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Quality Function Deployment
Quality Function Deployment
DEVELOPMENT
TOOLS
New
Derivative
Established
Market
Me too with
a twist
First of a kind
9
Next generation
Familiar
9
New
Product Concept
Since its introduction, Quality Function Deployment has helped to transform the way many
companies:
QFD uses some principles from Concurrent Engineering in that cross-functional teams are
involved in all phases of product development. Each of the four phases in a QFD process uses a
matrix to translate customer requirements from initial planning stages through production control
(Becker Associates Inc, 2000).
Each phase, or matrix, represents a more specific aspect of the product's requirements.
Relationships between elements are evaluated for each phase. Only the most important aspects
from each phase are deployed into the next matrix.
Phase 1, Product Planning: Building the House of Quality. Led by the marketing
department, Phase 1, or product planning, is also called The House of Quality.
Many organizations only get through this phase of a QFD process. Phase 1
documents customer requirements, warranty data, competitive opportunities,
product measurements, competing product measures, and the technical ability of
the organization to meet each customer requirement. Getting good data from the
customer in Phase 1 is critical to the success of the entire QFD process.
Phase 2, Product Design: This phase 2 is led by the engineering department.
Product design requires creativity and innovative team ideas. Product concepts are
created during this phase and part specifications are documented. Parts that are
determined to be most important to meeting customer needs are then deployed
into process planning, or Phase 3.
Phase 3, Process Planning: Process planning comes next and is led by
manufacturing engineering. During process planning, manufacturing processes
are flowcharted and process parameters (or target values) are documented.
Phase 4, Process Control: And finally, in production planning, performance
indicators are created to monitor the production process, maintenance schedules,
and skills training for operators. Also, in this phase decisions are made as to
which process poses the most risk and controls are put in place to prevent
failures. The quality assurance department in concert with manufacturing leads
Phase 4.
The House of Quality
The first phase in the implementation of the Quality Function Deployment process involves
putting together a "House of Quality" (Hauser and Clausing, 1988) such as the one shown below,
which is for the development of a climbing harness (fig. from Lowe & Ridgway, 2001).
References
Akao, Y., ed. (1990). Quality Function Deployment, Productivity Press, Cambridge MA.
Becker Associates Inc, http://www.becker-associates.com/thehouse.HTM and
http://www.becker-associates.com/qfdwhatis.htm
Hauser, J. R. and D. Clausing (1988). "The House of Quality," The Harvard Business Review,
May-June, No. 3, pp. 63-73
Lowe, A.J. & Ridgway, K. Quality Function Deployment, University of Sheffield,
http://www.shef.ac.uk/~ibberson/qfd.html , 2001
Mizuno, S. and Y. Akao, ed. (1994). QFD: The Customer-Driven Approach to Quality Planning
and Development, Asian Productivity Organization, Tokyo, Japan, available from Quality
Resources, One Water Street, White Plains NY.
Rosenthal, Stephen R, Effective product design and development, How to cut lead time and
increase customer satisfaction, Business One Irwin, Homewood, Illinois 60430, 1992
Reilly, Norman B, The Team based product development guidebook, ASQ Quality Press,
Milwaukee Wisconsin, 1999
Sullivan, L.P., 1986, "Quality Function Deployment", Quality Progress, June, pp 39-50.
Recommended further reading
Clausing, D. and S. Pugh (1991). "Enhanced Quality Function Deployment", Design and
Productivity International Conference, Honolulu HI, 6-8 Feb.
Day, R. G. (1993). Quality Function Deployment: Linking a Company with Its Customers,
ASQC Quality Press, Milwaukee WI.
Dean, E. B. (1992). Quality Function Deployment for Large Systems", Proceedings of the 1992
International Engineering Management Conference, Eatontown, NJ, 25-28 October.
King, B. (1989). Better Designs in Half the Time: Implementing Quality Function Deployment in
America, GOAL/QPC, Methuen MA.