Deciding to plunge headfirst into the world of Lean Six Sigma is one that takes some weighing up. Is it worth the while? Do I need this certification for my job? What is it going to give me? How is it going to help my business? Is it too expensive? Is there a good return on investment? Etc. Many questions will come up. However, to help you to determine whether or not seeking a Yellow Belt certification is a value add or not, understanding the benefits of it will really help.
Indeed, there are many benefits to pursuing this certification, and very few (if any) drawbacks. Let’s explore some of these benefits now.
The benefits of Six Sigma Yellow Belt certificate
1. Put quality at the heart of all you do
Lean Six Sigma is all about quality, and the Yellow Belt will show you clearly and logically what quality is, why it should be pursued and how. At the end of completing the course, you are ready to start deploying quality initiatives instantly.
2. Save your company money
This is where the return on investment really comes in. Lean Six Sigma projects enable you to make changes to your operations, structures and working practices which can lead to reductions in spending, whether that is through changing systems, contracts headcount reduction.
3. Save your company time
Given the focus of Lean Six Sigma on the process, you will grasp how to define, map and improve your processes, all within the Yellow Belt itself. Post completion of the certification, you will be able to reduce process steps, hand-offs rework loops, and bottlenecks – all of those things within your operations that are costing you more and more time. This is all time you can then reinvest back into the business (ultimately saving you more financial cost further down the line).
4. Upskill your colleagues
For those who receive Yellow Belt status, they then have the knowledge and the confidence to share the tools and techniques with others. Often, Yellow Belts will be seen as Change or Quality Champions within a business, and one of their new responsibilities will be to share their newfound knowledge with others, spreading the benefits across the business.
5. Improve customer journey & satisfaction
Lean Six Sigma puts the customer at the heart of its approach. This includes understanding your customer, their wants and needs, their current experience and the challenges plaguing this experience. At Yellow Belt level, you learn the best way to understand your customer and their needs, the best techniques to deploy to fix any issues plaguing the current customer journey and how to improve satisfaction rates not only immediately, but over the longer term.
6. Secure process capability and stability
Another key aspect of Six Sigma is to ensure your process is stable (operating as normal and as expected) and is capable (it can produce the outputs you want when you want). You will know how to set up the right charts to monitor this and the response you should deploy should any stability or capability issues arise. This is a really important feature for both leaders and customers alike.
7. Root cause analysis skills
Being able to identify when something has gone wrong, seek to understand why and decide on the right solution to fix the fault are all aspects of the Yellow Belt. You will leave the course with a raft of new tools and techniques (including Fishbone Diagram, 5 Whys, and Solution Selection Matrix) that will help you to achieve everything just mentioned. Not only will you know how to deploy these in a project, but you will also have the confidence to deploy them as part of your BAU activities.
8. Project management
You will also cover off the DMAIC project management framework used within the world of Lean Six Sigma. This is great if you have never done project management before, as it’ll effectively show you the key structure to follow in order to support or lead on a Lean Six Sigma project. Equally, if you are already a Project Manager, you will learn new skills and techniques about how to deploy project management within a business improvement setting. This helps you to infuse successful project delivery with successful business improvement.
9. Utilize your data better
Data is really important in the world of Lean Six Sigma. At the start, middle and end of any Lean Six Sigma projects, and when delivering Lean tools in silo, data is crucial. Within the Yellow Belt certification, you will understand how to generate new data, analyze it and present it. You will understand how to use it to make better, more informed decisions, how to use it to back up your project work and to measure the benefits of the approach you choose to take.
10. More employable
Employers today are crying out for people who can deliver all of the 9 benefits we just mentioned in some way within their organization. To be able to successfully map and improve processes. To be able to identify when something has gone wrong and deliver solutions to those errors instantly (coming with solutions not problems). To be able to save the company time, effort and money. All of these traits are super important to organizations and they are constantly scouring the market for such skills.
Conclusion
As you can see from the 10 benefits just listed, a Yellow Belt certification is highly desirable, highly effective and highly important. Those 10 benefits just scratch the surface of what a Yellow Belt certification can do for you as an individual, an employee, a Project Manager, a business owner. There is also a lot more the certification can do for your organization, no matter how big or small, or what industry it operates within.
The key point to remember here, however, is a certification will only take you so far. Employers want to see action. One of the best ways to learn, understand and develop Lean Six Sigma skills at the Yellow Belt level is to deploy projects, tools and techniques on a regular basis. Skills are like blades used to prepare food – they need to be sharpened regularly for them not to lose their purpose.
Read More: Help me choose a Six Sigma Belt/Level
