In an unstable economic situation, more and more attention is paid to management methods, including production, aimed at overcoming the crisis phenomena and increasing the effectiveness of enterprises at the expense of internal resources. The Six Sigma management system is a set of techniques to optimize production processes and employee management (Sohal et al., 2022). It identifies how working time is used and what inhibits work processes. It can also be used to identify the causes of defects and inconsistencies and to determine at what points work processes begin to lose efficiency and why there is a general decline. The Six Sigma empowers the manager and staff to identify problems and find solutions. Functions are adjusted and improved on the fly without bringing the system to a halt. All improvements are made incrementally but regularly, and the foundation of Six Sigma effectiveness is fine-tuning processes and results.
The Six Sigma is one of the most common in healthcare and is used to implement process optimization in care delivery and organization. There is now a marked improvement in the quality of care delivered to the population, which is achieved by improving staff skills and the internal structure of hospitals (Stelson et al., 2017). The Six Sigma is being implemented in various ways, but it is mainly focused on securing resources and monitoring their use. Six Sigma works toward administrative and financial support to improve the delivery speed and quality of care (Sohal et al., 2022). They offer simple solutions (increasing the number of hospital beds, providing X-ray equipment, redesigning emergency rooms, and more complex solutions (e.g., reducing wait times for emergency care). The success of simple solutions is justified by working in the financial sector by reallocating resources from areas already working to more sagging ones.
Complex solutions in Six Sigma projects become successful when multiple sectors are involved, each striving for a common goal. They also seek to control costs, improve processes, and increase patient satisfaction (Sohal et al., 2022). The success factors in such decisions are the timing of care delivery. In addition, the criteria of communication, feedback systems, and staff commitment to change are highlighted (Stelson et al., 2017). The degree of employee engagement may be the main factor that can affect the project’s success. It is due to the top-down systems integrating more successfully than bottom-up systems: employees need to understand that the weighting of the decision is not determined by single personnel (Sohal et al., 2022). In addition, all internal organizational processes, including leadership styles and current capabilities, predict Six Sigma project successes.
The success of the Six Sigma projects has already been demonstrated in numerous clinics worldwide. For example, Stanford Hospital has implemented a project in operations related to aortocoronary bypass surgery (Cimen, & Deniz, 2017). The hospital standardized procurement processes by implementing improved vendor communication technology and new criteria in care delivery. As a result, the hospital was not only able to control costs (savings of $15 million were seen) but also improve the quality of care. Mortality rates were reduced from 7.1% to 3.7%, and the average incubation time was reduced to 4-6 hours instead of 12-16 hours (Cimen, & Deniz, 2017, 8). Such indicators suggest that the effectiveness of Six Sigma is a proven phenomenon, and as the implementation of such projects in health care expands, overall health outcomes will improve significantly.
References
Cimen, M., & Deniz, S. (2017). Six sigma approach and examples from healthcare organizations. Healthcare Management, (1), 6-9. Web.
Sohal, A., De Vass, T., Vasquez, T., Bamber, G. J., Bartram, T. & Stanton, P. (2022). Success factors for lean six sigma projects in healthcare.Journal of Management Control volume, 33, 215–240. Web.
Stelson, P., Hille, J., Eseonu, C., & Doolen, T. (2017). What drives continuous improvement project success in healthcare?. International journal of health care quality assurance, 30(1), 43–57. Web.