Editor’s note: In response to Kyle Toppazzini’s article, “Lean Without Six Sigma May Be a Failing Proposition,” published in the Sept. 27, 2012, issue of Quality Digest Daily, Rip Stauffer left the following observant comment.

I started my career in quality when the consulting world hadn’t yet split into specialist camps they called “Six Sigma” and “lean.” At that point in time, if people were doing anything programmatic, they were calling it something like total quality. People studied the seven tools, and the seven new tools, and the Toyota Production System, and statistical process control (SPC). We studied general systems theory and learned to do process research.

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