Strauss Adriatic Wins Special Stanton Chase Talent Management Award

Strauss Adriatic has won the special Talent Management Award, handed out by the international executive search company Stanton Chase. Among numerous local and international companies, Strauss Adriatic has been recognized as one of those that offer quality advanced programs for the development of talents on all levels.

The award was handed out for the Green Belt program, which is executed within the Lean Six Sigma business philosophy, which Ljiljana Filipovic, Continuous Improvement Manager at Strauss Adriatic, expands on.

How would you present the Lean Six Sigma (LSS) business philosophy and how important is it?

– Lean Six Sigma is a business philosophy that is oriented toward continuous improvement, which, implementing efficient tools and concepts, provides and adequate response to various company challenges, such as continuous improvement of the position in the market, reduction of costs, quality control. Lean is a philosophy which uses tools and techniques for the creation and change of culture to the end of implementing good practice and focuses more on customers’ needs and process-based approach to business operations, whereas Six Sigma is an approach based on data that are used for the identification and removal of flaws with the help of statistics. By combining Lean & Six Sigma, company processes are improved, which leads to various benefits, both in terms of profitability and the satisfaction of the employees, but also all stakeholders.

What does the process of implementation of the Lean Six Sigma business philosophy look like?

– All changes, including the implementation of Lean Six Sigma, are introduced gradually, in phases. There is no generic model, because changes are accepted slowly and set habits do not change easily. Creating the necessary infrastructure of the staff for the launching and management of Lean Six Sigma projects requires patience and investments in education and training of people by the top management, which is in charge of securing the means of realizing the organization’s strategic goals and transforming the corporate culture.


DMAIC entails:

D – Define, to know exactly where we want to go
M – Measure, to measure where we are now
A – Analyze, to discover how to best achieve our goals
I – Improve, to carry out the agreed activities

What does Green Belt represent and why have you opted for that training?

– Team work is crucial for process improvement. Our company environment is such that the employees are encouraged to openly discuss, solve problems and overcome errors. The sectors cooperate mutually, their goals are harmonized and they all go together toward the realization of the common strategic goals.

The Green Belt team itself, the ambassador of our culture of continuous improvement, was selected based on certain predispositions: analytical approach, persistence, enthusiasm and leadership skills in working with people. Each Green Belt is strengthened through training to identify the project that is supposed to contribute to the actual improvement and the financial effects with quickly visible results, because financial and business benefits are pre-determined and quantified. As part of the training, and to the end of supporting the realization of concrete goals when it comes to increasing process efficiency, we have had 5 projects, and some of them have already been realized in practice.

I am extremely proud that the training and certification for Green Belt have contributed, in addition to other activities toward the development of the employees, to the company’s getting the Talent Management Award, especially since the colleagues showed great motivation and engagement during the training, as well as a clear orientation toward the expansion of the culture of continuous improvements by giving expert support to other employees.

Strauss Adriatic d.o.o. Šimanovci

Strauss Adriatic

Executive Search Stanton Chase

Talent Management Award

Green Belt

Lean Six Sigma business philosophy

Ljiljana Filipović