcare.

In today's competitive world, Six Sigma can serve as a corporate strategy to improve quality and reduce costs. Six Sigma is a comprehensive and flexible system for achieving, maintaining and maximizing organizational success, through an improved performance of processes. However, this tool can only be successful in organizations which are already prepared for Six Sigma implementation. This study investigated the readiness of an Iranian company, Tabarestan Steel Co., in terms of Six Sigma projects. In doing so, the study proposed a model designed for assessing the readiness of Six Sigma in organizations. To this end, primarily Six Sigma readiness indicators were identified through Fuzzy Delphi, by recourse to the experts’ opinions. Next the interrelationships between the indicators were examined through the Fuzzy DEMATEL method. The internal links between the indicators were determined after the examination, and the degree of importance and the weights of the indicators were decided. Ultimately, three highly important dimensions were discovered that had a significant function in Six Sigma implementation (leadership and perspective, corporate strategy, and focus on the customer).

Six Sigma is the concept of improving the quality by reducing process variations, making con-tinuous improvements, reducing defect rates and improving the processes. Initially, the concept of Six Sigma focused on defect reduction, cost reduction and value addition. Fundamentally the basic idea of Six Sigma is to improve the process-capability and making the process more relia-ble along with reducing wastes within industries. Evaluation the implication of applying Six Sigma over the small and medium-sized enterprises is the main purpose of this research work taking a particular case of automobile industries. In the present work, DMAIC methodology of Six Sigma is used to a small seat slider lock nut manufacturing unit to reduce the play issue in K2 seat slider lock in automobile units by reducing defects inherent in the process. After apply-ing Six Sigma methodology, it was found that manufacturing units could earn profits in terms of reducing the wastage as well as improving the quality standard of the product by controlling the play issue in seat slider lock nut mechanism. Result shows that with the application of Six Sig-ma, process, sigma level brought up to 5.53σ from 1.59σ by varying the seat slider lock nut di-mensions/size.

Polyester short cut fiber is a textile industry which is rarely explored or researched. This research explains the necessary steps of improvement using Six Sigma method to reduce the nonconform-ing products in a polyester short cut fiber manufacturing in Indonesia. An increased noncon-forming products in the shortcut fiber production process created some quality problems from January to May, 2015. Define, measure, analysis, improve, control (DMAIC) steps were im-plemented to determine root cause of the problems and to improve production process using sta-tistical approach. The results of Six Sigma improvement has indicated that the process capability was increased from 2.2 to 3.1 sigma, savings $18,394.2 USD per-month.