Six Sigma, Quality Control, and Proving Product Defect
Posted by John Sedgewick - 15/04/10 at 08:04 amSix Sigma is the most powerful quality control tool ever employed in industry. Developed at Motorola in 1986, this rigorous approach to quality engineering led to rapid improvement in the company’s products. It is believed to have been a major factor in Motorola’s being awarded the inaugural Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award. Because of the close connection between quality control, efficiency and profits, and because Motorola was willing to share the secrets of its success, by 1990 Six Sigma had been widely adopted among the world’s most successful companies. According to legend, Six Sigma saved General Electric more than $5 billion in the first five years of its implementation.
As Six Sigma has become a powerful tool for industry, understanding it can be a powerful advantage for a plaintiff’s lawyer in a product liability case.
Six Sigma Basics
Six Sigma is based on the premise that manufacturing processes can be systematically improved to the point where defects are reduced to as few as 3.4 defects per million opportunities. It is distinguished from earlier quality engineering programs by the intensity of the planning, goal setting and discipline it requires from employees at every level of the companies which adopt it. Six Sigma demands an unwavering commitment to measurement, feedback, analysis and improvement. While expensive to implement, Six Sigma has consistently produced business results which prove that no modern manufacturer or seller can afford to be without it.
Six Sigma as a Tool for Plaintiff’s Lawyers
Six Sigma can be useful to plaintiffs’ lawyers in product liability cases in a number of ways.
First, understanding Six Sigma can help in controlling discovery costs. Six Sigma companies engage in a vigorous regime of defining problems, measuring critical elements of the production process, analyzing results and changing features that produce bad parts. Using discovery requests to obtain the right data, and knowing how to read and use it, is much cheaper than wading through days of depositions trying to gather background facts on the product in question.
Second, one of the fundamental challenges in many products cases is to fully understand what the product, or a failed component, was designed to do. Because Six Sigma is based on measuring products against a specific and detailed standard, documentation available through a Six Sigma program should lead counsel to the product specifications, the sole purpose of which is to articulate the defendant’s design expectations. If the product did not meet the specifications, the plaintiff may be able to prove the defect by comparison of the product to the defendant’s own standards.
Third, although Six Sigma is most often used to eliminate the production of defective parts in manufacturing operations, its principles can be used to improve the design process, as well. A thorough understanding of those principles will help a plaintiff’s lawyer analyze and critique a defendant’s design efforts.
Finally, if the defendant has not adopted Six Sigma as a quality control system, it is likely that it either has no systematic quality control at all, or that its system is poorly run and ineffective. These facts can support arguments on both unreasonable conduct on the part of the defendant and product defect theories: bad products got into the marketplace because the defendant did not care enough to watch what it was selling. It is very difficult for any company to justify having an ineffective quality control system in today’s business environment.
Conclusion
Six Sigma brings discipline and systematic improvement to smart companies. Smart lawyers will understand Six Sigma concepts and use them to win the best possible results for clients injured by defective products.
