Black Belts are the key change agents for the Six Sigma process. They have an important role and should be compensated accordingly. If your organization is large enough to have people dedicated full-time to leading Six Sigma projects, their base pay should be in the top of your organization’s range for their level of management. If your organization is asking a manager to also devote part of his or her time to leading a Six Sigma project, you need to find some way to compensate them for their extra efforts. In addition to base pay, you can find creative ways for recognition for completed projects. Black Belts should receive some special and public recognition for their efforts, whether it is dinners, award ceremonies, plaques, etc. Whatever fits best with your organizational culture. Such recognitions should not be strictly limited to Black Belts either, as acknowledging the achievements of all who participated in and benefit from the Six Sigma project should receive some sort of recognition to boost morale.

Monetary bonuses are another way to compensate people for successful Six Sigma projects. Since Six Sigma projects are about helping the organization make more money it makes sense to share some of the cost savings from Six Sigma projects with the Six Sigma team. Develop a structured, team-based process improvement bonus system that will appropriately benefit each worker in the organization. As measurable and lasting improvements are made to processes, it is appropriate to share a part of the financial gains with employees. Just be sure there is a formal performance appraisal system that will identify what is to be accomplished, what success looks and feels like, and how an employee will be compensated, and that this is fully communicated to everyone. Such an organizational goal-sharing program will effectively support Six Sigma efforts. Being able to link compensation to Six Sigma implementation is much easier in a small company compared to a larger company.

Bonuses can also be paid to Black Belts, but with differences due to their unique status. Instead of paying bonuses to Black Belts as a share of actual process improvement, pay them bonuses related to specific project goals. There is a danger in directly tying their bonus with a share of the actual improvements as they may be motivated to inflate or misconstrue actual gains. That still leaves you with many concrete project milestones that can be the basis for their compensation.

Six Sigma is oriented toward the solution of problems at their root cause and the prevention of their recurrence, as opposed to attempting to control potential causes of failure on a project-by-project basis. Six Sigma inspired process redesign will change the way a company thinks about how they do their work and deliver their services. So many companies are focused on short-term financial goals. The “show me the money” attitudes of shareholders and the stock market shift focus away from the customer. Six Sigma, on the other hand, is clearly focused on the customer. It accomplishes this because it centers its attention on the end results and long-term cultural change.

Six Sigma is not just about number crunching and finances. All of the numbers are just data used to reach the real goal of Six Sigma: helping increase quality and service for the customer. Companies need to figure out what their customers want and need. One thing any customer of any business in any industry wants is a better experience. Quality and efficiency don’t only help the financial bottom line, they help the customer experience.

Companies need to remember that their first and final allegiance should be to the customer. By embracing Six Sigma, a company can achieve greater quality and efficiency in the flow of information and interaction between people, especially interactions with customers. Transforming the process of these flows will yield quality results for the customer experience.

Six Sigma is just another fad. There have been so many quality improvement fads over the years. It is not surprising that people are now a little jaded. The weakness of many of these fads is that they have the superficial appearance that something profound is happening, yet the substance is not there. A whole bunch of numbers and graphs on spreadsheets are not enough to bring about substantial and lasting quality improvement in an organization. The fads sell themselves as cheap and easy quick fixes. The reality is that there are no quick fixes to significant process improvement. Six Sigma understands that.

Success in managing Six Sigma teams begins with the top of the organization. Company leadership must give the teams the resources and the authority to apply Six Sigma concepts to their daily activities. They must also ensure that organizational goals are aligned with Six Sigma projects and that any roadblocks to Six Sigma deployment are removed.

The proper selection and training of Six Sigma team leaders is also critical as they have the most direct responsibility for managing the Six Sigma team. A Six Sigma Black Belt is the team leader and the key change agent for the Six Sigma process. The role of the Black Belt is to facilitate the Six Sigma adoption as part of the culture. They lead, and manage Six Sigma teams to sustain significant bottom-line results. Black Belts ideally are people previously experienced in leading cross-functional process improvement action teams who have been trained in the Six Sigma methodology. The Six Sigma Black Belt should demonstrate team leadership, understand team dynamics, and assign team member roles and responsibilities.

Managing a Six Sigma team comes down to two important aspects: leading and mentoring. As the team leader, a Black Belt needs to be directly involved with the project team. This is a crucial element as it enables the business to cut through and implement improvements quickly and efficiently. Six Sigma includes tools and practices that replace reactive habits with a dynamic, responsive, proactive method of management. As the team leader, the Black Belt must be being willing to adapt to circumstances including the need to accept – and manage – occasional setbacks. This includes handling group conflict and “problem people” and minimizing out-of-control meetings and personal interactions.

The Black Belt must also be a mentor to everyone on the team and develop a mentoring process. They must ensure that proper guidance is given for the new candidates immediately after their training. This will ensure that the course corrections are made regularly and the projects get completed on time. Six Sigma creates an environment that supports true teamwork and the Black Belt can go a long way toward enabling a positive and productive team environment. During the project, the Black Belt should continually Structure the team and its actions to best utilize the disparity in knowledge and techniques of the team members and increase project member morale. Always, the Black Belt should look at every circumstance as an opportunity to help instruct and improve the individual team members and the organization as a whole.