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Andronikdis
Andronikdis
Andronikdis
www.emeraldinsight.com/1754-2731.htm
Quality function
The application of quality deployment
function deployment in service
quality management
319
Andreas Andronikidis, Andreas C. Georgiou, Katerina Gotzamani
and Konstantina Kamvysi
Department of Business Administration, University of Macedonia,
Thessaloniki, Greece
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to promote successful application of quality function
deployment (QFD) combined with quantitative techniques in service organizations.
Design/methodology/approach – The paper assesses advantages and disadvantages of
implementing the QFD method in service organizations. It discusses the integration of quantitative
techniques with QFD in order to overcome some of the problems that organizations face in its
application. The implementation of QFD along with AHP and ANP is studied within the bank sector.
With the intention of completing the first House of Quality and thus prioritizing customers’ bank
selection criteria, a field survey was carried out with customers of a bank. Also, information from
interviews with the bank’s managers was utilized.
Findings – The real world illustration confirms the compatibility between QFD, AHP and ANP and
demonstrates the applicability and ease of use of the proposed model.
Originality/value – A procedure is presented to help practitioners of this improved QFD framework
deal with the challenges of quick response to dynamic shifts in customer needs by automating the
House of Quality (HOQ). The paper could be useful to academics and practitioners in developing the
integrated QFD-AHP-ANP method to design high quality services in various services.
Keywords Customer satisfaction, Quality function deployment, Analytical hierarchy process,
Customer requirements, Service industries, Competitive advantage
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Nowadays consumers are more informed, more demanding, and they easily change
brands and companies if their requirements are not met on time and at a price they are
willing to pay. Among others, delivering high service quality is considered an essential
strategy for success and survival in this competitive environment (Clow and Vorhies,
1993; Zeithaml et al., 1996; Kandampully, 1998).
Understanding customers’ service expectations is a prerequisite for delivering
superior service because they represent implicit performance standards that customers
use in assessing service quality (Parasuraman, 1998). Buzzell and Gale (1987) reported
a significant relation between relative quality -as perceived by the customers – and
organizations’ profitability. Although, service quality and customer satisfaction are
closely related constructs, satisfaction is generally viewed as a broader concept than
service quality assessment; thus, perceived service quality is a component of customer The TQM Journal
Vol. 21 No. 4, 2009
satisfaction (Lee et al., 2001). Indeed, there is a consensus in the literature that superior pp. 319-333
service quality leads to satisfied customers (Cronin and Taylor, 1992) and eventually to q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1754-2731
increased purchase intentions (Brady et al., 2002). DOI 10.1108/17542730910965047
TQM In summary, service quality is one of the most important issues in achieving
21,4 comparative advantage and financial success in the service sector. A well-known
method, that is successful in designing high quality services resulting in customer
satisfaction, is Quality Function Deployment (QFD) (Stuart and Tax, 1996; Mazur,
1997). The purpose of this paper is first to discuss the benefits of applying QFD in the
service sector and second to investigate possible modifications of QFD that could help
320 to overcome limitations that companies face in its implementation. The rest of the
paper is structured as follows: Section 2 provides a review of the QFD method and
highlights advantages and disadvantages. Section 3 proposes quantitative techniques
that may be combined with QFD so as to overcome its deficiencies. Section 4 illustrates
a modified QFD application, and finally, conclusions and suggestions for future
research are presented in section 5.
4. An illustrative example
The example presents the implementation of QFD along with the most widely used
quantitative techniques of AHP and ANP. This example uses real world data from the
banking sector aiming at prioritizing customer selection criteria. As mentioned earlier,
AHP has been criticized by few researchers regarding its utilization and limitations.
This illustrative example is an opportunity to investigate the possible problems that
may rise from the implementation of the modified QFD method. All relevant details are
illustrated step by step in order to facilitate the understanding of the integrated QFD
process in the service industry. The entire QFD process for services includes three
inter-linked phases. However, due to the reason that the structures and analyzing
methods of the other QFD phases are basically the same as the first one, the
presentation is limited to the first HOQ.
In the present example, a bank that, for obvious reasons, is called bank X, is
planning to improve its commercial banking services in response to increased
competition. Primary data regarding customers’ perceptions and preferences through a
field survey and bank managers’ evaluations through interviews were utilized.
Initially, the commercial customers were identified and categorized into seven market
segments, based on their product related primary relationship with the bank. The
classification of the market segments is in accordance with the annual report of The
Bank of Greece (2007) and they are: Consumer Loans, Housing Loans, Other Loans,
Credit Cards, Direct Access Deposits, Time Deposit Accounts, Mutual Funds Shares.
The size of each market segment as a percentage of X’s total business is 16 percent, 17
percent, 8 percent, 7 percent, 26.4 percent, 19 percent and 6.6 percent, respectively, as
shown in the first column of the HOQ (see Figure 1).
The inputs for the first HOQ were obtained through a market survey among bank
X’s customers. A questionnaire was designed with a list of pre-defined bank selection
criteria identified from previous researchers (Anderson et al., 1976; Holstius and
Kaynak, 1995; Zineldin, 1996; Almossawi, 2001). The final list comprised the following
customer requirements when selecting a bank: Recommendation by friends,
Quality function
deployment
325
Figure 1.
The House of Quality
327
Figure 2.
The QFD-AHP-ANP
network
order of importance are the following: Location (12.2 percent); Interest payments on
savings accounts (11.5 percent); Hours of operation (10.6 percent); Interest charges on
loans (9.3 percent); Reputation (7.6 percent); Recommendation by friends (7.3 percent).
5. Concluding remarks
QFD is an elegant tool that has been successfully introduced to the service sector. It
offers a structured guideline for converting customers’ requirements into
characteristics of new services. The main scope of this paper was to present the
benefits of applying QFD in the service sector, point out the possible shortcomings and
propose quantitative techniques that enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of QFD
as a means of translating the “voice of the customer” into service requirements.
AHP and ANP are well-known quantitative techniques that were used in
conjunction with QFD. The real world illustration provided in this paper demonstrated
the applicability and ease of use of the modified QFD model, but also revealed at least
one shortcoming. The integrated QFD-AHP-ANP method entails gigantic data
collection tasks. It employs a lengthy questionnaire with numerous and quite similar
questions, occasionally causing confusion to respondents. Consequently, it is
extremely difficult for customers to make all these pairwise comparisons while the
overall procedure requires a lot of time and patience.
Last, while the proposed model adds quantitative precision to an otherwise
qualitative method, on the other hand, there are several studies that point out
weaknesses and drawbacks of AHP. In particular, at least four main issues regarding
AHP criticism were identified.
Therefore, a final comment regarding this analysis is that future research should be
directed towards exploring alternative quantitative approaches of preference
assessment, which may resolve the issues raised for AHP. Still, undoubtedly, the
TQM
21,4
328
Figure 3.
The initial supermatrix
Quality function
deployment
329
Figure 4.
The limiting supermatrix
TQM incorporation of AHP in the QFD context provided a more accurate and less subjective
21,4 measuring framework. The outcome supports better service offerings that meet or
exceed customers’ needs, leading to improved sales and higher satisfaction.
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