By Lauri Monetti, Associate Editor

On Oct. 23, the Lean Six Sigma program continued its efforts to make OKDHS more efficient in its processes and procedures by graduating twelve new Black Belts.  Last year the program graduated a Green Belt class of 49 employees from a variety of divisions.

The graduates started meeting early in June and identified problems they wanted to team up to work on. Their projects included contract delays, fraud overpayment investigations, data exchange discrepancies, employee system access, claims auditing, quality training, office performance capacity and hiring processes. Some of the issues were resolved by October while others continue to be a work in progress.

Through the training provided and over months of work, these new Black Belts now have the skills to handle problems on their own, build their own teams to solve issues and move across divisions to assist with solving problems in other areas. Black Belts use a process known as R-DMAIC, or recognize, define, measure, analyze, improve and control, when approaching a process that needs improvement.

Black Belt graduates of the program are: Sunni Bolt, DSD, Steve Byrom, OCSS, James Conway, FSSD, Karen Duncan, DSD, Daron Everhart, DSD, Fonda Logston, EPMO, Bryan Moore, Finance, Shannon Rios, OPRS, Michael Russ, EPMO, Aleta Seaman, DSD, Jim Struby, FSSD, and Jon Trushenski, DSD.

There are varying levels of expertise that can be attained through the Six Sigma training program. OKDHS offers training for Green and Black Belts as the budget allows. Looking to the future of the program, Karen Duncan, OKDHS DSD Business Quality director, said the focus is to expand the training program to an application process that will allow access for all employees. The new program will involve a White and Yellow Belt level that will train individuals on the methodology and concepts of Lean Six Sigma.

Lean Six Sigma is a national certification program that helps corporations and organizations utilize lean processes to solve problems. Although this program is most widely used in the manufacturing industry, this training has been customized to meet the needs of OKDHS.