The companies mentioned thus far are certainly well known for their engineering and manufacturing excellence. What is not as well known is their view of the importance of Six Sigma in non-manufacturing or transactional areas. This is simply an excuse in order to avoid being held to the same accountability standards as manufacturing. The point to be made here is that any process can be represented as a set of inputs which, when used together, generates a corresponding set of outputs. Thus, a process is a process, regardless of the type of organization or function.
All processes have inputs and outputs.
All processes have customers and suppliers, and all processes exhibit variation. Since the purpose of Six Sigma is to gain breakthrough knowledge on how to improve processes to do things Better , Faster , and at Lower Cost , it applies to everyone. This has been and is being recognized by World Class CEO's such as Bob Galvin, Larry Bossidy, Dan Burnham, Nobuyuki Idei, and Jack Welch. These modifications are typically confined to the type and depth of statistical tools that need to be included in the training. Obviously, the slant on applications must also be directed toward the non-manufacturing processes.