Financial
evidence suggests that Six Sigma does help firms to achieve significant improvements in
performance. For example, some analysts attribute the very survival, and nowadays
existence, of Motorola to the adoption of this approach as part of its organisational
culture as it helped it to produce $16 billion dollars in savings during the period
1986-2001 (Eckes, 2001; Hendricks and Kelbaugh, 1998). Similarly, other large
organisations such as General Electric (GE), 3Mand Honeywell also reported significant
savings in their operations due to the use of Six Sigma (Arndt, 2004; GE Annual Report,
2002; 3M Annual Report, 2003; Honeywell Annual Report, 2002). According to
Garza-Reyes et al. (2010), one of the Six Sigma’s distinctive and essential approaches to
process and quality improvement is define, measure, analyse, improve, control
(DMAIC).