5 Career Paths to Choose After Lean Six Sigma Certification

Last Updated: 

November 5, 2024

Want to Close Bigger Deals?

Many big businesses are always keen on managing the quality of their products and services. This can be achieved by reducing the defects in the manufacturing products and also business processes. One of the best ways to achieve this is by deploying Six Sigma strategies and methodologies. Also includes tools and techniques needed to improve the business processes and products.

What is Six Sigma?

Six Sigma is a data-driven methodology recognized globally aiming to eliminate defects for improving business processes. This involves analysing and reducing errors or defects using appropriate statistical and analytical implementation.

Six Sigma uses the DMAIC roadmap to improve the quality of business production. DMAIC provides the methodology to eliminate any error from the root and solve real-life issues all the business. Also as the DMAIC suggests - Define, Measure, Analysis, Improve, and Control, it organises the working environment to match the business expectation.

Six Sigma Certification!

The credibility of the individual increases with the Six Sigma Certification. As six sigma certification usually demonstrates proficiency of experience by educating how to improve the process. 

The six certification helps professionals to take the required actions needed to identify the risks, errors, and defects and eliminate them in any business process. It enhances the individual's command over the quality assurance of the product.

There are mainly five types of Six Sigma certification - White Belt, Yellow Belt, Green Belt, Black Belt, and Master Black Belt.

  • White Belt - This is an entry-level Six sigma certification. The overview of the tools and techniques used in Six Sigma is awarded as part of this level.
  • Yellow Belt - This involves the demonstration of the projects practically and demonstrating the understanding of the implementation of six sigma by applying it appropriately.
  • Green Belt - Here principles of Six Sigma and implementing it on real-time projects are learned. The implementation is based on the guidance of the Black Belt.
  • Black Belt - Here, the planning and execution of the projects are made based on the Six Sigma principles.
  • Master Black Belt - You learn to manage how the Six sigma projects are implemented across the organisation. This enforces the expertise in the understanding of the principles of Six Sigma in the organisation.

Why is Six Sigma certification in demand in the market?

Six Sigma certification is increasing its popularity through its ability to enhance business to stand in the competitive market. Analytical skills and strategies are learned as part of the course curriculum. Through this Six Sigma certification, you can contribute to the reduction in defects and errors by increasing the revenue of the business. A competitive salary with good professional skills can fetch you the best organisation to enhance your career.

Anyhow, there are some skills needed to get into the Six Sigma career, this includes – an optimistic attitude, assume to complete the tasks in time while achieving the goal, the ability to analyse and solve any problems, the capacity to write the details crisp and clear with the good presentation, knowing the business process, become capable to manage company employees and budget, hard-working with result oriented details.

One of the other reasons is Six Sigma certification makes the professionals so popular as it applies to all industries and backgrounds of the industries. After the Six Sigma certification, an individual can choose to work either for a product-based or service-based company.

5 major career paths to choose after the Six sigma certification

After earning a Six Sigma certification, professionals can pursue various engineering career paths that focus on process improvement. Industrial Engineers optimize systems and manufacturing processes, while Mechanical Engineers enhance product designs and efficiency in fields like automotive or aerospace. Quality Engineers ensure high standards through continuous monitoring, and Software Engineers apply Six Sigma to improve development cycles and reliability. Lastly, Civil Engineers use Six Sigma to streamline construction processes and ensure project efficiency. These diverse roles, known as different kinds of engineers, leverage Six Sigma to drive operational excellence and reduce waste.

Most of the six sigma certification involves improvement of the processes by analysing the data and managing the projects. This leads an individual to choose the below career paths after the Six Sigma certification -

  • The Human Resource field offers an opportunity for the Green Belt certification. As Six Sigma certification helps you to analyse the data of the employees to recruit the correct employee. This improves employee benefits by reducing costs. Six Sigma certification initiates the operational responsibilities in an organisation by troubleshooting problems and continuously improving the process of the Six Sigma skill. They can work with any level of experienced professionals to achieve the common goal of the organisation's objective.
  • As quality engineers, Six Sigma-certified individuals ensure that the products meet the customer's expectations. They are professionals who can oversee operations and long-term improvement planning. Organisations look for these employees to overcome any of the issues and hold up the customer's needful requirements with negligible defects.
  • Industrial engineers with the Six Sigma certification evaluate the production rates, product flows, and quality control process to utilise efficient employees, equipment, and resources. Also, the mechanical engineer's role is to design and develop the products, tools, and devices. Along with that, the Six Sigma professionals assist mechanical engineers to develop a product, equipment, and test products.
  • Reliability engineers also consider Six Sigma to make the testing plans for the organisation and work closely with the internal teams. They can take the lead and prioritise projects of any size and complexity in a better manner. This way the project manager can make use of Six sigma for optimising resource and process management
  • Director of operational excellence involves the most important career path for the six sigma certified candidates to take up the project. This role also includes the responsibilities like procuring business intelligence, supervising the initiatives needed for implementation to ensure the quality operations and development of the operational objectives and many such.

As per the dynamic fast-paced working environment, professional certificates have a lot of importance.  Additionally, functional and technical details are applied in real-time scenarios.

Benefits of Six Sigma certified candidates for the Organization or Business

Good progress in production

The best practice of Six Sigma and its methodologies is expected to grow the production levels of the industry. As the multiple ways and strategies are the best part of the certification which also reduces the wastage in production.

Cost Reduction

There is a known fact that Six Sigma learning teaches ways to reduce cost and inversely reduce defects. They focus on delivering high-quality standard services to the organisation.

Gain customer attention and satisfaction

Organisations having employees holding relevant qualifications are expected to grab the attention of the customer. As the significant quality of Six Sigma certification, it provides good quality products which in turn provides the customers. Companies with quality employees are expected to be competitive and instil confidence in investors.

Reduced training cost

Six Sigma-certified candidates are expected to have a good learning experience. And it will be beneficial for the organisation to have such professionals, who can in turn train the freshers or less experienced candidates to grow their skills and knowledge.

This way the business can reduce its training cost and can increase the number of candidates with the Six Sigma certification knowledge.

Benefits of Six Sigma certification as an employee

In today's competitive work culture, it is always expected that the candidate with the certification is in high demand. And Six Sigma certification is considered to hold up your career with the increase in potential earnings.

Stand out in the interview

Recruiters receive many applications on a regular basis, and it becomes difficult for them to sort. Having the Six Sigma certification can help them to sort the candidates based on the certification. This is how the certification will provide global recognition and make you stand out in the competition.

Boost your real-time experience

Learning is useful only when you apply its knowledge. As part of the Six Sigma certification, you will get an opportunity to deal with some of the real-time projects with the best support from your mentors. This way you will expertise in the project and learn to manage the team requirements.

Increase in the job opportunities

Having Six Sigma certification in your resume shows your talent and skills by default. This will add to your quality and process management skills to deal with the projects and the team.

Reduction in the organisational expenses

Many organisations can not manage their expenses and track them appropriately. Tracking of the expenses is not dealt with properly. This is how Six Sigma comes into the picture. They teach to reduce the cost and eliminate wastage of the organisation by using multiple techniques and methods. Streamlining operations, improving communication skills, and eliminating errors can serve the best to reduce organisational expenses.

Increase in the organisational efficiency

One of the best sort after-benefits of Six Sigma for the organisation is it increases overall efficiency. When all the team members work together to achieve the same goal of the organisation the process and progress will enhance in itself.

When Six Sigma-certified candidates work towards increasing productivity by providing effective learning with efficient skills. With this increased productivity, products are expected to deliver to the customer on time and with fewer defects.

This will increase the efficiency of the organisation and customer satisfaction.

Capable to build an effective team

The most important learning of the business is the skills needed to work together towards achieving a common goal. This however needs more effort and proper managerial skills.

For the team to get success is dependent on the data and statistical analysis of the project. This also ensures that decisions are made based on the evidence and professional details of the projects.

The team running under Six Sigma-certified candidates is expected to be more efficient and effective towards project deliveries. You will equip the fundamental skills needed to build and grow the team along with managing them with high-quality production.

Incline towards Influencer and leader

Leading any team or project is a critical task, as you need to manage the changes, quality improvements, and efficient production with effective results. This not only relates to the tools and methods but also deals with managing the project.

With the Six Sigma certification, you will learn to manage the team smoothly and effectively. This will influence your team and their attitude towards the goal achievement.

Additionally, certification gives access to the analytical skills which manage the change and evaluate the team's responsibility toward building the project. And as you apply these, you can improve your leadership quality and influence your team to achieve increased productivity and morality.

Handle Managerial roles

Moving with the Six Sigma certification, you will learn about technical and managerial topics. This will improve your management skills hence improving your managerial role with the management change. You will gain the techniques and methods to apply for the analytical thinking of the business requirements.

Good Salary

It is expected that Six Sigma certification will grasp a good salary opportunity. And also along with the salary you can expect the perks and benefits of this position. You will be capable of bargaining and bring the negotiable salary you need. At Least 10% more salary is expected when compared with the non-certified candidates.

Improved work environment and work-culture

Six Sigma-certified managers are expected to create a happier, healthier, and more productive workplace for their employees. The skills learned in the Six Sigma training will help you to grasp the tools and techniques needed to manage your team effectively and efficiently. Through the training, you will learn to have a firm grasp on the requirement changes and quality management skills to improve the efficiency of the team members. This is possible by identifying and eliminating the roadblocks toward productivity.

By providing continuous improvement in work culture, managers can encourage their employees to work together towards achieving the common goal.

Streamlining the process and system

By growing the business, it becomes more complex to maintain the process, and improvement of the system becomes more apparent. Using Six Sigma technology you can streamline the process and systems to make them more effective and efficient. This way you will learn about the tools and techniques needed for the implementation to improve the business.

Six Sigma certification will give you the necessary knowledge and effective skills to manage the system and improve the process throughout the business. You also learn to identify the opportunities to improve and implement the plans to develop and track the progress to achieve the goal.

Global Recognition

One of the most important benefits of the Six Sigma certification is, it is recognized globally and provides confidence by improving skills.  All over the Six Sigma certification is globally recognized which can fetch you the best job across the industry.

Develop critical thinking by using more Analytical and innovative

Six Sigma certification develops the critical thinking capacity by learning various tools and methodologies needed to solve the problem. The tools and techniques learned during the Six Sigma certification can help you provide efficient solutions to problems, identify the root cause of the problems, and so on. This develops the critical thinking capacity which applies to real-time scenarios and business processes.

So, learning fundamentals of Six Sigma certification focuses on the approach to get clear identification of the root causes of the problems by focusing on the improvement of the results.

Conclusion

Individuals who earn Best Six Sigma Certification can demonstrate advanced learning and knowledge. A Six Sigma certification can assist in achieving the project's profitability and efficiency by learning how to improve stakeholder relationships. Also, Six sigma certification prepares you to hold new roles and responsibilities needed to deepen your knowledge to address the value-adding activity.

FAQs

Is Six Sigma certification valid all around the world?

Six Sigma certification is the most valuable certification which is recommended by large-scale industries. However, small-scale and mid-scale industries also require Six Sigma-certified candidates to comply with the organisation's requirements by reducing defects and enhancing product quality.

There are no boundaries for the Six Sigma certification.

Can we skip the belts while doing Six Sigma certification?

It is possible to jump to the Six Sigma Green Belt certification by skipping the Six Sigma Yellow Belt certification. But for the Six Sigma Black Belt certification, there are certain criteria like completion of one or two projects of the Six Sigma Green Belt certification. For the Master Black Belt Six Sigma certification, it is compulsory to complete the Six Sigma Black Belt certification.

How can I benefit from the Six Sigma certification course?

Six Sigma certification provides a high contribution to your CV. The Six Sigma certification will speak of its importance and your dedication towards building you to the best of your skills.

What is the duration for the completion of the Six Sigma certification?

There is no specific duration for the completion of the Six Sigma certification. As there is no specific curriculum followed. Every institute or academy has its way of specification towards the designing of the curriculum. 

What is the cost of the Six Sigma certification?

As Six Sigma training is not standardised and so its costs may vary as per the institutes and academies you select.

For example, if the company is providing training to its employees, then it is believed that the company will incur the costs of each employee.

Meanwhile, it is known that the cost of the certification belts will increase as we go from the primary level to the high-level belts.

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