Dow Chemical: Good Chemistry

Dow Chemical Pairs Six Sigma and Innovation

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When innovation is the lifeblood of your company, you can't rely solely on the fickleness of inspiration. So Dow formally adopted Six Sigma.

At first, the focus was on the basic DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) methodology for fixing problems and improving consistency.

But it soon became clear that the DMAIC set of tools was not enough to solve all the challenges Dow faced.

So the company added DFSS methods where innovation was needed.

To strengthen invention ability even more, TRIZ (pronounced "trees") was woven in. TRIZ is the Russian acronym for the "Theory of Inventive Problem Solving."

[caption id="attachment_17021" align="alignleft" width="1250"] Sample image from Dow Chemical case study[/caption]