How does the Pareto Principle relate to Lean Six Sigma or other business process management methodologies?
Well, it started with Joseph Juran and quality control in the early 1950s. Juran used the 80-20 Principle to focus on the most frequent and serious causes of poor quality. “Fix them first,” he told his clients, who pretty soon were mainly Japanese. And they did. From being a shattered nation with negligible exports, they became a powerhouse in the 1980s and a pesky challenge to the United States in many landmark industries—notably cars and consumer electronics. Progress is all about using energy, where small dollops go a long way. The Pareto Principle always tells us where the bang for the buck is greatest. The 80-20 Principle, a scientific law proven in business and economics, claims the great majority of results come from a small minority of causes or effort. How does this fall within a Lean Six Sigma framework? I think of the 80-20 Principle not so much as a law but as an observation. It’s not always true—but the most interesting and profitable things do follow an 80-20 or 99-1 dist
