Green Belt certification can increase your salary by an average of $11,000 USD (ASQ survey), compared to those with no Six Sigma certification. Black Belt certification can increase your salary by an average of $15-30,000 USD, compared to those with no Six Sigma certification, and $16,000-20,000 USD above those having only a Green Belt certification. Lean certification is less structured than Six Sigma, so there is less salary data available for comparison, but it is gaining popularity.
Why are companies willing to pay more for employees with Lean or Six Sigma certification?
This is because the cost savings and benefits that companies can obtain from employees with these certification levels will more than pay for the salary. When I worked at an aerospace company, we tracked improvement projects conducted by our Lean Six Sigma Black Belt certified staff, and we were able to save 20x our annual salary in hard and soft savings to the company each year. You can expect 2-10x payback period. This makes for a no-brainer return on investment (ROI).
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What are the elements of a Lean or Six Sigma certification?
There is no industry standard for certifications (despite what other companies or organizations might claim). Most companies will want to know that you have learned the content, and have confirmed that knowledge through testing and/or real-world application.
Most certifications require 2 or more of the following requirements before providing a certification:
- Training – Completion of training course (online or in-person)
- Exam – Passing a series of quizzes or exam questions
- Simulated Project – Completion of a simulated project (tied to the training course)
- Actual Project – Completion of a real-world project at work, at home or in your local community
- Portfolio – Review of your previous work experience, projects and improvements
There are 5 steps to obtaining a Lean Six Sigma certification from OpEx Learning, a company that we have partnered with to help our readers obtain a certification. They use the combination of training and actual project work for certification approval.
Green Belt training is the first belt level that is well-recognized due to the amount of content you learn, and the application of the training to a real-world project with tangible savings or benefits. Completion of the training will provide you with a Six Sigma training certificate, proving that you took a course on the topic. The training certificate will be generated automatically upon completion of the course (can be downloaded as a PDF).
Update Sept 2022: We are now offering Lean certification as of 2022, and our Lean Fundamentals course is the equivalent to the Six Sigma Green Belt certification level in terms of content.
If you are looking to boost your salary, get a promotion, or go into a process improvement role, most companies will value a Lean or Six Sigma certification earned by applying that knowledge to a real-world problem.
- Lean Six Sigma Green Belt Training
- Lean Six Sigma Black Belt Training (SigmaXL or Minitab software)
- Lean Fundamentals
Not sure yet? You can get started for FREE with White Belt Training (coupon code “KICKSTART-LSSE“) or FREE Lean Introduction (coupon code “KICKSTARTLEAN-LSSE“). Taking one or both of these courses will give you a good foundation in both Lean and Six Sigma at no cost, and will help you decide whether to proceed to higher levels of training. Completion of the Six Sigma Green Belt and Lean Fundamentals certification will give you a well-rounded skill set to be able to handle most problems in your work. Contact us if you have any questions.
For ideas on what projects to identify and improve, check out this list of possible home, work or community projects. This can be a difficult step. If you need help, please contact us for assistance based on your current work and personal situation.
Consider a problem that is happening in your direct area of responsibility, so you can work on it as part of your regular job. Look at your processes and evaluate how they are performing in terms of financial cost, quality performance, customer satisfaction, work-in-process backlog, cycle time or response time. If there are gaps or deficiencies in any of those areas, you may have a potential project.
If you want to obtain certification, your project will need to be reviewed and approved by the stakeholders of your project, along with an approved Master Black Belt from OpEx Learning. The cost of project coaching and review includes 2-3 hours of online email and phone support.
- Green Belt Certification Review (2 hours)
- Lean Certification Review (2 hours)
- Black Belt Certification Review (3 hours)
Although 2-3 hours doesn’t seem like much time, these times have been derived from data from previous projects. If you need a little extra time, no problem, we won’t turn you away!
You can also wait to sign up for this option until after you select a project, but don’t wait until your project is complete to sign up. You might miss some key requirements and analysis that will be hard to go back and resolve.
If you struggled to identify or complete a real-life project or kaizen event, consider signing up for our coaching program, which provides more in-depth coaching and mentoring in a 16-week program. Learn more about our Lean Six Sigma Project Coaching Program.
If you are able to complete a successful Six Sigma project (with valid improvement to a key metric like time, yield, accuracy, etc), and show the tools and analysis you used from the training to achieve these results, we will approve your project. Simply email us a Powerpoint slide deck or Word document that summarizes your project. If you have concerns about sharing sensitive data or client proprietary information, no problem, we deal with this all the time. We can sign non-disclosure agreements (NDA) or work through any limitations. Contact us if you want to discuss your situation ahead of time.
You will receive a digital PDF of your certification within a week of project approval. You will be an official Certified Green Belt, Certified Lean Agent or Certified Black Belt. Congratulations!
Questions? Contact us and we’ll get back to you quickly.