An Application of Six Sigma with Lean Production Practices for Identifying Common Causes of Software Process Variability

Six Sigma emphasizes the variability causes search. The special causes are more evident, which favors their identification, while the common causes are more difficult to be identified and solved and, for that, they request a specialists´ participation. Many software development process variability causes are common and it is not always possible to have Six Sigma specialists to identify them. An alternative might be the visibility criteria proposed by Lean Production. Instead of this criterion, software engineers are able to more easily notice the mistakes and their causes than Six Sigma specialists. This article verifies the advantages of using Lean Production practices, based on a Multiple Case Study on some software organizations that uses this methodology. The study shows that the projects were finished more quickly and they presented more effective results.