(2, 1) - Quality Improvement Flashcards
What does the Sales of Goods Act 1979 require from goods supplied with respect to quality?
Goods supplied will be “of satisfactory quality, working and in good condition” and to be “fit for the purpose for which they are commonly used or for any specific purpose made known by the buyer to the seller”
Why would an organisation want to produce high quality goods and services?
∞ Delight customers and improve market share
∞ Gain an edge over competitors
∞ Avoid costs and reputational risks from product failures
What are risks associated with poor quality?
∞ Failure and “make good” costs
∞ Reputational damage
∞ Delays and disruptions to supply while failures are being rectified
∞ Costs of claims and warranty pay outs
What are the 3 costs associated with poor quality?
∞ Prevention costs (The cost of ensuring quality delivery / QA)
∞ Appraisal costs (The cost of noticing quality defects / QC)
∞ Failure costs (The costs incurred after a quality failure causes damage)
What are Demings 14 points which led to improved quality in Japan?
¥ Create constancy of purpose
¥ Adopt new philosophy
¥ Cease dependence on inspection
¥ End awarding business on price
¥ Improve constantly the system of production and service
¥ Institute training on the job
¥ Institute leadership
¥ Drive out fear
¥ Break down barriers between departments
¥ Eliminate numerical goals, slogans and exhortations
¥ Eliminate work standards that prescribe numerical quotas
¥ Encourage people to have pride in their workmanship
¥ Institute education and a self-improvement programme
¥ Ensure that everyone in the company works to accomplish the transformation
How did Juran (a former co-worker of Deming) define fitness for purpose?
- Identify who the customers are (Including internal customers)
- Determine their needs
- Translate those needs into our language
- Develop a product that can respond to those needs
- Optimise the product features so as to meet our needs as well as the customers’ needs
- Develop a process which is able to produce the product
- Optimise the process
- Prove that the process can produce the product under operating conditions
- Transfer the process to operations
Juran considered quality under four headings, what are they?
Quality of design • Market Research • Product Concept • Design Specifications Quality of conformance • Use and application of technology • Human resources • Management Quality of availability • Logistics • Reliability • Maintainability Field Service • Promptness • Competence • Integrity
Phil Crosby included 4 major principles, these include:
¥ Definition of quality – Conformance to product spec and meeting customer requirements
¥ System of quality – To prevent defects
¥ Performance standard – Zero defects
¥ Measurement of quality – The price of non-conformance (Cost of quality)
What is quality control?
QC is the use of reactive detection techniques to identify poor quality and rectify or remove the offending component. Based on inspection and sampling. QC is costly and unless 100% sampling is used, cannot guarantee zero defects.
What is quality assurance?
The use of proactive prevention techniques to ensure quality defects don’t occur. QA aims to design quality in to every stage of production. Crosby emphasised zero defects as building in quality is usually cheaper than the waste from poor quality.
What is TQM?
Total quality management bring QA/QC and the principles of the Guru’s in this topic together. It is an integrative philosophy of management for continuously improving the quality of products and processes. It’s based on the premise that quality is everyone’s responsibility, requiring the involvement of management, workforce, suppliers and customers to meet or exceed customer expectations. TQM puts quality at the heart of everything which is done and covers all organisational activities.
What 8 key points does TQM stress?
a. Meeting the needs of customers
b. Covering all parts of the organisation
c. Making quality integral to the corporate culture
d. Examining all quality-related costs, including failure costs
e. Getting things right first time (Designing in quality)
f. Developing the systems and procedures which support quality and improvement
g. Sharing best practice
h. Embedding a continuous process of improvement
What is required to introduce TQM into an organisation?
¥ Senior management support
¥ Training
¥ Team work (quality circles to investigate quality events)
When considering quality and implementing quality improvements it is important to measure success, how can this be done?
KPI’s can be used and should be set with SMART objectives (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Timely)
When establishing KPI’s there are a number of factors that need to be considered, what are these?
¥ Acceptability (to the parties involved)
¥ Achievability (stretching but achievable targets)
¥ Appropriateness (to the work environment)
¥ Flexibility (measures may need to develop as requirements change)
¥ Continuity (must be maintained as far as possible)
¥ Comprehension (measures must be understood by the parties)
¥ Credibility (the information upon which the measures are based must be reliable)
¥ Cost effectiveness (the benefit derived from the measures must justify the cost of gathering information)
