Если у вас возникли сложности с курсовой, контрольной, дипломной, рефератом, отчетом по практике, научно-исследовательской и любой другой работой - мы готовы помочь.
Предоплата всего
Подписываем
Quality
What is quality?
The word 'quality' has an everyday meaning that has to do with features, reliability, performance, durability, aesthetics, value for money and conformance to requirements. It has more specific meanings, particularly those in the next few sections.
Quality control and quality assurance
Quality control is about detecting defects after they happen. It involves random sampling, spot checks, inspection and testing.
Quality assurance is about prevention rather than detection. If a failure happens, then it's isolated, the causes are analyzed, and there is a redesign of the process or of the parts to make sure it doesn't happen again. The aim is zero defects, to get things right first time.
Quality management
Total quality management (TQM) is a philosophy that was very popular in the 1980s and 90s. It aims to put an awareness of quality at the heart of all organizational processes (eg customer service) and not just production. It puts an emphasis on a continual increase in customer satisfaction combined with lowering costs by eliminating waste. It is similar in many ways to the ideas discussed in units 15-16: SCM, Toyota Production System, Lean Manufacturing, kaizen, etc.
European Foundation for Quality Management
This organization has taken the ideas of quality management and is trying to apply them to all organizations, including those in the service sector and public sector. It has a framework for assessing and improving organizations that is based on eight concepts of excellence: results orientation, customer focus, leadership and constancy of purpose (ie being faithful to aims and objectives), management by processes and facts, people development and involvement, continuous improvement and innovation, partnership development, and corporate social responsibility.
A variety of approaches
As can be seen, quality is a topic that occurs under the umbrella of many different philosophies. This is good news for the army of consultants called in to explain and implement the latest management fad. But certain things are common to all the approaches: measuring and systematizing processes; reducing variation, defects and cycle times; and employee involvement and teamwork.
The differences between the approaches (and others not mentioned above, like Six Sigma) are related to which tools, checklists, measurements and training they use.
Quality costs
Quality isn't free - It comes with a cost. But if there are no quality procedures, then the cost is much higher: continuing problems with the product, a loss of confidence in the brand, and fewer sales as a result. Here are just some of the ways that companies have to spend money and time to ensure quality:
Prevention costs (quality assurance)
Engineers have to spend time with marketers during the development of new products to facilitate design-for-manufacture.There have to be supplier capability surveys to make sure that suppliers can achieve the quality levels that they claim.There have to be regular meetings, education and training about quality improvement.
Evaluation costs (quality control)
The company has to inspect and test incoming material, material that is being processed, and the finished product. There is also the cost of buying and servicing any equipment used for measuring and testing.
Failure costs before delivery
There may be scrap, rework, re-inspection, re-testing, etc. If these continue at a high level, then perhaps there will be a fundamental review of suppliers and materials.
Failure costs after delivery
Time is needed to process customer complaints, to process customer returns, to deal with warranty claims and to handle product recalls.