The Deployment That Stalled at the Pilot Line
A mid-size automotive supplier has committed to a Lean Six Sigma deployment across four plants. Leadership chartered 12 Green Belt projects in Q1, but by Q3 only 3 are still active. Symptoms: Belts report they cannot get data from IT without a two-week ticket; plant managers say the projects were chosen by corporate without their input; two Belts were pulled back to production during a demand spike; and there is no standard project tollgate, so each Belt defines 'done' differently. The sponsor, the VP of Operations, believes the problem is Belt capability and wants to fund a second training wave. Budget for training is available, but the improvement portfolio has produced no verified savings yet.
1. Diagnose the root causes of the stalled deployment and recommend where the sponsor should spend the next cycle's effort.
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The symptoms point to deployment infrastructure, not Belt skill. Four failure modes are visible:
- Portfolio selection without line ownership - projects were pushed down, not pulled. No linkage to plant-level priorities, so plant managers have no stake and no reason to protect project time. This is a classic deployment-governance gap, not a training gap.
- Data access is a bottleneck - a two-week IT ticket makes any Measure Phase impossible on a 12-week cycle. This is an enterprise-process problem that no amount of Belt training fixes.
- No resource protection - Belts pulled to production means the sponsor's charter has no teeth. Without a written time commitment (e.g., 50% protected time) endorsed by plant leadership, projects will always lose to the daily crisis.
- No standard tollgate - inconsistent 'done' means no portfolio-level tracking and no verified savings.
Recommendation: Do not fund a second training wave yet. Spend the next quarter on: (a) a joint portfolio review with plant managers to re-select projects against plant KPIs; (b) a data-access service-level agreement with IT (or a data-extraction role); (c) written resource commitments; (d) a single tollgate template with defined deliverables and a finance-verified savings method. Training a second wave into the same broken system will simply produce more stalled projects and damage credibility further. Reassess training need after the infrastructure is fixed and the first wave shows verified results.
2. The VP argues that 'Lean Six Sigma is a training program.' How would you reframe this, and what evidence would you present to support your position?
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Reframe: Lean Six Sigma is a management system for solving problems and improving processes, of which training is one enabling component. Training builds capability; the deployment system (portfolio selection, governance, resource protection, measurement, recognition) determines whether that capability is used.
Evidence to present:
- Portfolio data: 12 chartered, 3 active, 0 verified savings. If training were the binding constraint, we would expect Belts to fail inside projects; instead the projects are dying from external causes (data access, resource pull, unclear scope).
- Attribution test: Ask each active Belt what blocked them in the last 30 days. If the top blockers are systemic (IT, time, unclear priority), training is not the constraint.
- Benchmark logic: Organizations that train without governance typically see high certification rates and low project completion - a pattern this deployment already matches.
- Cost of the wrong fix: A second training wave costs money and, worse, signals that the failure was the Belts' fault, which erodes the credibility needed to recruit future Belts.
A useful framing for the VP: 'We have proven we can train Belts. We have not yet proven we can run a portfolio. The next investment should buy the second, because without it the first produces no return.'
3. What leading and lagging measures would you put in place to track whether the deployment is recovering?
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Split into leading (predictive, controllable now) and lagging (outcome, verified later).
Leading indicators
- % of chartered projects with a signed charter naming a line owner and a finance partner.
- % of Belts reporting protected project time ≥ agreed threshold (e.g., 50%).
- Median days to obtain required data (target: within the project's Measure window).
- % of projects passing each tollgate on the first attempt (process quality of the tollgate itself).
- Number of projects re-selected jointly with plant managers vs. pushed from corporate.
Lagging indicators
- Verified savings (finance-signed), by project and by plant.
- Project completion rate against charter baseline (target: ≥70%).
- Cycle time from charter to control, by phase.
- Number of improvements sustained at 90-day post-control audit.
Governance cadence: a monthly portfolio review that reviews the leading indicators and a quarterly review that reviews verified lagging results. The point of the leading set is that it moves before the lagging set, giving the sponsor time to intervene. Reporting only lagging savings tells you the deployment failed after the fact.