Some facts about Six Sigma SIPOC

Here are some things you should know about Six Sigma SIPOC. The acronym SIPOC (Suppliers, Inputs, Processes, Outputs and Customers) is a high caliber method of doing business that shows how the current customer service process really works. It breaks down exactly what needs to be done and how it needs to be done.

Suppliers will provide inputs for your process. The Inputs will define the service and material as well as the information that is used to produce any output. This process will be a defined series of activities that generally add value to inputs to generate outputs for customers. The Products will be the services, products and/or information that are of value to consumers.

Customers will be the users of these products produced by these processes. What Six Sigma SIPOC is essentially is a map of the highest caliber. When a company makes the moves to improve quality, it will implement this method with flying colors. It helps the company better understand that what they are implementing is to become more efficient, which in turn makes it happen.

Creating a SIPOC diagram will be a team activity for you that involves brainstorming to find the hard-to-see details. The team will be made up of the stakeholders and other relevant parties involved in all of this. When implementing SIPOC for new processes under design, it would be a good idea to start with the customer and work your way back to the supplier. There is a different way through the existing process. For this scenario, start with the process definition and then move on to identifying your products, your customers, your inputs, and then your suppliers.

Making a process map will take process description to a new level of understanding. While verbal descriptions can provide the building blocks of this process, a map clarifies the flow of each event in the process. Then a team will see if there is a good path to the process or if there are obstacles in the way of bottlenecks, rework, etc.

One aspect of mapping Six Sigma processes within an organization is the expectation that the process within a department can be described in different ways. This could be the result of incorporated organizations, and not so much of merger processes. It could simply be the variety of employees carrying out the process.

One way to document the process is to take a walkthrough with others. Meeting with other associates who will be going through the process gives you an opportunity to work together to provide insight into exactly what the current steps are. Help build the variety of the Six Sigma team.