Lean Six Sigma Black Belt Certification Advanced Lean and Enterprise 4 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Which lean metric measures the percentage of time a process produces defect-free products at the required rate during planned production?
- Rolled throughput yield
- Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) (Correct answer)
- Process capability index (Cpk)
- Takt time compliance
Correct answer: Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE)
OEE = Availability × Performance × Quality, representing the share of planned production time that is truly productive.
Question 2: In enterprise lean deployment, 'catchball' is a communication practice used during:
- Root cause analysis of defects on the shop floor
- Hoshin kanri goal-setting and alignment between levels (Correct answer)
- 5S audit scoring between departments
- Kaizen event post-event reporting
Correct answer: Hoshin kanri goal-setting and alignment between levels
Catchball is the iterative back-and-forth dialogue between organizational levels during hoshin kanri to ensure goals are feasible, understood, and owned.
Question 3: Which of the following best describes 'value-added' work in a lean context?
- Any activity that keeps equipment running
- Work the customer would pay for that transforms the product (Correct answer)
- Activities required by regulatory compliance
- Inspection steps that prevent defects from reaching the customer
Correct answer: Work the customer would pay for that transforms the product
Value-added work transforms the product in a way the customer cares about and would pay for; inspection, rework, and compliance steps are generally non-value-added.
Question 4: What is the purpose of a 'supermarket' in a lean pull system?
- A retail store selling lean training materials
- A controlled inventory buffer that triggers replenishment via kanban (Correct answer)
- A centralized warehouse for finished goods distribution
- A scheduling board for production planning meetings
Correct answer: A controlled inventory buffer that triggers replenishment via kanban
A supermarket is a strategically located, controlled inventory point where items are stored and replenished based on actual consumption signals (kanban).
Question 5: In an enterprise lean context, which approach is most effective for sustaining continuous improvement culture long term?
- Relying on periodic large-scale kaizen events led by consultants
- Embedding daily kaizen habits and leader standard work at all levels (Correct answer)
- Implementing a suggestion box system for employee ideas
- Focusing improvement efforts exclusively on manufacturing processes
Correct answer: Embedding daily kaizen habits and leader standard work at all levels
Sustainable lean culture requires embedding daily small improvements and leader standard work across all levels, not episodic events or passive suggestion systems.
Question 6: What does 'poka-yoke' mean in lean manufacturing?
- Visual display of key production metrics
- Error-proofing device or method that prevents or detects defects (Correct answer)
- Standard work instruction posted at workstations
- Cross-training of operators across multiple stations
Correct answer: Error-proofing device or method that prevents or detects defects
Poka-yoke (mistake-proofing) uses devices or methods to prevent errors from occurring or to immediately detect them when they do.
Question 7: A lean enterprise VSM future state shows a 'pacemaker process.' What is this process's role?
- The process with the highest defect rate requiring extra inspection
- The single scheduling point that controls the pace of the entire value stream (Correct answer)
- The first operation where raw materials enter the facility
- The quality gate before finished goods are shipped
Correct answer: The single scheduling point that controls the pace of the entire value stream
The pacemaker is the one process in the future-state VSM that receives the production schedule; all upstream processes are pulled and all downstream processes flow from it.
Lean Six Sigma Black Belt Certification Advanced Lean and Enterprise 4
Which lean metric measures the percentage of time a process produces defect-free products at the required rate during planned production?