Lean Six Sigma has been around for a long time - on fine tuning processes - and often used in manufacturing. Six sigma black belt is a thing for engineers. Now when i think about it, its a good marketing gimmick =) Did a quick refresher on this book - Lean startup by Jefferey Ries

(A personal take on processes - I think it should be used to raise standards from bare minimal to an average standard. But if it prohibits growth, then it’s good to reassess instead of forcing everyone, everything to stick to the process. Most companies will do the latter and it can get overwhelming, esp if you are a builder or a creative person).

Some highlights :

1. The term “startup” here refers to any team that is planning to create a new product or service whose future isn’t 100% certain yet

2. There are many risks in startups - technical risk (product build), market risk (wrong/no customers)

3. Core fundamentals of Lean Startup:

Iterate quickly - test - measure - learn - improve - repeat

4. Most product development involves an extreme amount of work, up front.

5. Minimal viable product - developing just enough of the product to complete one cycle of the build, measure, and learn process.

6. Innovation accounting - measuring progress through KPIs, metrics (there are many other ways these days)

7. After several iterations - it will start getting to an ideal phase.

8. If things are not as planned, decide whether to pivot or stick to the current plan based on the data. Pivoting can be demoralizing but prevents future costly mistakes.

9. Types of Pivots :

Zoom In Pivot: Turn a successful feature of a failed prototype into its own product.

Zoom Out Pivot: Incorporate a useful failed prototype into a larger, more complex product.

Customer Segment Pivot: When the target audience is different than expected.

Customer Need Pivot: Create a new product to address a more urgent customer problem.

Platform Pivot: When one application becomes so successful that it creates a whole ecosystem.

Business Architecture Pivot: Shift from low-volume, high-margin to high-volume, low-margin business.

Value Capture Pivot: Restructure the entire business to generate value in a new way.

Engine of Growth Pivot: Change the profit structure to meet growing demand.

10. Small batches : doing each step individually or in smaller batch rather than in large batch processes. This reduces time wasted on reorganising between steps, easy to spot errors and improves overall system efficiency.

11. Andon Cord: Toyota's Andon Cord empowered every production line worker to halt operations if they detected defects. This quick response prevents costly issues from progressing and makes sense despite stopping production temporarily (if you are familiar with large manufacturing, production stoppage = heart attack)

12. Continuous Deployment: frequently updating software or products, even multiple times a day, in live production system for quicker user feedback, lower risk of errors, ongoing improvements, and gives a competitive edge (many small and large companies may not agree with this)

13. Kanban is used to optimize processes and has 4 stages :

First - where tasks are ready but not started (backlog).

Second - where tasks are actively being worked on (progress)

Third - it moves to build once the major work is done

Lastly : validated by customer review.

(This works really well if you are building a product from raw material to finished goods)

14. The "Five Whys"

This technique is used to trace technical issues back to its root cause (which happens to be always human related hence can be improved)

Example - a company updated an app and customers were upset - why ?

1st why - the update accidentally disabled a popular feature.

2nd why - due to a faulty service which failed

3rd why - because a subsystem was used incorrectly

4th why - due to an engineer that wasn’t trained correctly.

5th why - The manager skimps on training for new engineers due to team overwork and multitasking.

(Note : people can overreact and get defensive - this is one way to diffuse the situation and just stick to finding the root cause and problem solving. Often this becomes a habitual practice)

15. All startup founders need to focus on revenue efficiency.

16. Gather feedbacks from devotees and skeptics, differentiate between what works and noise

17. Be die hard fan of your first customers

18. Accept mistakes. Own them, clarify and apologize appropriately.

19. Levels of Zshift:

One sigma - customers get what they want 30% of the time

Two sigma - 70% probability of accuracy

Three sigma - 93%

Four sigma - 99% accuracy

Five and Six - 100 accuracy, customer satisfaction

20. Kaizen - streamline processes that works, and improve others (there’s a lot more to this)

21. Poka Yoke is a control concept to prevent errors or mistakes through system designs, processes or mechanisms.

22. The 5S method is a workplace improvement approach from Japan, emphasizing five principles:

Sort: Identify and remove unnecessary items.

Set in order: Organize and designate places for everything.

Shine: Maintain cleanliness and equipment.

Standardize: Establish consistent procedures.

Sustain: Create a culture of continuous improvement.

( I’ve seen companies go crazy with this)