Milwaukee, WI
Quoted from JWJr:<raise> Fellow Six Sigma GE survivor here. At the end of my career, my partner and I specialized in doing CBAs for Finance teams that had too much to do and too little to do it with and far_ too much internal dissension.
We'd come in for a 3-hour session that everyone there had already decided was a complete waste of their time. They all (always!) came out_ of the 3-hour session with priorities defined and goals set and a sense of "pulling together" they hadn't felt in years_.
The shit works, if you do it right. It does not_ involve marking where your stapler goes, unless that act can be proven to save enough time and energy to be worthwhile; believe it or not, one major_ breakthrough in one session was hanging a community stapler from a chain next to the copier so that everyone could always find it.
Six Sigma works. When a company is unorganized and inefficient its costs money. Cost savings is not in parts of the machine or cheeping out games and charging more. It's in running the production line better, or putting in better parts so there are fewer problems. Trying to bond the employees together for a better working team. Stern knows they need a solid product to stay in business, and I believe they will always improve and not go backwards.
Gratz to Gary, and thanks Gary for keeping pinball manufacturing going. I don't think much will change with the new CEO. Gary is still on the board and most likely still the man, Just less paperwork for him.
