We Said Teams
Are Awesome—in Las Vegas, They Proved
It!
Listen to What the
Winners Have to Say
Gold Winning
Team
Merrill Lynch Production
Technologies Mail Efficiency Partnering Team—A
Merrill Lynch Six Sigma process improvement team from
Piscataway, NJ.
They also won the Gold Award in the statewide competition
sponsored by the AQP Chapter in New Jersey.
Merrill Lynch’s Partnering Team consists of Merrill
Lynch and its five major suppliers that were tasked with
improving equipment efficiencies. Its mission consisted
of increasing equipment processing throughput, reducing
rework, and driving down cost. The team exceeded all of
its goals. Merrill Lynch achieved an annualized cost
savings of $1,088,000 while simultaneously strengthening
its supplier partnerships.
The problem solving partners for Merrill Lynch's Gold
Award winning team were:
Cunningham Graphics International
IBM
Pitney Bowes
Wallance
Westvaco
Robert Kroner
Title: Director
Team role: Project champion
Company: Merrill Lynch
What is your personal reaction to the team
winning?
My reaction was one of intense pride. I knew the teams
worked hard all year and gave a great degree of personal
commitment. It was personally gratifying to see that work
recognized by the nation’s business
community.
Will this help your overall program—what will
this do for the other teams?
It is impossible to overstate the favorable impact that
this will have on our continued deployment of Six Sigma
within our firm. Nothing succeeds like success. All
future Six Sigma teams will have at least a road map to
follow and the confidence to know that others have taken
the journey and been successful.
Tony DeMartino
Title: Vice president, Six Sigma Master Black Belt
Team role: Team leader
Company: Merrill Lynch
What is your personal reaction to the team winning?
What does it mean to you? What did you get out of being
on the team?
I was ecstatic to say the least. Winning
a national quality award has been a personal goal of mine
for many years. This award was made that much more
special because it promotes performance excellence
through employee involvement, specifically through high
performance teams. To me this award means that if you set
high goals for yourself and work hard you will eventually
realize the fruits of your labor. Personally and
professionally it was a rewarding experience to have the
opportunity to lead a team comprised of six major
corporations to a national championship title. It
reaffirmed what I’ve always known to be
true—that people are a company’s number one
asset.
How will this whole experience affect your ongoing
work?
This experience has benefited Merrill Lynch’s
entire Six Sigma program. Since the Six Sigma process
merged so well with the AQP team excellence criteria, we
plan to use the criteria and its focus on people issues
to further integrate Six Sigma into our culture.
Did you learn something from other people you met
at the conference that you want to share?
Yes, I learned that many teams—including Bayer,
Baxter, and DST Output—run their own internal team
competitions prior to the AQP National Competition. At
Merrill Lynch we plan to incorporate this best practice
as a way to prepare our teams for the national
competition.
Mark L. Frohlinger
Title: Senior reliability engineer
Team role: Partnering company team member/stakeholder
(helped in development of analysis tools and
solutions)
Company: Pitney Bowes-Document Messaging
Technologies
What is your personal reaction to the team
winning?
It was an amazing experience. I was completely down after
the bronze and silver medallists were called. I thought
our presentation was worthy of winning, but our fate was
up to the judges. Did we miss something? What could we
have done better? Only if... It was heart-wrenching;
after all of the time and effort preparing, we only had
one chance left. After our team’s name was
announced, I never experienced such a change in emotions.
It was such a great feeling.
How will this whole experience affect your ongoing
work?
We will be able to pioneer the work we’ve done with
Merrill Lynch to our other customers. We will also
continue to work with Merrill Lynch on continuous
improvements at their facilities. I hope this also leads
to more partnering efforts and future sales and service
opportunities.
Did you learn something from other people you met
at the conference that you want to share?
I learned that everyone has something of value to say. Be
open to everyone. Then use their input and your thought
process and common sense to interpret and shape
life’s future events and tasks. The attendees and
team participants provided a lot of insight and
experience.
Holly Hickey
Title: Region manager
Team role: Partnering company team member (helped to
identify and implement solutions)
Company: IBM
What is your personal reaction to the team
winning?
I was so proud of the team effort put forth between so
many companies and working toward one common goal.
Will this help your overall program—what will
this do for the other teams?
We manage to the ISO 9000 standard at IBM and are very
process-oriented. This partnership and accomplishment
will just be another reason for partners and customers to
work more closely in the future for cost savings and
business improvements.
Did you learn something from other people you met
at the conference that you want to share?
It was a great opportunity to meet some key individuals
from the other companies that we can possibly partner
with on other opportunities and improvements in the
future.
Silver Winning Team
The Hermetic Perfectors
From Emerson—a problem-solving team from Humboldt,
TN.
They also won the AQP Silver Award in 1998 and the Gold
Award in 2000.
The Hermetic Perfectors’ project was addressing the
problem of six hours of daily rework in repairs to meet
the customers’ demands with a superior product.
This long existing problem was addressed with
conventional problem-solving tools to completely
eliminate the root causes. The project resulted in a
savings of more than $13,000 in rework labor.
Ted Harpole
Title: Human Resource Development
Company: Emerson
What is your personal reaction to the team
winning?
To achieve the top honors in team competition is an
accomplishment and rewarding within. Yet, knowing that
that level of accomplishment could never have been
achieved without each member’s contribution. It is
a competition that you walk away from saying: we rather
than I.
Will this help your overall program—what will
this do for the other teams?
Other teams need a tangible goal to know where
they’re going and what is the mark of excellence.
Making national finalists gives other teams a road map
and a clear-cut path to travel. Companies and
organizations are constantly looking for ways to
recognize their teams’ accomplishments. The Team
Excellence Award Competition gives teams opportunities
for improvement within their problem-solving process and
at the same time recognizes their accomplishments. This
is benchmarking at its best.
Did you learn something from other people you met
at the conference that you want to share?
The conference is addictive and keeps you wanting more.
Positive attitudes and atmosphere are abundant throughout
the conference. Everyone wants to bring this creative and
positive environment back to his or her
organization—where everything is possible.
Bronze Winning Team
Merrill Lynch Statement Efficiency, led by Jim Friscia,
focused on decreasing the length of the statement without
impacting client data. A 15% page reduction was achieved,
with significant savings in postage and improvements in
customer satisfaction. The other team members from
Merrill Lynch included: Jennifer Guido from strategic
marketing, Chris Tiber from statement systems (CRIS),
Eric Ruoff and Irene Bartholomew from statement quality
assurance, and Dave Phillips and Kevin Forest from
Merrill Lynch production technologies.
Jim Friscia
Title: Vice president, Black Belt Six Sigma
Entitlement
Team role: Project leader for the Statement Efficiency
Team
Company: Merrill Lynch
What is your personal reaction to the team
winning?
The whole experience was very rewarding and I was very
proud of the team for all they accomplished on the
project and in the competition. To be recognized by AQP
was tremendous and our teams’ accomplishments are a
tribute to the work of all of the Black Belts and Six
Sigma teams at Merrill Lynch.
Will this help your overall program—what will
this do for the other teams?
It added visibility to the Six Sigma program that was
deployed less than a year ago. It has created added
excitement amongst all of the Black Belts as the program
and team’s accomplishments are being celebrated
within Merrill Lynch. Other teams have already begun to
envision how they can become active in next year’s
competition.
Irene Bartholomew
Title: Project analyst, Statement Quality Assurance
Team role: Prototype development
Company: Merrill Lynch
What is your personal reaction to the team
winning?
Our third-place award was a total shock. Not knowing what
to expect, I went in with lower expectations assuming the
other teams had competed in previous competitions. It is
pretty exciting to place in the top three, and I will
continue to work toward quality goals when working on
project teams in the future. I will continue to build
strong relationships with team members in the future to
ensure the successful implementation of projects. We had
a lot of laughs preparing for the competition and during
the competition. It was an experience that will not be
forgotten.
How will this whole experience affect your ongoing
work?
It will strengthen the drive to communicate teamwork for
all future projects. This process showed me that what we
did together actually made a difference. (Cumulatively
small changes would yield significant results.)
Did you learn something from other people you met
at the conference that you want to share?
I thought the entire Honda process of the internal teams
was really interesting. And I learned that I really
didn’t like what Patch Adams is about, but throwing
fish can be fun—I wonder if I should start throwing
statements.
Jennifer Guido
Title: Vice president, Client Experience Marketing
Team role: Focus groups, interface with marketing and
communications
Company: Merrill Lynch
What is your personal reaction to the team
winning?
I was very excited and proud just to participate in the
competition, but receiving the Bronze Award was an
amazing and rewarding feeling. It is always a great
feeling when your hard work is recognized. Our team
dedicated a great deal of time and effort and it is a
wonderful feeling to know it was recognized.
What did you get out of being on the
team?
I realized a real sense of accomplishment and am
extremely proud to have been a part of this team. We had
a great story to tell and we accomplished a great deal.
Everyone participated equally and had a great time in the
process.
Will this help your overall program—what will
this do for the other teams?
I think this competition will place a new focus on
teamwork and how goals can be accomplished by partnering
with various areas. I think much more can be accomplished
when working outside of our silos and partnering together
to achieve common goals. It’s also a lot more
fun!
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