Photos and story by Sgt. 1st Class Jason Shepherd
USARPAC Public Affairs

FORT SHAFTER- With more than 20,000 Soldiers from United States Army, Pacific deployed throughout the year, Soldiers and Civilians from USARPAC have been learning to do more with less. One of the ways the team has been able to accomplish such a task is with the help of Business Transformation, which uses Lean Six Sigma.

According to the Lean Six Sigma Deployment Guidebook, the purpose of the LSS is to achieve a full and lasting cultural transformation of the Army’s business practices in order to ensure the Army maintains its long-standing commitment to the American people.

 LSS combines the principles of Lean (reducing and eliminating non-value activities) with Six Sigma (reducing variation and increasing quality) to improve process efficiency and process effectiveness. The Army is also starting to become the model for other businesses on the effectiveness of LSS.

"Basically, LSS allows you to go inside parts and the entire business model and make adjustments for efficiency and effectiveness improvements," added Ron Rezek, Director, Continuous Process Improvement, Deputy Under Secretary of the Army for Business Transformation. "When we started this process two years ago, we went to other organizations and sought them as benchmark starting points. Now others come to us.".

Rezek traveled to Hawaii to congratulate eighteen individuals from around Hawaii who graduated from the Lean Six Sigma "Black Belt" training in a ceremony held at Shafter Flats May 9. Eight of the graduates were from USARPAC, four from Tripler Army Medical Center, three from Defense Installation Support Agency-Pacific, two from Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies and one from Installation Management Command-Pacific.

"This is a great day of celebration," Rezek said. "This is a very difficult class and we had 100 percent graduation rate. For everybody to pass is a big deal and you should be very proud of yourselves."

There are three different "belts" that a LSS practitioner can earn, according to the LSS deployment guidebook.

The first is a Green Belt. As the "tip of the spear," a Green Belt is responsible for applying LSS to improve products on a day-to-day basis.

A Black Belt serves as LSS project leaders. Project leadership includes identifying opportunities, defining and justifying projects, launching project teams, leading team activities, tracking project status and results, removing barriers and developing team members.

"Part of our job as LSS Black Belt graduates is to educate the rest of the Soldiers and Civilians on what LSS is and we can all work to use it to better our organization and the Army," said Jill Iwamuro, 8th Theater Sustainment Command Deputy G-8 and LSS deployment coordinator.

Finally, a Master Black Belt is responsible for driving the long range vision for LSS throughout the organization. He or she handles the long-term and complex projects for an organization.

Maj. Amy Brinson, executive officer at TAMC and one of three honor graduates of the class, said that the course offered individuals a chance to learn different types of business skills in one setting.

"What I like about this course is how it put all of change management in one package," she said. "It takes you through meeting management, statistical skills, creating ideas and putting those ideas into practice for the long term. You can take classes on each one of those aspects but the best thing about LSS is how it ties all together. This course especially offers practical examples that you can apply to your own projects."

So far, USARPAC has graduated 67 Green Belts, 22 Black Belts and 3 Master Black Belts.

"This is a big point of transition in the Army and Hawaii has always led the way," Rezek said. "No organization and no (group) of organizations is as well prepared to make significant contributions to the Army as USARPAC."