Basic Quality

The Quality Trilogy is a three-pronged approach to managing for quality. The three legs are

1. Quality Planning—Developing the products and processes required to meet customer needs.

2. Quality Control—Meeting product and process goals.

3. Quality Improvement—Achieving unprecedented levels of performance.

The quality improvement process involves the application of quality tools to generate ideas, analyze, develop and evaluate, processes, and collect data.

Seven Tools of Quality Improvement

1. Flowcharts/process map—A graphical representation of the steps in a process. Flowcharts are drawn to better understand processes.

2. Check sheets—A simple data recording device. The check sheet is custom designed by the user, which allows him or her to readily interpret the results.

3. Cause-effect diagrams—A tool for analyzing process dispersion. It is also referred to as the "Ishikawa diagram," because Kaoru Ishikawa developed it, and the "fishbone diagram," because the complete diagram resembles a fish skeleton. The diagram illustrates the main causes and subcauses leading to an effect (symptom).

4. Pareto charts—A graphical tool for ranking causes from most significant to least significant. It is based on the Pareto principle, which was first defined by J. M. Juran in 1950. The principle, named after 19th century economist Vilfredo Pareto, suggests most effects come from relatively few causes; that is, 80% of the effects come from 20% of the possible causes.

5. Histograms—A graphic summary of variation in a set of data. The pictorial nature of the histogram lets people see patterns that are difficult to detect in a simple table of numbers.

6. Control charts—A chart with upper and lower control limits on which values of some statistical measure for a series of samples or subgroups are plotted. The chart frequently shows a central line to help detect a trend of plotted values toward either control limit.

7. Scatter diagrams—A graphical technique to analyze the relationship between two variables. Two sets of data are plotted on a graph, with the y-axis being used for the variable to be predicted and the x-axis being used for the variable to make the prediction. The graph will show possible relationships (although two variables might appear to be related, they might not be: those who know most about the variables must make that evaluation).

Cost of Quality

Costs of poor quality are the costs associated with providing poor-quality products or services. There are four categories of costs: internal failure costs (costs associated with defects found before the customer receives the product or service); external failure costs (costs associated with defects found after the customer receives the product or service); appraisal costs (costs incurred to determine the degree of conformance to quality requirements); and prevention costs (costs incurred to keep failure and appraisal costs to a minimum). ASQ's Online Glossary

Gage Repeatability & Reproducibility (GR&R)

Repeatability is the ability of one observer to obtain consistent results measuring the same part (or set of parts) using measuring equipment.

Reproducibility is the overall ability of two or more observers to obtain consistent results repeatedly measuring the same part (or set of parts) using the same (or similar) measuring equipment. The Quality Technician's Handbook, 4th ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2000), p.472.

Gauge (or gage) repeatability and reproducibility (GR&R) is the evaluation of a gauging instrument's accuracy by determining whether the measurements taken with it are repeatable (i.e., there is close agreement among a number of consecutive measurements of the output for the same value of the input under the same operating conditions) and reproducible (i.e., there is close agreement among repeated measurements of the output for the same value of input made under the same operating conditions over a period of time). ASQ's Online Glossary

History of Quality

Quality did not begin in the 1980s when the American Automotive industry finally noticed that Japanese cars were selling well. It did not begin in 1942, when America's entry into World War II led to the military demanding weapons and vehicles that worked. It did not even begin at the dawn of the Industrial Age.

According to A History of Managing for Quality (J. M. Juran, ed.-in-chief), China had instituted quality control in its handicrafts as early as the Western Zhou dynasty in the eleventh to the eight centuries BCE, and Scandinavian shipbuilders were using quality improvement techniques over the whole first two millennia BCE and the first millennium CE. Examples of specifications and inspection can be found in the Bible dating from at least 500 BCE, and at about the same time Greeks were using tight quality control methods in the building of their temples. India had strict standards for working in gold in the fourth century BCE, and the Romans standardized nearly everything they touched from 300 BCE to 300 CE.

Guilds and governments carried on quality control during the Middle Ages, while consumers carried out informal quality inspections during every age of humanity. The desire for products that do as well as, or better than, the customer's needs and requirements is a constant in human history matched only by the determination of builders and makers to meet that desire.

Quality Auditing

Quality audits are used to determine the following about organizations and their processes:

1. The sustainability of documentation as it applies to systems, products, services, processes, and overall management practices

2. The conformity of the operations to established documentation 3. The effectiveness of the documentation and its implementation to achieve

intended results

Service Quality

The principles and tools of quality management can be implemented and integrated in organizations that have a service as the primary product. These organizations want to improve their customer service, focus on customer requirements, and building customer loyalty.

ASQ's Six Sigma Portfolio of Products and Services

As the only nationally recognized third-party certification body for Six Sigma, ASQ is committed to providing you with the very best of Six Sigma. With networking, education, training, certification, and publications, the portfolio at left constitutes the most comprehensive curriculum of Six Sigma resources available. We're confident that you'll find any or all components indispensable to your professional success.

Software Quality

ASQ understands software quality. We know what it takes to succeed in this field. Inspections, standards, metrics, testing, ethics, verification, evaluation—we understand its complexities and demands, its pitfalls and perils.

Statistical Quality Control

Statistical Quality Control is the application of statistical techniques to control quality. Often the term "statistical process control" is used interchangeably with "statistical quality control," although statistical quality control includes acceptance sampling as well as statistical process control. ASQ's Online Glossary