Many organisations invest in Yellow Belts and Black Belts, but forget a level that often makes the difference right on the shop floor. In this blog, you will read why the Orange Belt has more impact than many people think.
Directeur | MBB
Contents: The four Lean Six Sigma levels | What the Orange Belt actually offers | How that looks in practice | Orange Belt or Green Belt? | Conclusion
We regularly speak with operational managers who are stuck on the same problem. The Yellow Belt training has been well received, employees understand what waste is and recognise improvement opportunities in their daily work. But after that, little happens. Improvements get stuck on post-its, in meetings, or in good intentions.
Meanwhile, the Green Belt is busy. There are several ongoing projects, two waiting, and the day only has 24 hours. The improvement request from the shop floor ends up somewhere in the queue.
This is the gap we encounter most often in organisations that are serious about continuous improvement. And it is precisely the gap that the Orange Belt fills.
Before we zoom in on the Orange Belt, it is useful to compare the four levels. Because the power of the Orange Belt level only becomes clear when you see where it fits into the whole.
The Orange Belt is an intermediate solution. This level sits deliberately between Yellow and Green: for professionals who not only want to recognise improvement opportunities but also want to realise small improvements within their own work area themselves.
The Orange Belt is not a shortened Green Belt, nor is it an extended Yellow Belt. It is a level with its own defined role: the employee who independently initiates and realises improvements within his or her own work area, without having to set up a full DMAIC project.
After an Orange Belt training course, participants are able to:
– Systematically identify and prioritise improvement opportunities based on impact – Determine the root cause of a problem using techniques such as the 5 Whys and Ishikawa analysis – Perform a process analysis and quantify waste – Develop, test and implement improvement measures within their own team – Secure improvements to prevent relapse – Facilitate small improvement initiatives and involve colleagues in the approach
The difference with Yellow Belt: Orange Belts do it themselves. The difference with Green Belt: Orange Belts work at team level and on a smaller scale, without the methodical weight of a full improvement project.
A good example is a medium-sized manufacturing company. They had been working with Yellow Belts on the floor and two Green Belts at staff level for years. Awareness was there. Employees mentioned points for improvement, knew DMAIC and understood the importance of waste elimination. But the two Green Belts were structurally overstretched. They led the formal improvement projects, were called upon for every deviation of any size, and had no time for the smaller initiatives from the shop floor. Result: an informal queue of improvement ideas, the majority of which were never addressed. The company decided to have six team leaders follow an Orange Belt training course. Three months later, four of the six had independently completed an improvement process. Not large projects, but recurring malfunctions in a manual setting, an inefficient handover routine between shifts, a repetitive rejection item in the final inspection. Each one a problem that had been known for years but remained unresolved because they were “too small for a project” and “too big to solve quickly.”
A rule of thumb: choose Orange Belt if an employee wants to implement improvements within their own work area. Choose Green Belt if someone is going to lead formal improvement projects that affect multiple departments. Not sure what best fits your organisation? Our training advisors will help you make the right choice.
The Orange Belt is underestimated because it is less well-known. The classic belt structure that organisations know runs from Yellow to Green to Black. The Orange Belt falls in between. Not because it is less valuable, but because it is less visible. And that is the missed opportunity. Because the Orange Belt is exactly the level that bridges the gap between awareness and results.