The "Big 3" whole-company improvement technologies -- Lean Thinking, Six
Sigma, Theory of Constraints -- are individually so powerful that advocates can
easily become defensive; "my technology is better than yours."
A sign of maturity in the movements is the recognition that each brings things
to the table that the others do not; and the combination is more powerful than
the independence. For example, managers trained in TOC know that the Theory of
Constraints is the ultimate "mixer" -- it pulls other technologies in to an
implementation, in a focused manner and with a high degree of leverage that
helps each to achieve better results than they could have individually. Everyone
wins.
... mean that a big bureaucracy is needed. For example, Dow Chemicals had 2001 sales of $27.8 billion; they have more than 50,000 employees distributed over more than 40 countries. Six ...