Six sigma programs are raging through corporations worldwide, with some corporations citing savings in the $US billions resulting from six sigma implementation. Six sigma has both proponents and detractors with some arguing that nothing new is involved and others identifying it as revolutionary. The view espoused herein argues for six sigma as a methodology within the larger framework of total quality management – a blend of old and new in the sense that the tools of six sigma are often familiar ones, but are applied with an eye that is more strategically focused than historic use of those tools ordinarily indicates.

The traditional Bain/Mason paradigm of industrial organization (IO) offered strategic management a systematic model for assessing competition within an industry, yet the model was seldom used in the business policy (BP) field. IO and BP differed in their frames of reference (public vs. private), units of analysis (industry vs. firm), views of the decision maker and stability of structure, and in other significant respects. Development of IO theory during the 1970s has narrowed the gap between the two fields, to the extent that IO should now be of central concern to policy scholars.