Managing for Quality

Dr. Ron Tibben-Lembke

The Big Man
W. Edwards Deming
Ph.D. in Physics
Western Electric in 1920s, 30s.
WWII taught Quality Control for war effort
Ignored after the war
Japan wanted to learn from the US
Deming went to help with census
Started teaching them quality control
1951 Deming Prize for high level of achievement in quality
practices
1980 NBC If Japan CanWhy Cant We? US discovers
Quality Philosophy
A product or service possesses quality if it helps
somebody and enjoys a good and sustainable market.
Variation is the cause of poor quality
The Process
Product/service design
Manufacture/service delivery
Test
Sales
Market surveys
Redesign and improvement
Chain Reaction
Improve Quality
Provide jobs and
more jobs
Costs decrease because of less
rework, fewer mistakes, delays,
better use of time & materials
Productivity
Improves
Stay in business
Capture market with better
quality and price
System of Profound Knowledge
1. Systems
1. Buying at lowest cost ignores everything else
2. Dont suboptimize performance of one part at the expense
of total performance
2. Understanding variation
1. Variability is inherent in everything
2. Variation from human behavior hurts quality
3. Theory of Knowledge
1. Experience is not enough. You need a theory
4. Psychology
1. Fear and pay are not motivators
If you dont get it
Systems:
See symptoms, not causes
Dont see effects of one part on the others
Variability
See trends where there are none, miss others
Psychology
Create cynicism, demoralization, guilt, resentment,
burnout, craziness, and turnover
Theory of Knowledge
Problems remain unsolved, despite best efforts
Demings 14 Points
1. Create a vision and demonstrate commitment
1. Long-term vision
2. Companies purpose is to serve their customers and
employees, not simply for profit
3. Invest in innovation, training, research
4. Improve competitive position
5. Top management is responsible for this
6. Effective leadership begins with commitment
14 Points
2. Learn the New Philosophy
1. Quota-driven, adversarial management wont work
2. That ignores importance of quality improvement
3. Labor and management have to cooperate to improve
the customers satisfaction
4. Keep training people turnover does exist
3. Understand Inspection
1. Routine inspection let someone else fix it
2. Increases costs in the end (no rework in services)
3. Inspect your own work and fix it
4. Dont Buy on the Cost per Part
Basis
Dont buy from several for competition
Increases variability
Work with suppliers in long-term relationships
Improve quality with your suppliers
Also get volume discounts, fewer setups
Supplier-customer bond
5. Improve Constantly and Forever
Reduce causes of variation
Engage all employees
How to do jobs more efficiently
More effectivelye
Continuous Process Improvement now is mandatory
6. Institute Training
People are a valuable resource and want to do a good
job
They need training to know how to do a good job
Invest in their future
Training should include tools for
Diagnosing
Analyzing
Solving quality problems
Identify improvement opportunities
7. Institute Leadership
The job of management is leadership, not supervision.
If supervisors dont know the job, they cant lead
Focus on getting product out the door
Good supervisors are coaches, not prison guards
8. Drive Out Fear
Managers and workers must have mutual respect
Pointing out quality problems will miss quotas
Deming story about not fixing a machine
Auto plant: workers knew more than the experts
9. Optimize the Efforts of Teams
People have to understand what customers want
Union vs. Management
Management trying to exploit workers
Unions keeping to piece-rate known systems
Hillerich & Bradsby
10. Eliminate Exhortations
Do you work better with a poster on the wall?
Slogans assume quality problems caused by people
Deming thinks the system is responsible for problems
Workers demoralized when they cannot fix defects,
and yet are held accountable
Workers attempts to fix problems only cause more
variation
11. Eliminate Numeric Quotas
They do not encourage improvement
If you do improve it, theyll just raise the quota
Risk of missing quotas
Once you meet the standard, why try harder?
Arbitrary goals are demoralizing without a plan of how
you can reach those goals
Variability in system year-to-year
12. Remove Barriers to Pride in
Workmanship
People are treated like a commodity
Work nights to make up for cut positions
Dont make your people compete against each other
Behavior driven by what boss wants, not Quality
13 Education & Self-Improvement
Not job-specific
Many benefits, some specific to job, others broader
14. Take Action
Accomplish the Transformation
Start the cultural change with top management
People will be skeptical until they start to see change
Joseph Juran
Joined Western Electric in 1920s.
1951 Quality contol handbook
Taught quality principles to Japanese in 1950s
Quality directed by senior management
Train whole mgt hierarchy in quality
Strive for evolutionary changes in Quality
Report progress to executive levels
Involve the workforce in quality
Quality part of reward/recognition structure
Difference in Juran
Not a major cultural shift
Top management understands money
Workers understand parts
Middle management has to translate
Eliminate defects through statistical study
Views of Quality Fitness for Use
Quality is related to:
Product performance that results in customer
satisfaction
Freedom from product deficiencies, which avoids
customer dissatisfaction
The mission of the firm is to:
Achieve high design quality
The mission of each department is to:
Achieve high conformance quality
Quality Trilogy
Quality Planning
Preparing to meet quality goals
Quality control
Meeting quality goals during operations
Quality improvement
Breaking through to unprecedented levels of
performance
Jurans Detailed Program
Prove the need for improvement
Identify projects for improvement
Organize support for the projects
Diagnose the causes
Provide remedies for the causes
Prove remedies are effective under operating
conditions
Provide control to maintain improvements

Philip Crosby
Corporate VP for Quality at International Telephone
and Telegraph, ITT for 14 years.
Quality is Free 1 million copies sold

Philip Crosby
Quality means conformance to requirements, not
elegance
Either you meet the requirements or not
Determine requirements up front, and very carefully
There is no such thing as a quality problem
There are accounting, mfg, design problems
Quality originates in those depts., not in QC
There is no economics of quality
Crosby Philosophy
Only quality cost is non-conformance
15-20% of sales on quality costs
Well-run, it can be 2.5%
Measure & publicize cost of poor quality
Provides visible signs of improvement
Zero Defects
Do it right the first time, prevent defects, dont fix them
Human errors from lack of attention, because we
assume errors are inevitable
Deming: what are you talking about?
Basic Elements of Improvement
Determination top management must take Q
seriously
Education everyone knows the absolutes
Implementation everyone in management has to
understand the implementation process
Similarities & Differences
Quality is imperative for competitiveness
Top management must lead the way
Quality efforts save, not cost, money
Continuous, never-ending improvement
Importance of understanding the customers needs
Worker / management partnership

Accuracy & Precision
Accuracy:
How close you are to the
actual value
Depends on the person
measuring
Calculated by the formula:
% Error = (YV AV) x 100 AV
Where: YV is YOUR measured Value &
AV is the Accepted Value
Precision:
How finely tuned your
measurements are or
how close they can be
to each other
Depends on the
measuring tool
Determined by the
number of significant
digits
Accuracy & Precision
Precision without
Accuracy
No Precision &
No Accuracy
Accuracy without
Precision