Quality function deployment
#1

INTRODUCTION


Quality function deployment is the conversion of the consumer's demands into quality characteristics and developing a designed quality for the finished product by systematically deploying the relationships between the demands and the characteristics, starting with the quality of each functional part and extending the deployment to each part process.
Dr, Mizuno, professor emeritus of the Tokyo institute of technology, is credited with initiating the quality function deployment (QFD) system. The first application of QFD was at Mitsubishi, heavy industries, ltd., in the Kobe Shipyard, Japan, in 1972. After four years of case study development, refinement, and training, QFD was successfully implemented in the production of mini vans by Toyota. Using 1977, as a base, a 20% reduction in startup costs was reported in the launch of the new van I October 1979, a 38% reduction by November 1982, and a cumulative 61% reduction by April 1984. Quality function deployment was first introduced in the United States in 1984 by Dr. Clausing of Xerox. QFD can be applied to practically any manufacturing or service industry. It has become a standard practice by most leading organizations, which also require it of their suppliers.
The QFD analysis include identifying customer needs and expectations, determining how to meet them, defining quantified goals, and methodologies for identifying and resolving conflicting requirements. One of the advantages of QFD analysis is that it deploys the "voice of the customer", and forces product development teams to focus on customer needs and expectations. As mentioned, the QFD is a relatively advanced concept, and is probably best employed when used in conjunction with other previously-implemented disciplines. Organizations that use QFD successfully prepare numerous matrices for the products concept development phase, detailed design work, and various phases of the products manufacture. The approach is the same focus on the customer's needs and expectations, and develop everything else in a manner than optimally satisfies these needs and expectations. This seminar also includes case study on NOKIA, its observations, voice of the customer research, optimizing, planning, prioritizing, selecting the target customer and benefits.


WHAT IS QFD?

A systematic procedure for translating the "VOICE OF THE CUSTOMER" into technical requirements and operational terms, displaying and documenting the translation information in matrix form.
Quality function deployment is a planning tool used to fulfill customer requirements or expectations, often referred to as the voice of the customer. It is employed to translate customer in terms of specific requirements, into directions and actions, in terms of engineering characteristics, that can be deployed through
" Product planning
" Part development
" Process planning
" Production planning
" service
QFD is a team based management tool in which the customer expectations are used to drive the product development process. Conflicting characteristics or requirements are identified early in the QFD process and can be resolved before production.

Organization today uses market research to decide what to produce to satisfy customer requirements. Some customer requirements adversely affect others, and customers often cannot explain their expectations. Confusion and misinterpretation are also a problem while a product moves from a market to design to engineering to manufacturing. This activity is where the voice of the customer becomes lost and the voice of the organization adversely enters the

product design. Instead of working on what the customer expects, work is concentrated on fixing what the customer does not want. In other words, it is not productive to improve something that the customer did not want initially. By implementing QFD, an organization is guaranteed to implement the voice of the customer in the final product.

QFD helps identify new quality technology and job functions to carry out operations. This tool provides a historic reference to enhance future technology and prevent design errors. QFD is primarily a set of graphically oriented planning matrices that are used as the basis for decisions affecting any phase of the product development cycle. Results of QFD are measured based on the number of design and engineering changes, time to market, cost, and quality. It is considered by many experts to be a perfect blueprint for quality by design.

QFD enables the design phase to concentrate on the customer requirements, thereby spending less time on redesign and modifications. The saved time has been estimated at one-third to one-half of the time taken for redesign and modification using traditional means. This saving means reduced development cost and also additional income because the product enters the markets sooner.
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#2

CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION


Quality function deployment is the conversion of the consumer’s demands into quality characteristics and developing a designed quality for the finished product by systematically deploying the relationships between the demands and the characteristics, starting with the quality of each functional part and extending the deployment to each part process.
Dr, Mizuno, professor emeritus of the Tokyo institute of technology, is credited with initiating the quality function deployment (QFD) system. The first application of QFD was at Mitsubishi, heavy industries, ltd., in the Kobe Shipyard, Japan, in 1972. After four years of case study development, refinement, and training, QFD was successfully implemented in the production of mini vans by Toyota. Using 1977, as a base, a 20% reduction in startup costs was reported in the launch of the new van I October 1979, a 38% reduction by November 1982, and a cumulative 61% reduction by April 1984. Quality function deployment was first introduced in the United States in 1984 by Dr. Clausing of Xerox. QFD can be applied to practically any manufacturing or service industry. It has become a standard practice by most leading organizations, which also require it of their suppliers.

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CHAPTER 2
WHAT IS QFD?


A systematic procedure for translating the “VOICE OF THE CUSTOMER” into technical requirements and operational terms, displaying and documenting the translation information in matrix form.
Quality function deployment is a planning tool used to fulfill customer requirements or expectations, often referred to as the voice of the customer. It is employed to translate customer in terms of specific requirements, into directions and actions, in terms of engineering characteristics, that can be deployed through
• Product planning
• Part development
• Process planning
• Production planning
• service
QFD is a team based management tool in which the customer expectations are used to drive the product development process. Conflicting characteristics or requirements are identified early in the QFD process and can be resolved before production.

Organization today uses market research to decide what to produce to satisfy customer requirements. Some customer requirements adversely affect others, and customers often cannot explain their expectations. Confusion and misinterpretation are also a problem while a product moves from a market to design to engineering to manufacturing. This activity is where the voice of the customer becomes lost and the voice of the organization adversely enters the

product design. Instead of working on what the customer expects, work is concentrated on fixing what the customer does not want. In other words, it is not productive to improve something that the customer did not want initially. By implementing QFD, an organization is guaranteed to implement the voice of the customer in the final product.

QFD helps identify new quality technology and job functions to carry out operations. This tool provides a historic reference to enhance future technology and prevent design errors. QFD is primarily a set of graphically oriented planning matrices that are used as the basis for decisions affecting any phase of the product development cycle. Results of QFD are measured based on the number of design and engineering changes, time to market, cost, and quality. It is considered by many experts to be a perfect blueprint for quality by design.

QFD enables the design phase to concentrate on the customer requirements, thereby spending less time on redesign and modifications. The saved time has been estimated at one-third to one-half of the time taken for redesign and modification using traditional means. This saving means reduced development cost and also additional income because the product enters the markets sooner.

CHAPTER 3
THE VOICE OF THE CUSTOMER


Because QFD concentrates on customer expectations and needs a considerable amount of effort is put into research to determine customer expectations. This process increases the initial planning stage of the project definition phase I the development cycle. But the result is a total reduction of the overall cycle time in bringing to the market a product that satisfies the customer.

The driving force behind QFD is that the customer dictates the attributes of a product. Customer satisfaction, like quality, is defined as a meeting or exceeding customer expectations. Words used by the customers to describe their expectations are often referred to as the voice of the customer. Sources for determining customer expectations are focus groups, surveys, complaints, consultants, standards and federal regulations. Frequently, customer expectations are vague and general in nature. It is the job of the QFD team to break down these customer expectations into more specific customer requirements. Customer requirements must be taken literally and not incorrectly translated into what organization official desire.

QFD begins with marketing to determine what exactly the customer desires from a product. During the information, the QFD team must continually ask and answer numerous questions, such as

1. What does the customer really want?
2. What are the customer’s expectations?
3. Are the customer’s expectations used to drive the design process?
4. What can the design team do to achieve customer satisfaction?

The goal of QFD is not only to meet as many customer expectations and needs as possible, but also to exceed customer expectations. Each QFD team must make its product either more appealing than the existing product or more appealing than the product of the competitor. This situation implies that the team has to introduce an expectation or need in its product that the customer is not expecting but would appreciate. For example, cup holders were put into automobiles as an extra bonus, but customer liked them so well that they are now expected in all new automobiles.

PROCESS STEPS
The QFD process from the beginning to the end is shown in the flow diagram.

Fig. 3.1 Process Steps

The first chart in the flow diagram is for the product –planning phase. For each of the customer requirements, a set of design requirements is determined which is satisfied, will result in achieving customer requirements. The next chart in the flow diagram is for part development. Design requirements from the first chart are carried to the next chart to establish part- quality characteristics. The term part - quality characteristics is applied to any elements that can aid in measuring the evolution of quality. This chart breaks down the design requirements into specific part details. Once the part-quality characteristics have been defined, key process operations can be defined in the process-planning phase. The next step is process planning, where key process operation are determined from part-quality characteristics. Finally, production requirements are determined from the key process operation.
Numerous other house of quality planning charts can be used to improve quality and customer satisfaction. Some of these are the following
1. The demanded quality chart uses analysis of competitors to establish selling points.
2. The quality control process chart shows the nature of measuring and corrective actions when a problem arises.
3. The reliability deployment chart is done to ensure a product will perform as desired. Tests are done, such as failure mode and effective analysis (FMEA), to determine the failure modes for each part.
4. The technology deployment chart searches for the advanced or, more importantly, the proper technologies for the operations.

The use of these charts is dependant upon the type of product and scope of the project.



CHAPTER 4
ORGANISATION OF INFORMATION


Numerous methods include affinity diagrams, interrelationship diagrams, tree diagrams, and cause-and-effect diagrams. These methods are ideal for sorting large amounts of information. The affinity diagram, which is ideally, suited for most QFD applications.

AFFINITY DIAGRAM

The affinity diagram is a tool that gathers a large amount of data and subsequently organizes the data into groupings based on their natural interrelationships.

The diagram allows the team to creatively generate a large amount of ideas issues and then logically group them for problem understanding and possible breakthrough solution.

The procedure is to state the issue in a full sentence, brainstorm using short sentences on self -adhesive notes, post them for the team to see, sort ideas into logical groups, and create concise descriptive headings for each group. Figure 1.2 shown below illustrates the technique.

Large groups should be divided into smaller groups with appropriate headings. Notes that stand alone could become headers or placed in a miscellaneous category. Affinity diagram encourage team creativity, break down barriers, facilitate breakthroughs, and stimulate ownership of the process.


Scrambled ideas


Ordered ideas
Figure 4.1 Affinity Diagram
An affinity diagram can be implemented when:
1. Thoughts are too widely dispersed or numerous to organize.
2. New solutions are needed to circumvent the more traditional ways of problem solving.
3. Support for a solution is essential for successful implementation.

This method should not be used when the problem is simple or a quickly solution is needed. The team needed to accomplish this goal effectively should be a multidisciplinary one that has the needed knowledge to delve into the various areas of the problem. A team of six to eight members should be adequate to assimilate all of the thoughts. Constructing an affinity diagram requires four simple steps:

1. Phrase the objective.
2. Record all responses.
3. Group the responses.
4. Organize groups in an affinity diagram.

The first step is to phrase the objective in a short and concise statement. It is imperative that the statement be as generalized and vague as possible. The second step is to organize a brainstorming session, in which responses to this statement are individually recorded on cards and listed on a pad. It is sometimes helpful to write down a summary of the discussion on the back of the cards so that, in the future when the cards are reviewed, the session can be briefly explained. Next all the cards should be sorted by placing the cards that seem to be related into groups. Then, a card or word is chosen that best describes each related group, which becomes the heading for each group of responses. Finally, lines are placed around each group of responses and related clusters are placed near each other with a connecting line.
CHAPTER 5
HOUSE OF QUALITY

The primary planning tool used in QFD is the house of quality. The house of quality translates the voice of the customer into design requirements that will meet specific Target values and matches those against how an organization will meet those requirements. Many managers and engineers consider the house of quality to be the primary chart in quality planning.
The structure of QFD can be thought of as a frame work of a house, as shown in Figure 5.1.


FIGURE 5.1 HOUSE OF QUALITY

The parts of the house of quality are described as follows:

• The exterior of the walls of the house are the customer requirements. On the left side is a listing of the voice of the customer, or what the customer expects in the product. On the right side, are the prioritized customer requirements on planning matrix.
• Listed are items such as customer bench marking, customer importance rating, and target value, scale of factor and sales points.
• The ceiling or second floor of the house contains technical descriptors. Consistency of the product is provided through engineering characteristics, design constraints and parameters.
• The interior walls of the house are the relationships between customer requirements and technical descriptors. Customer requirements (customer expectations) are translated into engineering characteristics (technical description)
• The roof of the house is the interrelationship between technical descriptors. Trade offs between similar and / or conflicting technical descriptors are identified.
• The foundation of the house is the prioritized technical descriptors. Items such as the technical bench marking degree of technical quality and target value are listed. This is the basic structure for the house of quality; once this format is understood, any other QFD matrices are fairly straight forward.




CHAPTER 6
BUILDING A HOUSE OF QUALITY


STEP 1: LIST CUSTOMER REQUIREMENTS (WHAT’s)
The left exterior wall of the house is the customer requirements. It deals with what a customer needs or expects in a particular product. The list of customers is divided into primary, secondary and tertiary requirements.
STEP 2: LIST TECHNICAL DESCRIPTORS (HOW’s)
The ceiling or second floor of the house contains technical descriptors The goal of the house of quality is to design or change the design of a product in away that meets or exceeds the customer expectations. Each engineering characteristic must directly affect a customer perception and be expressed in measurable terms. These characteristics are an expression of the voice of the customer. Brainstorming among the engineering staff is a suggested method for determining the technical descriptors.
STEP 3: RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CUSTOMER REQUIREMENTS AND TECHNICAL DESCRIPTORS
The next step in building a house of quality is to compare customer requirements and technical descriptors and determine their respective relationships. The interior walls of the house are the relationships between customer requirements and technical descriptors. Customer requirements (customer expectations) are translated into engineering characteristics (technical description).
STEP 4: DEVELOP AN INTERRELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EACH OF THE TECHNICAL DESCRIPTORS
The roof of the house is the interrelationship between technical descriptors. Trade-offs between similar and/or conflicting technical descriptors are identified.


STEP 5: COMPETITIVE ASSESSMENTS
The competitive assessments are a pair of weighted tables (or graphs) that depict item for item how competitive products compare with current organization products. The competitive assessment tables are separated into two categories, customer assessment and technical assessment.
 Customer competitive assessment
The customer competitive assessment is a good way to determine if the customer requirements have been met and identify areas to concentrate on in the next design. The customer competitive assessment also contains an appraisal of where an organization stands relative to its major competitors in terms of each customer requirements.
 Technical competitive assessment.
The technical competitive assessment is often useful in uncovering gaps in engineering judgment. When a technical descriptor directly relates to customer requirements, a comparison is made between the customer’s competitive evaluation and the objective measure ranking.
Customer requirements and technical descriptor that are strongly related should also exhibit a strong relationship in their competitive assessment. If an organizations technical assessment shows its product to be superior to the competition, then the competitive assessment should show a superior assessment. If the customer disagrees then a mistake in engineering judgment has occurred and should be corrected.

STEP 6: DEVELOP PRIORITIZED CUSTOMER REQUIREMENTS
Prioritized customer requirements make up a block of columns corresponding to each customer requirements in the house of quality on the right side of the competitive assessment.

STEP7: DEVELOP PRIORITIZED TECHNICAL DESCRIPTORS
The foundation of the house is the prioritized technical descriptors. The QFD team identifies technical descriptors that are most needed to fulfill customer requirements and need improvement. These measures provide specific objectives that guide the subsequent design and provide a means of objectivity to assess progress and minimize subjective opinion.
QUALITY
CHARACTERISTICS




CUSTOMERS
REQUIREMENTS 1ST LEVEL MOTOR LOAD BODY
2ND LEVEL POWER LOCATION TORQUE ANGLE OF THE FANS MATERIAL STRENGTH THICKNESS DENSITY
1ST LEVEL 2ND LEVEL 3RD LEVEL

X X
CLEANING FEEL COMFORTABLE WHILE USING LESS NOISY

LESSVIBRATION
EXHAUST DOES NOT BLOW TO USERS

EXHAUST AIR IS WEAK X
EXHAUST AIR DOES NOT CONTAIN DUST
STABLE AND STRONG ABSORPTION ABSORB ALL DUST



KEEP STRONG ABSORPTION EVEN DUST BAG IS FULL

STRONG RELATIONSHIP MEDIUM RELATIONSHIP
X WEAK RELATIONSHIP
Table 6.1 QFD Table for a Vacuum Cleaner to be designed
CHAPTER 7
CASE STUDY


NOKIA has been using QFD since the mid 1990s, learning of it after its successful introduction into the US automobile industry, which began in mid 1980s. The benefits of this approach included easier implementation and training. QFD, which includes several tools to better analyze the Voice of the customer, and more precise deployment matrices that address specific design requirements such as performance, function, technology, capability, as well as the components, manufacturing, and production phases. Nokia has been involved in the Japanese cellular phone market since 1994 when its first product for Japan was launched. Nokia has developed a stable market position since then but in terms of market share has not reached anything like its world position. This reflects the intense competition from Japanese manufacturers and the difficulty of understanding the Japanese culture, from the perspective of a western company.



VOICE OF CUSTOMER RESEARCH

Traditional customer research has focused on the testing of new products or product features that have already been developed to some level. The techniques used have been focus group discussions in the office of research agencies and telephone surveys. The objective of such research is to measure the attractiveness of the new product/feature as part of the new product development process.
An alternative customer research method focuses on customer needs or problems. This method is called “going to the GEMBA” and involves encounters with customers in the environment where they actually using the products. This method relies more on observation of customer behavior and direct interviewing of the customers. The outcome of such research is an understanding of customer needs and problems, which can feed into the earliest phases of the product/feature development process.

THE BENEFITS OF GEMBA* RESEARCH

Meeting different kinds of requirements is the key to achieving customer satisfaction. There are three types of customer requirements to consider, according to Dr. Noriaki Kano

• Normal Requirements
They are typically what we get by just asking customers what they want. These requirements satisfy (or dissatisfy) in proportion to their presence (or absence) in the product or service.

• Expected requirements
They are often so basic the customer may fail to mention them. They are basic expectations without which the product or service may cease to be of value; their absence is very dissatisfying .Further, meeting these requirements often goes unnoticed by most customers.


• Exciting requirements
They are difficult to discover. They are beyond the customer’s expectations. Their absence doesn’t dissatisfy; their presence excites. These are the things that wow the customers and bring them back. Since customers are not apt to voice these requirements, it is the responsibility of the organization to explore customer problems and opportunities to uncover such unspoken items. These requirements can shift over time, segment, or other external factors.


*a Japanese word for location
NOKIA’S OBSERVATIONS


Fig.7.2 Nokia’s Observation

OBSERVATIONS
• Many people were waiting to meet their friends and made phone calls and SMS messages to find them from the crowd.
• Mostly young people; few of the High Flyers or Assured, but many Trendsetters
• Young high school students wear phones around their neck
• "Salary-men" smoke while talking, either holding their cigarette in the other hand or talk with it hanging from their mouths
• Many people are carrying bags and other things (suite bag) in their hands while walking and being on the phone
• "Punk" style dressed young guy has similar color (mix colors of yellow and green) shoes and the cellular phone
Of course, each customer group produced a different structure, although we found that there was a remarkable degree of similarity between the structures.

CHAPTER 8
THE QFD TEAM

When an organization decides to implement QFD, the project manager and team members need to be able to commit a significant amount of time to it, especially in the early stages. The priorities of the projects need to be defined and told to all departments within the organization so tea members can budget their time accordingly. Also, the scope of the project must be clearly defined so questions about why the team was formed do not arise. One of the important tools in the QFD process is communication.

There are two types of team.
1. For the new product
2. For the existing product

Teams are composed of members from marketing, design, finance, quality and production. The existing product team has fewer members, because the QFD process will only need to be modified. Time and inter-team communication are two very important things that each team must utilize to their fullest potential. Using time effectively is the essential resource in getting the project done on schedule. Using inter-team communication to its extent will alleviate unforeseen problems and make the project run smoothly.

Team meetings are very important in the QFD process. The team leader needs to ensure that the meetings are run the most efficient manner and that the members are kept informed. The format needs to have some way of measuring how well the QFD process is working at each meeting and should be flexible, depending on certain situations. The duration of the meeting will rely on where the team’s members are coming from and what needs to be accomplished. These workshops may have to last for days if people are coming from around the world or for only hours if everyone is local. There are advantages to shorter meetings, and sometimes a lot more can be accomplished in a shorter meeting. Shorter meetings allow information to be collected between times that they will ensure that the right information is being entered into the QFD matrix. Also, they will keep the team focused on a quality improvement goal.

Products are the vehicle to deliver benefits to customer. Manufacturers like Nokia must assure that the products they create actually deliver the benefits that the customer value most. Thus to address several areas in the product development process

• Identify normal, expected, and exciting requirements
• Determine which are benefits and which are features, and mine feature requirements for underlying benefits.
• Have customers tell which benefits are most important, have them rate our current product and competitive products ability to satisfy those benefits.
• Improve weak features to meet those benefits that are important and under-performing.
• Assure that internal operations related to those features actually deliver.

OPTIMIZING THE PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT PROCESS
The QFD approach to detailed market study is the GEMBA research.
Prioritse and clarify numerical goals of the project.
• Determine which customers are critical to achieving these goals. Describe customers in terms of modes of uses.
• Design and conduct an observational study of the key customers in the act of using the subject product. Analyze observations and verbatim for latent requirements (exciting, expected, normal)
• Separate requirements into customer benefits and product features. Make sure to extract any new benefits from required product features. Structured benefits with affinity diagram to preserve paradigm of customer(not engineers)
• Deploy to product features using house of quality.

PROJECT OBJECTIVES

The first step was to define the objectives of the project. They translated this step has ‘defined objectives of the project’ which clarifies the focus of discussion, the team defined six objectives
1. Profit
2. Time to market
3. Brand
4. Technology reuse
5. Quality
6. Market share

Each of the objectives was defined by a smart model. This check the objectives were
• Specific
• Measurable
• Achievable
• Realistic
• Time related
This made shows that the objectives were clear and that a common understanding existed in the system.

PRIORITIZING THE OBJECTIVES

Since not all objectives were equally important to the success of the project, the team then defined priorities for the objectives. This was done using the AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) [Saaty 1990] where each objective was compared with each other. After asking themselves the question “which objective is more important, and why,” a consensus about the priorities was reached. This discussion yielded not only an agreement about the priorities but also a common understanding of the reasoning behind the decisions that were made. The graph below shows how the priorities worked out.


Fig 8.1 Prioritizing the Objectives

SELECTING THE TARGET CUSTOMER SEGMENTS

When choosing which customer GEMBA to research, they could have chosen their direct trade customers or members of the distribution channel; all of who have needs from Nokia’s mobile phone products. In fact, their trade customers (the mobile service operators) have a strong influence on the product specification. In the Japanese mobile phone market, the products are dual branded and the operators define that certain features must be included in the phones. However, Nokia decided to focus on end users, as it was perceived that this is where the biggest improvements in their understanding would come. Also it has been argued that the end users in any product supply chain are the most important members of that chain because they are the only ones putting money into the system – everyone else is taking money out (profits). Therefore, if the end users are happy then everyone in the chain will benefit.
For the task of choosing the customer segments that would best support the objectives of the project, Nokia had developed a segmentation model of mobile phone users, which it has used in its product planning activities. The segments are drawn according to the differing benefits that customers expect to derive from their mobile phone. These include such things as keeping in contact with family members for reassurance about their safety, and enhancement of work efficiency. Using a correlation matrix, the customer segments were analyzed by asking themselves the question; “if we target this segment, to what degree can we expect to achieve the objectives?” Nokia asked this question for all the segments and for each objective in turn. From the table, the top four segments were selected that best supported the weighted project objectives from above. The combined weights of the top 4 segments totaled 74%.


SELECTING THE GEMBA

The Nokia office is located in Tokyo and nokia wanted to make it as easy as possible for employees to take part in the research.
• 25% of the Japanese population lives in the Tokyo area.
• Due to the high population density and high penetration of mobile phones in Japan (currently 41%), it is very easy to find mobile phone users in public in Tokyo.
• The Japanese have a high awareness of the effect of their behavior on others around them. They avoid making or receiving phone calls in areas where others would be disturbed and prefer public places.
• A nation-wide survey of Japanese cellular phone usage behavior shows that70% of usage is either in public areas or on public transportation. These areas the company believes are sufficiently similar throughout the country.
After selecting the GEMBA the company realized that they would face some cultural barriers when trying to stop people and encourage them to talk about their mobile phone experiences. The issues that were considered are as follows:

• Thanks to the Aum incident, the Japanese are more conscious than ever about being approached by people on the street. There are also many men who aggressively recruit or flirt with women in ‘young’ areas such as the Shibuya area of Tokyo.
• People in Japan are naturally reluctant to voice their opinions in public to someone that they do not know. This is particularly true when the person asking them is also Japanese.
• Similarly, most Japanese will refuse to have their photo taken by other Japanese, but less so by foreigners. Foreigners are seen as tourists and so it is ok.
• (Probably not specific to Japan) People are naturally not comfortable with being approached by a group of four or more people. Even three is a bit too many.
For these reasons, the company selected the following approach.
• The research teams would comprise two people.
• One male, one female.
• One Japanese, one Gaijin (foreigner).
• The foreigner is assigned to observation and taking photographs of the GEMBA scene and customers.
• The Japanese person also observes, conducts interviews and makes notes of what the customers say.
The combination of male/female avoids putting the customer on their guard too much (males or females). The combination of Japanese/Gaijin is unusual and arouses the interest of the customer. Nokia found that customers were more likely to be open and express their opinions with a foreigner present, even though they do so in Japanese! Also the combination is less likely to be mistaken for representatives of a religious group (not very popular in Japan).

THE GEMBA EXPERIENCE

The visits have been running at the rate of about two per month but have slowed since the beginning of this year. The company decided to take stock and to analyze the results of the GEMBA visits to date. The company used the results of only five visits but this generated over 80 Voice of the Customer statements. These statements have been analyzed and turned into a tree structure of Demanded Quality statements with two levels of detail. This is how the company did the analysis:

• Extract the customer statements from the visit reports.
• Get the customers to organize the statements into groups (affinity diagram method).
• Turn the affinity diagram into a hierarchy of Demanded Quality statements (a tree structure).

Turn the Affinity Diagram into a Hierarchy of Demanded Quality Statements (Tree Structure)

The intention of this step was to ‘sort out’ the hierarchy. The company planned to align levels of detail, harmonize the language used in the statements and look for missing statements in the structure. At the same meeting the company planned to design the quantitative research to discover the customer importance rating for the statements.






RESULTS FROM THE GEMBA

‘Going to the GEMBA’ was planned as a continuous process and the GEMBA visits continue to this day. More and more people in the company are gaining experience and insight from observing and interviewing customers and the GEMBA Training Guide continues to be used as a reference.
Going to the GEMBA is becoming a popular job for Nokia people!
The main learning points from the GEMBA research project are as follows:
1. The company care in taking local situation and cultural issues into account really seems to have paid of. The research implementation has gone more smoothly than NOKIA could have hoped for and useful information was obtained immediately.
2. It has proved easy to recruit employees to ‘go to the GEMBA’. There seems to be an unmet need for employees to talk to customers. Perhaps this is commonsense!
3. It was surprising how much information could be gleaned from a few clues gained by observation and interviews. The company also quickly found that they encountered repeat situations and heard the same comments from customers. This infers that a good appreciation of any one particular GEMBA can be gleaned from just a few visits.
4. The analysis of the Voice of the Customer information was more difficult and took longer than we expected. This was despite the facilitation of an expert. NOKIA have concluded that QFD cannot be learned effectively from books or lectures. The facilitation of an experienced person is certainly required but there is no substitute for putting the methodology into action within a real life context. This is learning by doing!



CHAPTER 9
BENEFITS OF QFD


Quality function deployment was originally implemented too reduce start-up costs. Organizations using QFD have reported a reduced product development time.
 customer driven
 reduces implementation time
 time promotes teamwork
 provides documentation

CUSTOMER DRIVEN

Quality function deployment looks past the usual customer response and attempt to define the requirements in a set of basic needs, which are compared to all competitive information. All competitors are evaluated equally from customer and technical perspectives. This information can be prioritized using a Pareto diagram. Management can then place resources where they will be the most beneficial in improving quality. Also, QFD takes the experience and information that are available within an organization and puts them together as a structured format that is easy to assimilate. This is important when an organization employee leaves a particular project and a new employee is hired.

REDUCES IMPLEMENTATION TIME

Fewer engineering changes are needed when using QDFD, and, when used properly, all conflicting design requirements can be identified and addressed prior to production. This results in a reduction in retooling, operator training, and changes in traditional quality control measures. By using QFD, critical items are identified and can be monitored from product inception to production. Toyota reports that the quality of their product has improved by one- third since the implementation of QFD.

PROMOTES TEAMWORK

QFD forces a horizontal deployment of communication channels. Inputs are required from all facts of an organization, from marketing to production to sales, thus ensuring that the voice of the customer is being heard and that each department knows what the other ids doing. This activity avoids misinterpretation, opinions, and miscues. In other words, the left hand always knows what the right hand is doing. Efficiency and productivity always increase with enhanced teamwork.

PROVIDES DOCUMENTATION

A data base for future design or process improvements is crated. Data that are historically scattered within operations, frequently lost and often referenced out of context, are now saved in an orderly manner to serve future needs. This data base also serves as a training tool for new engineers. Quality function deployment is also very flexible when new information is introduced or things have to be changed on the QFD matrix.









CONCLUSION

Quality function deployment- specifically the house of quality- is an effective management tool in which customer expectations are used to drive the design process.
QFD forces the entire organization to constantly be aware of the customer requirements. Every QFD chart is a result of the original customer requirements that are not lost misinterpretations or lack of communication. Marketing benefits because specific sales points that have been identified by the customer can be stressed. Most importantly, implementing QFD results in a satisfied customer.


REFERENCE


POORNIMA M. CHARANTIMATH “TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT”
First Edition 2003- Page No. 48

DALE H. BESTERFIELD “TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT”
Third Edition 2004 - Page No. 315

AMITAVA MITRA “FUNDAMENTALS OF QUALITY CONTROL AND IMPROVEMENT” Second Edition 2002 -Page No. 94

http://google.com
http://clusty.com
http://informintel.com
http://qfdi.org

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