Six Sigma, Italian Style

By Author: Lance Tavares
Total Articles: 4
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This article provides an introduction to the cultural dimension of change tolerance.

In 1993, John Kovach, who had been an HR manager at General Electric Power Generation Systems in upstate New York, was tapped to go to Italy to support the transition of a new acquisition, NuovoPignone*. This Italian company designed and manufactured small-to-medium power generation systems. In making this acquisition, GE knew that NuovoPignone was the “class act” in the small-to-medium power generation manufacturing sector. Everyone understoodthat NuovoPignoneprided themselves on extremely high quality standards.
In preparation for the assignment, John took time to study the Italian culture and focused on learning as much as he could about the inner workingsofNuovoPignone. Of course, no amount of preparation could fully ready him for the challenge he was about to encounter.

GE, under Jack Welch, had developed a very strong corporate culture. While each GE unit thought of itself as unique--with its own corporate cultures--there was a strong “GE Way,” and John’s role was to make NuovoPignone a GE company in every ...
... sense of the word. GE, at that time, was a highly disciplined organization that attacked new challenges with an across-the-board commitment. It was very much in the Jack Welch tradition where leadership would lay out a plan and the whole organization would buyinto it and enthusiastically pursuethe target.

John’s charter was not only to make NovoPignone fit GE, but to do it quicklyand thoroughly. One of John’s early challenges was to institute a Six Sigma quality management process. Jack Welch had decided earlier in the year that Six Sigma would be GE’s corporate-wide quality control management process and all of its divisions and employees were now being evaluated within the Six Sigma structure.

In the U.S., Six Sigma was accepted (sometimes grudgingly) without exception because Jack wanted it. There was not much discussion about whether or not it fit a business style; the discussion was always about how to implement the plan as fast as possible.

However, John encountered a very different decision-making environment at NuovoPignone. Decisions weren’t accepted merely because they were mandated—at least not if you wanted them to work. In this environment new ideas had to be discussed, sold and bought into. People affected by a decision needed to express themselves, to challenge and question the new approach, and to find a locally acceptable way before finally moving to institute a new process. This never happened in a rapid manner.

This attitude stood in stark contrast to the rest of GE, where decisions were accepted because “Jack said so” and people made their commitments quickly because thespeed of implementation was critical.John knew that he would have to find a culturally acceptable way to introduce Six Sigma to NuovoPignone if he ever wanted it to take hold. He was aware that it would take longer in Italy than it would in the U.S. He also knew that he had to keep his American management advised of the progress, and that their expectations would need to be managed accordingly. He would have to buy time for the plan to work in Italy.

Johnworked diligently with his Italian colleagues to help them understand why they needed to adopt Six Sigma, allowing them enough time to find an acceptable way to integrate the system withNuovoPignone culture. “Little by little we got the senior leadership onboard. We got some things translated into Italian and then we started with the key manufacturing and technical people, too,” explained John.

He also had to make sure that his American management knew he was making progress,all along explaining to them why movement was so slow. In order to establish credibility, he had to demonstrate some progress in order to buy the additional time. Simultaneously, he bouncedfrom meeting to meeting showing the slow progress he was making and explaining as best as he could how the local culture made decisions differently.

Like a good global manager should, John recognized that decisions in Italy, and an introduction of a new system in NuovoPignone couldn’t be made with the same speed as his management group in the U.S. was accustomed to. The trick for him was to keep the process moving forward at NP, as quickly as it could, while buying time with GE management. John explained that Italians generally embrace change a little more slowly than Americans.

By having preliminary discussions and getting buy-in throughout the organization, once decisions were made, he believed they would be implemented more quickly and with fewer errors or adjustments downstream.

"There is an element, particularly inItalian culture, where they spend the time with their decision-making process up front. They make what they believe to be good decisions and ones that the group can agree to. They shorten the cycle on implementation and rework because they don’t have to go back and fix things afterwards."

It took a long time.

John realized that the NuovoPignone culture and the Italian culture had a different level of change tolerance than in the U.S. In the Italian culture, systems change has to be discussed, tested, probed and examined. Unlike the U.S., where change is assumed to be an improvement, the Italians make no such assumption.

New systems are not agreed to until they are thoroughly understood. In Italy’s less change tolerant environment, changes can be made, but in order for them to work, they need to respect the local culture, as well as the needs oflocal management.

*Of note, two years after completing his assignment, John was delighted to see NuovoPignone getting the 6 Sigma award in Global GE.