Rating: 
Summary: Sigma Six Only Works When EVERYONE buys in
Review: Good book outlining a good program. I'm actually a Sigma Six admirer, but it's one of those things everyone has to buy into, not just upper management. It only takes a few week points to render it ineffective.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Book
Review: Great book!!! Chowdhury took a very simple and interesting approach to explain the whole concept of Six Sigma. I recommend this book to anyone interested in the topic.
Rating:
Summary: An Excellent Primer
Review: How to describe this book? Chowdhury creates a fictional situation in which one executive, fired one morning, unexpectedly has lunch the same day with another executive employed by a different division of the same company. The former (Joe Meter) is understandably self-preoccupied as the latter (Larry Hogan) explains his involvement in Six Sigma initiatives. In effect, the reader is an eavesdropper on their conversation. Meter is the narrator. What Chowdhury provides is a primer. (For those in need of a cohesive and comprehensive explanation of this subject, I highly recommend The Six Sigma Way co-authored by Pande, Neuman, and Cavanagh.) Some reviewers have noted that Chowdbury's book is entertaining and that is true. Other reviewers seem to criticize it for what it isn't and that's not fair. It is what it is: a remarkably lucid, reader-friendly explanation of Six Sigma principles, illustrated (by Hogan's own experiences) in a fictitious but credible corporate context. I think this book would serve as an excellent introduction to The Six Sigma Way but has substantial value on its own merits. Here is a brief excerpt from the final chapter as Meter summarizes what he has learned. "As I understand it, the main thrust of Six Sigma is to reduce errors and waste in every kind of business endeavor to please customers and fatten the bottom line....You do that not simply by cranking up quality control, but by taking a step back, defining where the underlying problems are -- within the business, processes, or operation -- and eliminating them....The key to doing all that, of course, is measuring where you are and where you want to go, analyzing the data, improving the situation, and controlling the activity after you fix it to make sure you don't slip." Obviously, this excerpt has been taken out of context but I want to include it to suggest the clarity and brevity of Chowdhury's writing style which is consistent throughout the narrative. Also, I share Meter's comments to suggest that the fundamental principles of Six Sigma were not invented at Motorola, Allied Signal, or GE. They have been with us since cave dwellers began to exchange large rocks for sharp sticks. But we can credit executives at the aforementioned companies for creating a nomenclature for the principles, and, for demonstrating how effective they can be if applied with appropriate passion, precision, and patience. Chowdhury's little book creates wide access to those principles. Those who require depth of analysis must seek it elsewhere.
Rating: 
Summary: THINGS TO CONSIDER BEFORE MASS DISTRIBUTION
Review: I am an officer in a small corporationand read this book for possibly distributing across the company. So it was important to find a book that stays at the '30,000 foot level' and remains generic enough to apply to any company. The discussions abot REWARD and CAREER PROGRESSION and use of CONSULTANTS were too specific to the point of quoting dollar figures on rewards, and this did not reflect the aproach we have chosen given our culture and finances. The Black belts are said to be rewarded by 2-3% of a projects savings which is estimated to be 10k per project. In our opinion such decisions should be left to each company. It is stated " matter of factly " that the best green belts will become black belts and best black belts will become master black belts and the best master black belts will be executives. What about companies with a flat structure?. In addition it is stated that master black belts are hired consultants that come in and lead the black belts. All that is presented as standard procedures and that is not the way we see it best for our business. Also we will have many more green belts than black belts or Master black belts. Oddly there is a jeering directed at GB's which is not directed at BB's or MBB's not that there should be any at all. The Gb's are referred to as worker bees and that they can work themselves up to BB's. It is important to promote team work in the company. I do not want to create a Caste system instead. This definitely WILL NOT work for distributing across our company. I am glad I read it carefully before we created a huge problem.
Rating:
Summary: The Power of Six Sigma
Review: I didnt know anything about Six Sigma until I read this book. I really liked how he put it in story format, it made it easier to follow. This book really explains every thing, I love it and I think it would be great for people who dont know Six Sigma.
Rating:
Summary: Did I read the same book?
Review: I have a different perspective than most of the reviewers... my company is not implementing Six Sigma - I just wanted to learn more about it. It's about 120 pages, consisting of about 5 pages of good information (you can read the last 5 pages to get this) & 115 pages of the cheesiest, forced dialog. I really felt like someone was trying to sell me a used car. Worth a quick read because you got it free at your company - definitely. But, I definitely wouldn't recommend this as a purchase.
Rating:
Summary: The Power of Six Sigma
Review: I just completed this book, it's a great book to learn just "What is Six Sigma" on an elementary level. I learned alot from it, the underlying factor is "if" Top Management buys into the process and keeps the process on the front burner. I will work, but it's a long process, not one you can do in 2 weeks.
My company has just started the Six Sigma process and I don't feel that it's gotten down to Middle Mgmt. as of yet, but I strongly recommend this book to learn the Six Sigma way.
Rating:
Summary: This book taught me what I needed to know and more
Review: I just finished reading "The Power of Six Sigma" and enjoyed it more than I had expected. My company is starting to implement Six Sigma and I wanted to get a jump on my other fellow employees. I read it over the course of a week during my lunch break, and because it is not overly technical enjoyed doing so. I always hated textbooks back in school because it seemed they were written by experts for experts and not for real people. I'm not a mechanical engineer and I'm no statistics expert but I have used statistics software before in school and now have a working knowledge of the concepts of Six Sigma. In addition to learning the basics such as what greenbelts, blackbelts, and executive champions are, I now understand terms such as DPMO, Critical to Quality, DMAIC, Standard Deviation, and the importance of assigning numbers to measurements. The explanation of the DMAIC process was also helpful, and although we don't make pizza or burgers we can apply the main concepts and adapt them to our business and develop our own strategy for how Six Sigma will work for us. We have recently chosen our first project and because I had read the book I could explain the main concepts to my line workers. Once they knew what we were doing they opened up to us and we quickly found the cause of the problem. Our shop guys always seem to get nervous whenever someone from the office comes out to the plant to examine a defect. But if they all knew about Six Sigma and understood that we were not out their to challenge their job, but instead to improve quality, things would go a lot smoother and quality would be better. I am now a big fan of the book!
Rating:
Summary: This book taught me what I needed to know and more
Review: I just finished reading "The Power of Six Sigma" and enjoyed it more than I had expected. My company is starting to implement Six Sigma and I wanted to get a jump on my other fellow employees. I read it over the course of a week during my lunch break, and because it is not overly technical enjoyed doing so. I always hated textbooks back in school because it seemed they were written by experts for experts and not for real people. I'm not a mechanical engineer and I'm no statistics expert but I have used statistics software before in school and now have a working knowledge of the concepts of Six Sigma. In addition to learning the basics such as what greenbelts, blackbelts, and executive champions are, I now understand terms such as DPMO, Critical to Quality, DMAIC, Standard Deviation, and the importance of assigning numbers to measurements. The explanation of the DMAIC process was also helpful, and although we don't make pizza or burgers we can apply the main concepts and adapt them to our business and develop our own strategy for how Six Sigma will work for us. We have recently chosen our first project and because I had read the book I could explain the main concepts to my line workers. Once they knew what we were doing they opened up to us and we quickly found the cause of the problem. Our shop guys always seem to get nervous whenever someone from the office comes out to the plant to examine a defect. But if they all knew about Six Sigma and understood that we were not out their to challenge their job, but instead to improve quality, things would go a lot smoother and quality would be better. I am now a big fan of the book!
Rating:
Summary: a novel
Review: I purchased the book The Power of Six Sigma about a week ago. This book is written like a bad novel. It is a poor excuse for a technical publication. If you can't understand anything at all technical, this is your book. It takes about an hour to read.
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