A North Carolina company announced they expect to save as much as $1.2 million through the Green Belt training of just seven employees.
Renfro Corporation decided that in 2019, it would send seven employees for a Six Sigma Green Belt training at a local community college. The company identifies itself as the “sock and legwear experts in our industry.”
The results of the training have been impressive. “The identified savings are substantial, and the learnings that were garnered through the training will continue to provide value to Renfro,” said Stan Jewell, the president and CEO of Renfro Corporation.
Who Received Training
In getting the training for its employees, Renfro decided to send people from key areas in the operation. They included:
• A supply chain analyst
• An industrial engineer
• A research and development project manager
• The vice president of distribution
• A compliance and logistics analyst
• The director of engineering
• The director of international accounting
The seven employees attended eight weeks of classes to earn a Green Belt certificate. As part of the Green Belt training, students completed projects that addressed waste or found inefficiencies at Renfro. It is from these projects that the company expects as much as $1.2 million to be saved.
A Big Commitment
Renfro’s commitment to sending seven people at once through Green Belt training is significant. It’s also helped them remain competitive. In addition to developing its own brands, the company is the licensee for a host of popular brands that includes Fruit of the Loom, Dr. Scholl’s, Polo/Ralph Lauren, Chaps, New Balance, Vera Bradley and Merrell.
Other organizations have made similar commitments to process improvement training. For example, the U.S. military and the Department of Defense, including the Air Force and the Defense Logistics Agency, have supported Six Sigma belt training with great success.
Green Belts are considered some of the most important people for implementing Six Sigma or Lean methodology. With their training and the role they play in implementing process improvement, Green Belts bridge the gap between learning Six Sigma theory and applying it.
On many project teams, Green Belts work at the direction of a Black Belt, helping to collect data and organize the project team’s schedule. They also become familiar with using the tools of Lean and Six Sigma, including The Five Whys, Affinity Diagrams, Fishbone Diagrams and Process Maps. What’s more, even after a project is done, Green Belts take the knowledge they have learned and start to apply a more quantitative, data-driven approach to their job every day.
