2. Human Sigma
John H Fleming and Jim Asplund
A Branch of Six Sigma that focuses on improving the quality of
employee-customer encounter, particularly within sales and service
organizations.
Human Sigma is the process of improving and reducing
variability in the engagement levels of employees and
customers.
3. Human Sigma And Six Sigma
• Six sigma helps how to focus an organization on
improving itself but it was developed in a
manufacturing context only and the role of
people was relatively small.
• Human Sigma was developed as a response to
the lack of effectiveness of Six Sigma
methodology for increasing productivity from
people.
4. Human Sigma Rules
The Human Sigma combines a proven method for assessing the
health of the employee-customer encounter with a disciplined
process for improving it.
It is based on five rules to bring excellence to the way employees
engage and interact with customers.
5. RULE #1: E Pluribus Unum
Employee and customer experiences must be managed together -- not as separate entities.
RULE #2: Feelings Are Facts.
Emotions drive and shape the employee-customer encounter.
RULE #3: Think Globally, Measure and Act Locally.
The employee-customer encounter must be measured and managed at the local level.
RULE #4: There Is One Number You Need to Know.
Employee and customer engagement interact to drive enhanced financial performance. And this
interaction can be quantified and summarized with a single performance metric.
RULE #5: If You Pray for Potatoes, You Better Grab a Hoe.
This means that good intentions alone do not constitute a plan of action. Sustainable
improvement in the employee-customer encounter requires disciplined local action coupled
with a company wide commitment to changing how employees are recruited, positioned in
roles, rewarded and recognized, and importantly, how they are managed.
Human Sigma Five Rules
6. Human Sigma Approach
• The most volatile and valuable assets are your customers and
employees ±the people
• Human sigma approach helps in Measuring, Managing and
Improving the performance of these valuable assets
• Paradoxically, this does not rely on reducing the variability in
how employees are managed or how they serve the
customers but likely to increase the variability
• Human sigma approach starts by accepting human nature and
then uses it to manage employees, motivate them, accelerate
their development, and customer’s emotions
• Contrary to popular wisdom, emotional traits are quite
predictable
7. Measuring Human Sigma
Asking the people involved in an interaction
how it made them feel.
That is based on simple question like,
what to ask them, how to ask them, and why
asking them.
8. Questions to measure Employee Engagement
Scoring: 1=not at all in agreement, 5=extremely in agreement
1. Do I know what is expected of me at work?
2. Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right?
3. At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?
4. In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for doing good
work?
5. Does my supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about me as a
person?
6. Is there someone at work who encourages my development?
7. At work, do my opinions seem to count?
8. Does the mission/purpose of my company make me feel my job is
important?
9. Are my co-workers committed to doing quality work?
10. Do I have a best friend at work?
11. In the last six months, has someone at work talked to me about my
progress?
12. This last year, have I had opportunities at work to learn and grow?
9. Questions to measure Customer Engagement
1. Overall, how satisfied are you with [Brand]?
2. How likely are you to continue to choose/repurchase/repeat (if needed)
[Brand]?
3. How likely are you to recommend [Brand] to a friend/associate?
Customers are given the next eight statements and asked to rate them
from “strongly agree” (5) to “strongly disagree” (1).
4. [Brand] is a name I can always trust.
5. [Brand] always delivers on what they promise.
6. [Brand] always treats me fairly.
7. If a problem arises, I can always count on [Brand] to reach a fair and
satisfactory resolution.
8. I feel proud to be a [Brand] [customer/shopper/user/owner].
9. [Brand] always treats me with respect.
10. [Brand] is the perfect [company/product/brand/store] for people like
me.
11. I can’t imagine a world without [Brand].
Scoring: 1=not at all in agreement, 5=extremely in agreement
10. Formula
The Sigma Score summaries the overall effectiveness of the
employee-customer encounter that is reliably related to that
organization’s.
