Over the last few months I have been fascinated with the business philosophy known as "Six Sigma". This powerful fact & data based process was created by Motorola in the mid 1980's as a solution to their quality control and continuous improvement issues that had plagued them for years.
While Motorola came up with this process, it was GE and their charismatic leader Jack Welch who truly made it the powerhouse it is today. Through his ability to champion it within the organization, he was able to transform the then floundering GE into what he has since called a "World Class Organization"

The reason I became interested in this intitially, was because I found out that my company had been using Six Sigma for some time and I thought this would be a great way to get involved. The more I read about it, the more I am fascinated by how powerful it is and the simplicity of the ideas involved. I have read the following two books, and my comments on them follow. I have two more Six Sigma books sitting on my desk here, and I will post my opinions on them as well.

My intention is to ultimately become trained in the use, implementation and values of Six Sigma so that I may participate more fully in the projects my company is involved in.

Making Six Sigma Last by George Eckes
While this book would have been better used after being officially trained in these processes, it was still a fantastic read. Making Six Sigma last focuses it's efforts on two specific areas. First, it emphasizes the importance of affecting change on a cultural level within an organization. The ability to develop a strong following within your team/group/company has an immense impact on the ultimate success or failure or the Six Sigma implementation. The second component is proper analysis and measurement of the Six Sigma process that incorporates both tactials but cultural changes elements as one product. Most of the discussions in the book focus around the following equation.

Q x A = E

Where Q is the nuts and bolts of your program; i.e.-setting up teams, developing processes, hiring consultants, measurement and A represents the "softer" aspects (while equally or more so important) of the process. These "A" components can be; the acceptance/resistance of Six Sigma by the entire organization, the commintment by senior management to the process, proper communication, etc.

I found this book to be very well written and provided plenty of interesting anecdotes. I would have like to have had more technical information and hard facts, but apparently there is another book by the same author that covers this. I'll have to grab that one!

Knowledge Based Management - I would have provided a link to this book, but Amazon doesn't even carry it. That should be the first indicator as to it's quality. KBM (for short) was written, edited and published by a trio of consultants who specialize in Change Management. They also owned the publishing company that put this book to paper, otherwise they would still be peddling their goods elsewhere.
These consultants, while impressed with Six Sigma, argued that it was more complex than needed and by using their principles an organization could make the same savings and reap similar benefits to others using Six Sigma. What they failed to do, however, was to actually ever come out and say exactly what it was they had come up with. This horrendous book was filled with name-tossing anecdotes and poor examples of badly planned out ideas and concepts. Don't waste your time reading it.