Lecture 1

Introduction

The rapidly increasing global competition over the past decade has led to the emergence of new scenarios for most of the industrial sectors. The industries are now associated with rapid technological changes and product variety proliferation in order to remain competitive. The competitiveness of a company is mostly dependent on its ability to perform well in dimensions such as cost, quality, delivery, dependability and speed, innovation and flexibility to adapt itself to variations in demand.

Aiming at improving organizational performance through the effective use of production capability and technology, operations strategy such as total quality management (TQM), quality function deployment (QFD), six sigma, business process re-engineering (BPR), just in time (JIT), benchmarking, performance measurement and many others are commonly used. The concept of quality has evolved from mere specifications, controls, inspections, systems, and methods for regulatory compliance to a harmonized relationship with business strategies aimed at satisfying both the internal and external customer. Today, quality and value are, first and above all, givens, and the customer expects them. Quality in the successful organization is fully integrated into all of the business processes and is an extension of everything else that has to happen along the path to success, both for the company and for the people involved.

Quality Definition(s)

As Specified by Joseph Juran, Quality is the fitness of use i.e. it is the value of the goods and services as perceived by the supplier, producer and customer. The measure also pertains to the degree to which products and services conform to specifications, requirements and standards at an acceptable price. Some of the definitions of the term ‘Quality', provided by quality gurus are as follows:

• Quality is fitness for use (JURAN)
• Quality is conformance to requirements (CROSBY)  
• The efficient production of the quality that the market expects (DEMING)
• Quality is what the customer says, it is (FEIGENBAUM)
• Quality is the loss that a product costs to the society after being shipped to the customer (TAGUCHI)
• The totality of features and characteristics of a product or services that bear on its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs of the customers (ASQC)
• A quality system is the agreed on company wide and plant wide operating work structure, documented in effective, integrated,  technical and managerial procedures for guiding the co-coordinated actions of people, the machines, or the information of company in the best and most practical ways to assume customer quality satisfaction and economical costs of quality. (FEIGENBAUM)

Dimensions of Product Quality

As prescribed by Garvin, the eight dimensions of quality are:

•      Performance          (will the product do the intended job?)
•      Reliability                (how often the product fails?)
•      Durability                 (how long the product lasts?)
•      Serviceability          (how easy is to repair the product?)
•      Aesthetics              (what does the product look like?)
•      Features                 (what does the product do?)
•      Perceived quality   (what is the reputation of a company or its products?)

Dimensions of Service Quality

•      Reliability
•      Responsiveness
•      Competence
•      Courtesy
•      Communication
•      Credibility
•      Security

Three Aspects of Quality (Figure)

The three aspects of quality and their linkages with each other have been depicted in the figure below:

The product must be designed to meet the requirement of the customer. The product must be designed right first time and every time and while designing all aspects of customer expectations must be incorporated into the product. The factors need to consider while designing the product are:

Type of product      Cost      Profit policy of the company      Demand      Availability of the parts

The product must function as per the expectations of the customer. The two way communication between designers and customer is the key to have a quality product.

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