Improvement Insights Blog

Most Lean Six Sigma trainers do not include quality improvement software in their pricing, because it would make it hard to compete with other trainers. Purchasing is buying on price, not total value. Without tools like QI Macros, the training is wasted. Here’s why:

“Hi, I’m Jay Arthur, author of “Lean Six Sigma Demystified” and QI Macros [software].

“Last week I was out at the American Society for Quality conference in Philadelphia. We had a number of trainers and consultants who stopped by, and they were asking us about QI Macros because Minitab changed their pricing to be an annual subscription of like $1800 bucks, but you can buy QI Macros for $350 and you don’t have to keep renewing it every year.

“Oddly enough, what they said to me [was] “Well, I can’t include the software in the price of the course. I’m being price shopped against everybody else who’s doing training so I can’t do that.” I thought, “Well, isn’t that strange? Don’t the people who are hiring you want their people to be effective? Don’t they need software to be effective?” Duh! Yes they do.

“I think very often the trainers forget that they should sell a total solution, even if they [have their clients] buy the software from us and do the training from them, because that’s the whole package. If you don’t have the software that you’re training people in, those people are not going to go back and hack their way through the purchasing department, I.T. and everything else. It’s too hard. They don’t do it.

“I think that this is a form of malpractice to train somebody but not give them tools. It’s like teaching somebody auto mechanics but then you don’t give them [the tool] to tighten spark plugs, right? You don’t give them any tools. [It’s like saying] “Oh you know how, now go out and buy your own tools.” That’s not the way it should go, all right?

“So that’s my Improvement Insight for this week: Don’t spend money on training if you’re not going to spend a little more money and get software to make it better.”