Quality management

Question 1

What is Quality?

Answer 1

features of a product that allow it to satisfy customers’ needs, it may refer to some standard of excellence

Question 2

What factors influence quality?

Answer 2

physical appearance
reliability & durability
special features
suitability
after sales service
image
reputation

Question 3

What are different methods of ensuring quality?

Answer 3

quality control
quality assurance
TQM

Question 4

What is meant by quality control?

Answer 4

aims to identify and correct defects in the finished product (reactive task)

Question 5

What is Quality assurance?

Answer 5

commitment by a business to maintain quality throughout the organization: aims to prevent defects with a focus on the processes used to make the product (proactive task)

Question 6

What is the aim of quality assurance?

Answer 6

The aim is to stop problems before they occur rather than finding them after they occur

Question 7

What is quality circles?

Answer 7

groups of workers meeting regularly to solve problems and discuss work issues

Question 8

What is total quality management?

Answer 8

maintaining quality is part of culture

Question 9

What are the features of TQM

Answer 9

quality chains
company policy, accountability and empowerment
control
monitoring
teamwork
consumer views
zero defects
quality circles

Question 10

What is quality chains?

Answer 10

when employees form a series of links between customers and suppliers in business, both internally and externally

Question 11

How can Quality chains improve/give quality?

Answer 11

Failure to meet the requirement in any part of the quality chain creates problems, such as delay in the next stage of prduction

Question 12

How can Empowerment, company policy improve/give quality?

Answer 12

-People must be totally committed and take ‘ a pride in the job’ –> an example of enrichment
-Lack of commitment particular at the top causes problems –> knock on affect it has on employees motivation and commitment
-in TQM everyone is accountable for their own performance –>employees may also be empowered to make decisions

Question 13

How can monitoring improve/give quality?

Answer 13

-Statistical process control (SPC) involves collecting data relating to the performance of a process
-SPC can be used to reduce variability, which is the cause of most quality problems
-Variations in products delivery times, methods materials, people’s attitudes and staff performanceoften occur

Question 14

How can teamwork improve/give quality?

Answer 14

Most effective way to solve problems (imporves communication, new skills, builds trust and morale, cooperation)
+greater range of skills
+employee morale
+problems across departments better dealt with

Question 15

How can consumer views improve/give quality?

Answer 15

customer feedback platforms=enable business to constant improve

Question 16

How can zero defects improve/give quality?

Answer 16

This aims to ensure that every product that is manufactured is free from defects
=good rep=new clients=more sales

Question 17

How can quality circles improve/give quality?

Answer 17

encourages a continuos approach

Question 18

How does using Total Quality Management help a business?

Answer 18

+focus clearly on needs of customers and relationships between suppliers
+critic analysis to remove waste
+develop team approach to problem solving
+continious improvement

Question 19

What are the drawback to Total Quality Management?

Answer 19

-training costs
-only work if whole business is committed
-stress placed on process/worker not product

Question 20

what are features of kaizan?

Answer 20

continious improvement
eliminate waste
cell production
quality circles

Question 21

Competitive advantage from quality management

Answer 21

+product quality should be improved=help increase sales
+business costs may be cut if fault ins product identifies before the product reaches the market eg cost of failure reaching market is higher than in manufacturer
+develop usp= differentiate in quality=customer thinks its superior=set high prices

Question 22

what are the negatives of improving quality?

Answer 22

-loss of production when intro of new systme comes into place
-expensive training

Question 23

What are the advantages of Quality Control?

Answer 23

not wasting time
cheaper
lower training costs than Quality Assurance
Less difference in opinion on quality

Question 24

What are the disadvantages of Quality Control?

Answer 24

-dont know when the problem occurred
May be expensive as whole batches could be discarded
inefficient if errors occur early on - waste of time and resources

Question 25

What are the advantages of Quality Assurance?

Answer 25

-Guaranteed a perfect product at the end
-Can easily identify where the problem is
-less chance of waste products as quality is assured

Question 26

What are the disadvantages of Quality Assurance?

Answer 26

time-consuming
expensive training costs