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The purpose of this paper is to review the historical development of Lean Six Sigma and to identify the relevant opportunities for the application of Lean Six Sigma within the university setting. The paper also discusses the challenges of Lean Six Sigma implementation in higher education, as well as the cultural changes necessary to provide an appropriate climate for its long-term success.

The paper contains a comprehensive discussion of the development of Lean Six Sigma over the past three decades. Additionally, the paper describes how Lean Six Sigma may be applied in the university setting to improve processes in curriculum delivery; business and auxiliary services; admissions and enrollment management; and research.

Lean Six Sigma can be applied to facilitate process improvements in curriculum delivery; business and auxiliary services; admissions and enrollment management; and research. While obstacles to Lean Six Sigma implementation exist, the process improvements and resulting cultural changes are worthwhile and noteworthy.

The paper serves as a guide for how Lean Six Sigma processes can be utilized in the higher education setting. Other researchers and practitioners may use the paper as a practical orientation to Lean Six Sigma in the university setting.

Due to the unique culture of higher education, the application of Lean Six Sigma to university processes has been sparse. The paper provides a needed orientation as to how Lean Six Sigma may be applied to improve some of the more important functional aspects of the university.

One of the major obstacles contributing to the cost, time and efficiency of improving the quality output of manufacturing systems is the propagation of defectives or errors through the system. Conventional individual control chart design does not address the problem of the interrelation of the processes adequately. Owing to the increasing complexity of manufacturing systems as well as the problems caused by the natural variability of the systems, trial‐and‐error methods are the most commonly used technique for the implementation of the control charts. Trial‐and‐error methods are very costly, time consuming and highly disruptive to the real system. Hence, a systematic and holistic computer‐based methodology is proposed in this paper to obtain a control chart configuration which improves productivity and quality, and reduces cost. Simulation is used as a platform to conduct the control chart system design because different scenarios can be tested off‐line so that statistical process control can be performed effectively without making costly mistakes and disturbing the real system.

Discusses the development and evaluation of a forecasting model for inventory management in an advanced technology batch production environment. Traditional forecasting and inventory management do not adequately address issues relating to a short life cycle and to non‐seasonal products with a relatively long lead time. Limited historical data (fewer than 100 observations) is also a problem in predicting short‐term dynamic or unstable time series. A Bayesian dynamic linear time series model is proposed as an alternative technique for forecasting demand in a dynamically changing environment. Provides details of the important characteristics and development process of the forecasting model. A case study is then presented to illustrate the application of the model based on data from a multinational company in Singapore. It also compares the Bayesian dynamic linear time series model with a classical forecasting model (auto‐regressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model).

The purpose of this paper is to explore the western developed notion of responsible leadership (RL) from a Singapore context.

Following the qualitative research tradition, face-to-face interviews with 20 influential Singaporean leaders were developed into case studies. Grounded theory methodology was applied to identify similarities and differences within and across cases.

The findings reveal that the interviewed Singaporean leaders projected traits and values consistent with western definitions of responsible and effective leadership. Findings also suggest that contextual factors such as national culture and the ethos of the nation as well as leaders’ relational intelligence influence RL. These factors also help responsible leaders to better manage the tension between responsible and effective leadership.

The small and geographically bound sample size makes it difficult to generalise the findings of this study. As in other ethics studies, interviewees’ desire to present a socially desirable image of themselves could be high in this study. Finally, the methods and analytical techniques applied may be biased and be influenced by the purposive selection of the participants.

Singaporean business leaders may need to consider the importance of retaining and developing the national culture and ethos of the nation, since these are the factors that have been identified in this study as key to influencing RL.

This study identifies the factors that influence RL from a Singapore context. It extends the understanding of the mostly western-based multi-level theory of RL.

The purpose of this study is to research the influence of wire’s surface topography on interwire contact performance of simple spiral strand.

The mechanical model of the simple spiral strand imposed by a tensile load is first established, into which the surface topography, Poisson’s ratio effect and radial deformation are incorporated simultaneously. Meanwhile, the Gaussian and non-Gaussian rough surfaces of the steel wires are obtained with the fast Fourier transform (FFT) and digital filter technology. Then, the rough interwire contact performance of the simple spiral strand is calculated by using conjugate gradient method and FFT.

As compared with smooth wire surface, both the longitudinal orientation for the Gaussian wire surface and large kurtosis or small skewness for the non-Gaussian surface yield a small contact pressure and stress.

This study conducts detailed discussion of the influence of wire’s surface topography on the interwire contact performance for the simple spiral strand and gives a beneficial reference for the design and application of a wire rope.

The aim of this paper is to present a synthetic chart based on the non‐central chi‐square statistic that is operationally simpler and more effective than the joint X¯ and R chart in detecting assignable cause(s). This chart will assist in identifying which (mean or variance) changed due to the occurrence of the assignable causes.

The approach used is based on the non‐central chi‐square statistic and the steady‐state average run length (ARL) of the developed chart is evaluated using a Markov chain model.

The proposed chart always detects process disturbances faster than the joint X¯ and R charts. The developed chart can monitor the process instead of looking at two charts separately.

The most important advantage of using the proposed chart is that practitioners can monitor the process by looking at only one chart instead of looking at two charts separately.

Lean Six Sigma (LSS) has been one of the most widely used quality improvement initiatives over the last decade. However, the success rate of LSS is dismally poor, and most organizations discontinue LSS initiatives prematurely. The purpose of this paper is to answer the question why do organizations discontinue LSS initiatives?

To understand the discontinuance mechanism of LSS initiatives, the authors selected two companies. One from the manufacturing and one from service sector in India. The companies were selected as they had initially implemented LSS, and later within six years had discontinued the initiatives. Four projects from each company were studied using case study methodology.

This study finds 11 factors due to which the organizations discontinue LSS initiatives. The factors are poor success rate, unrealistic expectations from LSS, unsustainable results, misuse of statistics, large tool set, unsupportive and uncommitted top management, lack of training and development, lack of synergy of LSS and business strategy, lack of link between LSS and customer needs, wrong projects selection and premature discontinuation of LSS experts. The study further discusses the discontinuance mechanisms of LSS using propositions.

LSS is one of the most widely used initiatives in the organizations. Such initiatives involve costs. Earlier studies have reported that many organizations discontinue the LSS initiatives resulting in a loss or not meeting the intended goals. This paper will help the practitioners as well as organizations to understand why organizations discontinue LSS and take prompt actions for its success.

Earlier studies on LSS address the critical success factors, and this paper addresses those about failures by studying organizations that have discontinued LSS. The present study finds 11 factors that are responsible for discontinuing LSS in organizations. In addition, propositions are developed for future research and empirical testing. This study also offers further insights into the discontinuance mechanisms involved in LSS.

Describes the development of an adaptive simulation model for a keyboard assembly cell for real‐time decision support. Discusses the architecture of the modelling and control system, including the movement of entities and conveyors, describing how up to four different keyboard types may be modelled, with a PC cell controller continually monitoring the state changes of the assembly line, passing the data captured to the simulation model created in ARENA.

Control charts and process capability calculations remain fundamental techniques for statistical process control. However, it has long been realized that the accuracy of these calculations can be significantly affected when sampling from a non‐Gaussian population. Many quality practitioners are conscious of these problems but are not aware of the effects such problems might have on the integrity of their results. Considers non‐normality with respect to the use of traditional control charts and process capability calculations, so that users may be aware of the errors that are involved when sampling from a non‐Gaussian population. Use is made of the Johnson system of distributions as a simulation technique to investigate the effects of non‐normality of control charts and process control calculations. An alternative technique is suggested for process capability calculations which alleviates the problems of non‐normality while retaining computational efficiency.

The purpose of the study reported in the paper is to apply a structured problem-solving approach based on the Lean approach to analyse weld defects and derive appropriate solutions.

Manufacturing organisations involved in welding fabrication are expected to reduce weld defects to attain competitive advantage. Weld defects need to be systematically analysed for valve performance enhancement. In this research study, Lean approach is used to reduce variations and waste by annihilating the root causes for failures that occur during submerged arc welding (SAW) process.

The deployment of solutions facilitated weld defect reduction and substantial financial savings for the organisation.

The framework has been test-implemented for analysing variations and wastes generated in the SAW process. In future, studies could be conducted for assessing different welding processes.

The proposed Lean framework has been successfully implemented in a large-scale manufacturing unit involved in fabrication work.

Lean framework has been test-implemented in a large-scale manufacturing organisation involved in weld fabrication work.