This is the fourth and final installment of my collaboration with John Hunter and friends on the Year-End Management Improvement Carnival, where we review the best management improvement blogs and share which posts we found to be the most insightful or helpful. Today I have the privilege of bringing you a few gems from the iSixSigma blogosphere.
PART 4 of 4 – The iSixSigma blogs are written by a cast of columnists who share their experiences with the practice of quality improvement. The favorites I’ve picked out here are only the tip of the iceberg… there are many more on the site.
Innovation and Six Sigma (5/9/2008) – This article aims to answer the question “Does Six Sigma kill innovation?” In addition to being a thought-provoking article, the collection of comments is worth reading as well. I particularly liked this perspective: “I’m reminded of a story I was once told about an author who decided to write an entire novel without using the letter E. You’d think this would be incredibly limiting, but in fact the author ended up learning many, many new words and taking his writing in entirely new directions. The structure forced him to break old habits and think in new ways.”
The iPod Did Not Come From a Focus Group (3/3/2008) – Development of the iPod is an example of customer and market-driven innovation. The author of this article notes that “your company probably knows more about what is possible than most of your customers; but the lesson I take away from the Apple example is this: some of our customers know a lot more than we do, and we ignore them at our peril.” There’s also a pointer to an excellent 2002 article in the Harvard Business Review.
Six Sigma: The Laissez-Faire of Politics (1/28/2008) – In this article, the author explores how to solve a real public policy issue using Six Sigma: reducing the consumption of plastic bags (like the ones you get at the grocery store) on the national level. “If there is one area in society that definitely needs an injection of Six Sigma, it’s politics. Just like the working world of business, people want a silver bullet quick fix that sounds good and will make people feel good. Politicians often open their mouths without performing due diligence and as a result only partially address an issue.”
What You Measure is What You Get (12/22/2008) – This post reflected on the role and meaning of measurement (one of my favorite issues). “Perhaps what you measure is what you get. More likely, what you measure is all you’ll get. What you don’t (or can’t) measure is lost” – H. Thomas Johnson
Six Sigma Project Failure (7/28/2008) – What’s required for a Six Sigma project to fail? Conflicting definitions are explored in these survey results. (This is somewhat related to Eight Reasons Why Projects Fail (4/24/2008), another good post.)
Return to Part 1 of 4 –>
Return to John Hunter’s Management Improvement Carnival: 2008 Year in Review –>
Quality and Innovation 
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