IE 135: INDUSTRIAL QUALITY CONTROL

Topic: Quality and Quality Improvement

1.0 Meaning of Quality and Quality Improvement

Garvin’s 8 Dimensions of Quality

1. Performance → Will the product perform specific functions? How well does the
product perform (wrt competitors)?
2. Reliability → How frequent will the product require repair over its service life?
3. Durability → How long is the service life of the product? (highly applies to automobile &
major appliances)
4. Serviceability → How quick and economical will the repair or maintenance of the
product be? (highly applies to appliance, automobile, and service industries)
5. Aesthetics → Visual appeal: style, color, shape, and packaging
6. Features → Are there features of the product that are not in the competitors’?
7. Reputation → In the past, did the company have product failures that were highly
visible to the public (product recalls)? How were the customers treated when
quality-related problems were reported to the company? [perceived quality, customer
loyalty, repeat business]
8. Conformance → Does the product meet the specifications set by the designers? Is the
product performing as intended?

NOTE: Quality is a multifaceted entity.

Traditional Definition of Quality: “Quality = Fitness for Use”

Two General Aspects of Fitness for Use:
1. Quality of Design - Variations in grades or level of quality of a product is intentional.
Includes: type of materials used, specifications on the components, reliability through
engineering development, & accessories or equipment
 2. Quality of Conformance - How well the product conforms to the specifications
required by the design. Influenced by: choice of manufacturing process, training &
supervision of the workforce, types of process controls used, extent to which
procedures are followed, and motivation of the workforce

PROBLEM: Led to much less focus on the customer and more of a “conformance to
specifications” approach.

Modern Definition of Quality: “Quality is inversely proportional to variability in the important

characteristics of the product”
● Jack Welch - “Your customer doesn’t see the mean of your process, he only sees the
variability around that target that you have not removed.”

Quality Improvement - reduction of variability in processes and products / reduction of waste

● Excessive variability in process performance → waste
○ Ex: Repairs due to variability in dimensions for transmission → wasted money,
time & effort
○ Ex: Service industries - correction of error or mistake → effort and expense

2.0 Quality Engineering Terminology

1. Critical-to-Quality (CTQ) characteristics - parameters/elements that describe what
the user or consumer think of as quality
a. Physical: length, weight, voltage, viscosity
b. Sensory: taste, appearance, color
c. Time Orientation: reliability, durability, serviceability
2. Quality Engineering - activities that a company uses to ensure that the CTQs of a
product are at the nominal levels and that variability around the nominal is minimum
3. Variability
● Ex: thickness of the blades on a jet turbine impeller is not identical even on the
same impeller (if the variation is large, the customer may perceive the unit to be
undesirable and unacceptable)
 ● Sources of variability: difference in materials, performance and operation of the
manufacturing equipment & the way the operators perform their tasks
4. Variables Data - continuous → length, voltage, or viscosity
5. Attributes Data - discrete → # of loan applications that could not be properly
processed because of missing required information; # of emergency room arrivals that
have to wait more than 30 minutes to receive medical attention
6. Specifications - desired measurements for the CTQs of the components,
subassemblies, and final product
● Ex: diameter of a shaft used in an automobile transmission cannot be too large
or too small
● Ex: maximum amount of time to process an order or to provide a particular
service
7. Nominal or Target Value - desired value for the CTQs
8. Upper Specification Limit (USL)
9. Lower Specification Limit (LSL)
10. Over-the-wall approach to design - Specification limits are determined by the design
engineer → specifications are often set w/out regard to the inherent variability that
exists in materials, processes, and other parts of the system → non-conforming parts or
products
11. Nonconforming products - fail to meet one or more specifications but not necessarily
unfit for use
12. Nonconformity - specific type of failure
13. Defective - not fit for use
14. Defect - nonconformity that affect the safe or effective use of the product
15. Concurrent Engineering - team approach to design; specialist in manufacturing,
quality engineering, and other disciplines work together with product designer at the
earliest stages of the product design process

3.0 Brief History of Quality Control and Improvement

1. Frederick W. Taylor - principles of scientific management; division of labor so that
products could be manufactured and assembled more easily → substantial
 improvements in productivity; standardized production and assembly methods →
positive impact to quality of manufactured goods; work standards - standard time to
accomplish the work or specified # of units that must be produced per period
2. Frank and Lillian Gilbreth - Motion study & work design
NOTE: Taylor and the Gilbreths had positive impact on productivity, but they did not emphasize
the quality aspect of work
3. Walter A. Shewhart - statistical control chart concept → formal beginning of statistical
quality control
4. Harold Dodge & Harry Romig - acceptance sampling → alternative to 100%
inspection
NOTE: At this point, statistical quality control was still not widely recognized by industry
5. World War II - made apparent that statistical techniques were necessary to control and
improve product quality
6. American Society for Quality Control - promoted the use of quality improvement
techniques for all types of products and services → trainings on quality assurance
7. Design of Experiments - first application: Chemical Industries → process
improvement, new process development, new products and design evaluation, etc.
(had been used by Japanese for quite some time already when competitors discovered
DOEs)
NOTE: Since then, statistical methods for quality has been a key competitive weapon

Topic: Statistical Methods; Management Aspects

4.0 Statistical Methods for Quality Control and Improvement

1. Control Chart (under Statistical Process Control or SPC) - process monitoring
technique → when unusual sources of variability are present, sample averages will plot
outside the control limits → signal that some investigation of the process should be
made and corrective action to remove these unusual sources of variability taken
a. Center line (CL) - where the process characteristics should fall if there are no
unusual sources of variation
b. Upper and lower control limits (UCL & LCL)
 2. Design of Experiments - for discovering the key variables that influence the CTQs of
interest in the process → reducing variability in the CTQs and determining the levels of
the control variables that optimize process performance
● When the important variables have been identified and the nature of relationship
between the important variables and the process output has been quantified
(thru regression analysis and time series analysis) → an on-line SPC technique
for monitoring and surveillance of the process can be employed
3. Acceptance Sampling - technique for inspecting only a subset of population and make
conclusions about the population
a. Outgoing inspection - inspection is performed immediately after the production
→ before the product is shipped to the customer
b. Incoming inspection - products are sampled as they are received from the
supplier
● Sampled lots may either be accepted or rejected (either scrap or rework)

Quality Engineering - systematic reduction of variability in the CTQs of the product

Fallout - units that do not conform to the specifications

NOTE: No quality improvement effort → Acceptance Sampling → Design of Experiments &

Statistical Process Control (SPC)

5.0 Management Aspects of Quality Improvement

NOTE: For statistical techniques to be effective, they must be implemented within and become
part of a management that is focused on quality improvement → ensures that statistical
techniques are deployed in all aspects of the business

Three Activities for Effective Management of Quality:

1. Quality Planning - strategic activity that involves listening to the Voice of the
Customers (VOC) → identifying customers and their needs → then ideate for products
 or services that will meet or exceed customer expectations → determine how the
products and services will be realized
2. Quality Assurance - activities that ensure that the quality levels of products and
services are properly maintained and that the supplier and customer quality issues are
properly resolved; emphasis on documentation of the quality system (which has 4
components)
a. Policy - what is to be done and why
b. Procedures - Methods and personnel that will implement the policy
c. Work Instructions and Specifications - specific instructions to carry out the
tasks
d. Records - used to track specific units or batches of product, so that it can be
determined exactly how they were produced → data for dealing with customer
complaints, corrective actions, and if necessary, product recalls.
3. Quality Control and Improvement - activities used to ensure that the
products/services meet requirements and are improved on a continuous basis; its major
tools are SPC and DOE; often done on a project-by-project basis and involves teams
led by personnel with specialized knowledge of statistical methods and experience

5.1 Quality Philosophy and Management Strategies

NOTE: Three individuals emerged as leaders in terms of implementation and management

philosophy
1. Edwards Deming - Firmly believed that the responsibility for quality rests with
management → strong emphasis on organizational change and the role of management
in guiding this change process
● Deming’s 14 Points: An important framework for implementing quality and productivity
improvement
○ Constancy of purpose for improvement: Think long term → management tends
to be driven by quarterly business results and doesn’t always focus on strategies
that benefit the organization in the long run (e.g. investment in research,
development, & innovation)
 ○ Reject poor workmanship, defective products, or bad service (costs of these
drains the company’s resources)
○ Quality results from prevention of defectives through process improvement, not
inspection
○ Price is a meaningful measure of a supplier’s product only if it is considered in
relation to a measure of quality.
○ Continuous improvement → involve the workforce & use statistical methods
○ Invest in on-the-job training for all employees (technical aspects of their job and
in quality improvement methods)
○ Do not supervise for passive surveillance, focus on helping the employees
improve the system in which they work
○ Management must do something to eliminate fear of the workers to ask
questions, report problems, or point out conditions that are barriers to quality
and effective production
○ Promote teamwork among different organizational units
○ A target such as “zero defects” is useless without a plan on how to achieve it
○ Management must eliminate numerical quotas and work standards
○ Powerful statistical techniques should be mandatory for all employees (e.g.
control chart)
○ The top management of the organization should vigorously advocate the first 13
points
● Recommended the Shewhart Cycle or PDCA Cycle as a model guide to improvement:
○ Plan - propose a change in the system that is aimed at improvement
○ Do - Carry out the change
○ Check - Analyze the result of the change
○ Act - either adopt the change, or if it was unsuccessful, abandon it
2. Joseph Juran - one of the founding fathers of the quality-control and improvement field
→ his management philosophy focuses on planning, control, and improvement (Juran
Trilogy)
 ● Planning: identify the customers & their needs → design products/services that
meets customer needs → develop the process for producing the product →
plan for quality improvement projects
● Control: Ensuring that the products or service meet the requirements (use SPC)
● Improvement: Aims to achieve performance level higher than the current;
project-by-project basis
○ Breakthrough improvement - result of studying the process and
identifying a set of changes that result in a large, relatively rapid
improvement in performance
NOTE: Juran always urged a project-by-project approach to improving quality
3. Armand Feigenbaum - concept of total quality control/company wide quality control
● Three step approach to improving quality:
○ Quality leadership
○ Quality technology - statistical methods
○ Organizational commitment
● Initially suggested that much of the technical capability be concentrated in a
specialized department
● Organizational aspect of his philosophy: quality improvement requires a lot of
management commitment to make it work

NOTE: Similarities of philosophies of Deming, Juran, and Feigenbaum

1. Quality is an essential competitive weapon
2. Management has an important role in implementing quality improvement
3. Statistical methods and techniques are important in quality transformation

Total Quality Management - strategy for implementing and managing quality improvement
activities on an organizational basis → focus all elements of the organization around the quality
improvement goal → focal point is the philosophies of Deming and Juran
● Core principles: Customer focus, employee involvement, process-approach, system
integration, systematic approach, continuous improvement, fact-based decisions,
communication
ISO 9000 series - A set of international standards developed by the International Standards
Organization (ISO); demonstrates a supplier’s ability to control its processes; heavy focus on
documentation of quality system
● ISO 9000:2000 Quality Management System – Fundamentals and Vocabulary
● ISO 9001:2000 Quality Management System – Requirements
● ISO 9004:2000 Quality Management System – Guidelines for Performance Improvement

Six Sigma -developed by Motorola in the late 1980s; focuses on reducing variability in CTQs to
the level at which failures or defects are extremely unlikely → reduce the variability in the
process so that the specification limits are at least six standard deviations from the mean
● Typically 4 to 6 months in duration
● Goal: 3.4 defect ppm
● Utilized specially trained individuals called “belts” to handle the projects

Evolution of Six Sigma:

1. Gen I: defect elimination & basic variability reduction
2. Gen II: Gen I + cost reduction
3. Gen III: Gen II + value creation (e.g. improved customer satisfaction)

Structure of a Six Sigma Project Group:

1. Champions - Business leaders with conceptual understanding of Six Sigma; supports
the team by removing obstacles to project completion
2. Master Black Belts (MBB) - LSS experts with thorough understanding of the
methodology → mentors and coaches black belts; plays a strategic role in the
organization → advising senior management on high impact improvement opportunities
3. Black Belts - Leads cross-divisional improvement efforts; facilitates Green Belt and
Yellow Belt trainings; Advises MBBs and champions on local-level improvements to
support strategic initiatives; Coaches Green Belts in completing local-level
(departmental) improvements
 4. Green Belts - Trained in fundamental six sigma concepts; can lead improvement teams
in using some six sigma tools; aware of the full potential of six sigma methodology, able
to engage BBs and MBBS in advanced tools to support the efforts that they are leading;
Leads local improvements in their areas of expertise; generally do not have full-time six
sigma responsibilities
5. Yellow Belts - have a general understanding of six sigma principles, no full-time six
sigma responsibilities; ideal team members for improvement initiatives because of their
understanding of six sigma

Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) - Takes the variability reduction and process improvement
philosophy of six sigma upstream from manufacturing or production into the design process,
where new products are designed and developed → spans the entire development process
from the identification of customer needs to the final launch of the new product or service
● Customer input is obtained through VOC activities to determine what the customer
really wants → set priorities based on actual customer wants → determine if the
business can meet those needs at a competitive price that will enable to make profit
● VOC data is usually obtained through customer interviews, direct interaction and
observation of customer, FGDs, surveys, and analysis of customer satisfaction data →
will be used to develop a set of CTQs for the products/service
● DFSS is focused on improving business results by increasing the sales revenue
generated from new products and services and finding new applications or
opportunities for existing ones → reduction of development lead time
● DMADV (Define, Measure, Analyze, Design, Verify)

Lean Systems - eliminate waste (unnecessary long cycle times, or waiting times between
value-added work activities, rework, and scrap) and improve cycle time

Process Cycle Efficiency = Value-added time / Process Cycle Time

● Value-added time → amount of time actually spent in the process that transforms the
form, fit, or function of the product or service that results in something for which the
customer is willing to pay
Process Cycle Time = Work-in-process / Average Completion Rate
● Average completion rate → output of a process over a defined time period

Just in Time (JIT) Approach - emphasizes in-process inventory reduction, rapid set-up, and a
pull-type production system
Poka-Yoke - mistake proofing process

NOTE: The “I” in DMAIC may become DFSS

6.0 The Link Between Quality and Productivity; Quality Costs

Terms:
1. First-past yield
2. Fallout
3. Manufacturing cost per good part
4. Total Yield

Reasons why the cost of quality should be explicitly considered in the organization:
1. Increase in the cost of quality due to increase in the complexity of manufactured
products (more parts = more complex = high potential for defects) associated with
advances in technology
2. Increasing awareness of life-cycle costs (maintenance, spare parts, and the cost of field
failures)
3. Quality engineers and managers can most effectively communicate quality issues in a
way that management understands

NOTE: Quality costs have emerged as a financial control tool for management and as an aid in
identifying opportunities for reducing costs
Quality Costs - categories of costs that are associated with producing, identifying, avoiding, or
repairing products that do not meet requirements

A. Prevention Costs - directed toward prevention of nonconformance → cost incurred in

an effort to “make it right the first time”
a. Quality Planning and Engineering - creation of the overall quality plan,
inspection plan, reliability plan, data system, and preparation of manuals and
procedures used to communicate the quality plan; and costs of auditing system
b. New Products Review - evaluation of new designs from a quality viewpoint,
preparation of tests and experimental programs to evaluate the performance of
new products
c. Product/Process Design - design of the product or the selection of the
production processes that are intended to improve the overall quality of the
product
d. Process Control - Cost of process control techniques like control charts
e. Burn-in - Testing products under extreme conditions to prevent early-life failures
f. Training (workers)
g. Quality Data Acquisition and Analysis - cost of running the data system to
acquire data on product and process performance; analyzing the data into
problems, summarizing and publishing information for management
B. Appraisal Costs - cost associated with measuring, evaluating, or auditing products,
components, and purchased materials to ensure conformance to the standards that
have been imposed
a. Inspection and Test of Incoming Materials - receiving inspection and test;
inspection, test, and evaluation at the vendor’s place
b. Product Inspection and Test - checking the conformance of the product
throughout its various stages of manufacturing (includes final acceptance
sampling, packing, and shipping checks, and any tests done at the customer’s
facilities prior to turning the product over to the customer
c. Materials and Services Consumed - materials and products consumed in a
reliability tests
 d. Maintaining Accuracy of the Test Equipment - cost of operating a system that
keeps the measuring instruments and equipment in calibration
C. Internal Failure Costs - costs incurred when products, components, materials, and
services fail to meet quality requirements, and this failure is discovered prior to delivery
of the product to the customer
a. Scrap - net loss of labor, materials, and overhead resulting from defective
products
b. Rework - cost of correcting nonconforming units so that they meet
specifications
c. Retest - cost of reinspection and retesting of products that have undergone
rework
d. Failure Analysis - cost incurred to determine the causes of product failures
e. Downtime - cost of idle production facilities that results from nonconformance
to requirements
f. Yield Losses - Cost of process yields that are lower than might be attainable by
improved controls
g. Downgrading/off-specing - price differential between normal selling price and
any selling price that might be obtained for a product that does not meet
customer requirements → products sold do not recover the full contribution
margin to profit and overhead as do products that conform to the usual
specifications
D. External Failure Costs - occur when the product does not perform satisfactorily after it
is delivered to the customer
a. Complaint adjustment - costs of investigation and adjustment of justified
complaints
b. Returned product/material - costs associated with receipt, handling, and
replacement of nonconforming units
c. Warranty charges
d. Liability costs
e. Failure Analysis
 f. Indirect costs - customer dissatisfaction = negative attitude of the customer
toward the company; loss of business reputation, loss of future business, and
loss of market share

Prevention Costs
Cost of Attaining Quality
Appraisal Costs

Internal Failure Costs

Cost of Poor Quality (COPQ)
External Failure Costs

Leverage Effect - investment in COAQ have a payoff in reducing costs incurred in COPQ

Topic: DMAIC: Overview, Define, Measure

1.0 Overview of the DMAIC

DMAIC - structure problem-solving approach widely used in quality and process improvement;
not necessarily tied to Six-Sigma, and can be used regardless of an organization’s use of
Six-Sigma.
● The improve step in DMAIC sometimes become DFSS → when the process is operating
so badly that it is necessary to abandon the original process and start over, or if it is
determined that a new product or service is required
● Concentrates on the process that creates the output
● Used to complete projects by implementing solutions that solve root causes of quality
and process problems
● Solutions are permanent and replicable
● Used when a product or service is not meeting customer specifications or not
performing adequately
Tollgates: this is where the projects are reviewed before proceeding to the next phase →
project team presents work to managers and “owners” of the process → participants would
also include the project champion, master black belts, and other black belts not working
directly on the process
● Ensures that the project is on-track
● Opportunity to give guidance on use of specific tools or other info about the problem
● Organizational problems, other barriers to success, and strategies to deal with these are
identified

Project selection: selecting, managing, and completing projects successfully is critical in

deploying any systematic business improvement effort
● Project should represent a potential breakthrough and evaluated in terms of financial
benefit
● Value opportunity must be clearly identified and aligned with business objectives at the
highest corporate level (i.e. returns) and business unit or operations level (i.e. factory
metrics)
● Projects should be able to be completed within a reasonable timeframe and should
have real business impact
● “A problem well-defined is a problem half-solved!”

Lean Six Sigma:

● Lean - systematic approach to reduce/eliminate activities that do not add value to the
process → emphasis on waste (muda) elimination [Visual Techniques]
● Six Sigma - Data-driven methodology to continuously improve process to have 3.4
defects ppm → emphasis on variability reduction [Statistical Techniques]

2.0 Define Phase

Objectives:
1. Identify the project opportunity and to verify that it represents legitimate breakthrough
potential
 2. Define critical customer requirements
3. Document (map) processes - graphic aids facilitate understanding about what needs to
be changed in the process
● SIPOC Diagram - gives simple overview of a process and are useful for
understanding and visualizing basic process elements; tells us where the
process starts and where it ends
4. Establish project charter, build team
● Project Charter - short document that contains a description of the following:
○ Business Case - why is the project important?
○ Problem/Opportunity Statement - define the issue being resolved
○ CTQs - specify the problem from a customer perspective (may not be
known until the Measure Phase)
○ Goal Statement - define the objective of the project
○ Project Scope - what is and what isn’t included?
○ Project Plan - summarize milestones and provisional dates to the goal
○ Team Structure - identify who is involved and their responsibilities
Questions Answered:
1. What is the problem?
2. What is the goal/objective?
3. Who are the customers?
4. What are the critical stages of the process

3.0 Measure Phase - evaluate and understand the current state of the process → collecting
data on measures of quality, cost, throughput/cycle time

Objectives:
1. Determine what to measure - a list of all the key process input variables (KPIV) and key
process output variables (KPOV) → how does it relate to customer satisfaction and
CTQs?
● there must be sufficient data to allow thorough analysis and understanding of
current process performance with respect to the key metrics
 2. Manage measurement data collection - examining historical records (may not always be
satisfactory), observational study, work sampling → will be the basis for determining the
baseline performance
● There must be comprehensive process flow chart or VSM → All major process
steps and activities, suppliers and customers must be identified
○ Identify areas where queues and work-in-process accumulates → queue
length, waiting time, and work-in process levels
○ process cycle time can also be divided into value added and non-value
added activities to estimate process cycle efficiency and process cycle
time
3. Develop and validate measurement systems - Capability of the measurement system
4. Determine Sigma performance level
● Baseline Performance - current state of the process
● Display the data collected graphically

Questions Answered:
1. What is the baseline?
2. What is the defect rate?

4.0 Analyze Phase - use data from measure phase to determine the cause-and-effect
relationships in the process and understand the sources of variability; verify the root cause of
variation; prioritize opportunities to improve (which of the problems causing variation should be
addressed)
● Common Causes - sources of variability are embedded in the system or process itself
(e.g. inadequate training of personnel)
● Assignable Causes - arise from external source (e.g. tool failure on a machine)

Questions Answered:
● What are the sources of variation?
● What are the root causes of defects?
Tools:
● Stream Diagnostic Chart - helps visually map which causes may be attributed to which
effects; helpful for prioritization (Management, Social, Technology, Physical factors)
● 5 Whys
● Statistical Hypothesis Testing and Confidence Interval Estimation - can be used to
determine if different conditions of operation produce statistically significantly different
results & accuracy with which parameters of interest have been estimated
● Regression Analysis - allows models relating outcome variable of interest to
independent variables to be built
● Failure modes and effects analysis (FMEA) - used to prioritize the different potential
sources of variability, failures, errors, or defects in a product based on risk priority
number (RPN)

NOTE: Analyze tools are used with historical data or data that was collected in the measure
step. This data is often very useful in providing clues about potential causes of the problems
that the process is experiencing → A list of specific opportunities and root causes that are
targeted for action in the improve phase should be developed.

5.0 Improve Phase - develop and evaluate the solution/s to address the problem; turning to
creative thinking about the specific changes that can be made in the process and other things
that can be done to have the desired impact on process performance
Questions answered:
● How do we change the process?
● How do we verify that the changes will improve the process?
Activities:
● Directly address the cause
● Brainstorm potential solutions
● Prioritized solutions based on the VOC
● Test if the solution can solve the problem (Pilot Study)
○ Pilot test - confirmation experiment → evaluates and documents the solution
and confirms the solutions attains project goals (iterative)
Tools:
● Process redesign - improve workflow and reduce bottlenecks and work-in process will
make extensive use of flowcharts/or value stream maps
● Mistake Proofing - designing an operation so that it can be done only one way → right
way
● Design of Experiments - can be used both for determining which factors influence the
outcome of a process and for determining the optimal combination of factor settings

6.0 Control Phase - Complete all remaining work on the project and hand off the improved
process to the process owner, along with process control plan, and other necessary
procedures to ensure project gains are institutionalized

Questions answered:
1. Are the improvements consistent over time?
2. How do we maintain the improvements into the future?

Activities:
1. Standardize and sustain solutions overtime
2. Institutionalize the improvements through modification systems and structures (staffing,
training, incentives, documentation)
3. Define the roles of every relevant member in maintaining the “new” process

Output:
1. Transition Plan - ensure a smooth transition to the improved process
2. Process Control Plan - to monitor the new processes, documenting elements of
quality control to ensure set of quality standards are met
3. Response Plan - how to respond when nonconformities are detected

Topic: Modelling Process Quality; Intro to SPC; Designing CCs