What is Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt Training?

A Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt is someone who has been trained to problem solve process problems at a more localized level. They generally operate on project teams supporting Green belt and Black Belts in their project delivering.

Some of the skills that are taught:

• How to define a problem properly taking time to understand its true nature from all angles
• How to look at a process from the customer’s point of view
• How to use some of the basic analytical techniques to identify root causes
• How to come up with solutions to problems
• How to make sure processes are controlled

Six Sigma is where we get the term ‘belts’ to describe the different levels of knowledge. It’s generally accepted that there are 4 belts and 6 different levels. These are:

White Belt – Introduction to Lean Six Sigma

Yellow Belt – Awareness of Lean Six Sigma methodology

Green Belt – Ability to practice improvement using tools and techniques

Black Belt – Expert is tools and techniques, training and mentoring others

Master Black Belt – Master of all techniques, training, mentoring, & leadership

Champion – Leader of change in an organization

The Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt is trained in the basic tools and techniques required to solve problems at a team level i.e. not really involved in the cross-functional nature of bigger processes and business problems and hence not as much consideration is required towards areas such as stakeholder management.

Where Yellow Belt training focusses effort is on the practical nature of problem-solving.

Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt training is about equipping individuals with the basics to be able to perform well as part of a project team or to take control of solving some of the localised problems within their own business area. If you’re looking to develop improvement capability within your operations Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt is a great place to start and provides a grounding for further development into Green Belt and Black Belt courses.