12-05-2011, 11:40 AM
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INTRODUCTION
Quality function deployment (QFD) is a “method to transform user demands into design quality, to deploy the functions forming quality, and to deploy methods for achieving the design quality into subsystems and component parts, and ultimately to specific elements of the manufacturing process.”, as described by Dr. Yoji Akao, who originally developed QFD in Japan in 1966, when the author combined his work in quality assurance and quality control points with function deployment used in Value Engineering.
Quality function deployment (QFD) is defined by Cecilia Temponi, John Yen and W.Amos Tiao as “a multiattribute measurement method that brings together major components of an organization and the complex task of capturing customer’s expectations and ultimately delivering customer satisfaction”.
Quality function deployment is a customer driven tool in implementing total quality management. Among lots of TQM methods, QFD has been used to translate customer needs and wants into technical design requirements by integrating marketing, design engineering, manufacturing, and other relevant functions of an organization.(Akao, 1990)
As an approach to design, QFD is a concept that Akao introduced in Japan in 1966. It was first put into use at Mitsubishi’s Kobe shipyard site in 1972,and then Toyota and its suppliers developed it further for a rust prevention study. After the concept of QFD was introduced in the US by King in 1983, many US firms, such as Procter Gamble, Raychem, Digital Equipment, Hewlett-Packard, AT&T, ITT, GM and Ford applied QFD to improving communication, product development, and measurement of processes and systems (Park,1998).
QFD is designed to help planners focus on characteristics of a new or existing product or service from the viewpoints of market Segments Company, or technology-development needs. The technique yields graphs and matrices.
QFD helps transform customer needs (the voice of the customer) into engineering characteristics (and appropriate test methods) for a product or service, prioritizing each product or service characteristic while simultaneously setting development targets for product or service.
Quality function deployment (QFD) is a planning tool used to fulfill customer expectations. It is a disciplined approach to product design, engineering, production and provides in-depth evaluation of a product.
QFD focuses on customer requirements often referred as “voice of customer”. Words used by customers to describe their expectations are known as voice of customer.
QFD is a team based management tool in which customer expectations are used to drive the product development process
QFD stands for quality function deployment. Quality function deployment is a structured method in which customer requirements are translated into appropriate technical requirements for each stage of product development and production. The QFD process is often referred to as listening to the voice of the customer and is considered a tool of concurrent engineering. Basically, QFD relates the customer requirements (product specifications) to the product design parameters in a mathematical manner. The result of this is a product design driven by math.
The advantages that would be realized through the use of QFD include a reduction in the time required for product design as well as a reduction is those costs associated with the process. This is possible because the design alternatives are realized much earlier in the process thus reducing the number of corrections and design errors. Also, a higher level of clarity for decision making is gained through the use of this tool.
Yoji Akao defined QFD as a method for developing a design quality aimed at satisfying the consumer and then translating the consumer's demands into design targets and major quality assurance points to be used throughout the production phase. The main features of QFD are its focus on meeting customer needs through the use of their actual statements (termed the "Voice of the Customer"), its facilitation of multidisciplinary team work and the use of a comprehensive matrix for documenting information, perceptions and decisions. This matrix is commonly referred to as the "House of Quality" and is often perceived to represent QFD in its entirety. In addition to the "House of Quality" matrix, QFD utilizes "Seven Management and Planning Tools” which are used in many of its procedures:
1. Affinity diagrams.
2. Relations diagrams.
3. Hierarchy trees.
4. Matrices and tables.
5. Process Decision Program Diagrams (PDPC)
6. The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP)
7. Blueprinting
Affinity diagrams:-
This is a powerful method used by a team to organize and gain insight into a set of qualitative information, such as voiced customer requirements. Building an Affinity Diagram involves the recording of each statement onto separate cards which are then sorted into groups with a perceived association. A title card which summarizes the data within each group is selected from its members or is created where necessary. A hierarchy of association can be achieved by then sorting these title cards into higher level groups.
Hierarchy trees:-
A Hierarchy tree or Tree Diagram also illustrates the structure of interrelationships between groups of statements, but is built from the top down in an analytical manner. It is usually applied to an existing set of structured information such as that produced by building an Affinity Diagram and is used to account for flaws or incompleteness in the source data. Working down from the top a team can amendments at each level and the completed hierarchy can be drawn.
Matrices and tables:-
The matrix is a tool which lies at the heart of many QFD methods. By comparing two lists of items using a rectangular grid of cells, it can be used to document a team's perceptions of the interrelationships that exist, in a manner which can be later interpreted by considering the entries in particular cells, rows or columns. In a prioritization matrix the relative importance of items in a list and the strength of interrelationships are given numerical weightings (shown as numbers or symbols). The overall priority of the items of one list according to their relationships with another list can then be calculated.
Tables are also used in QFD to study the implications of gathered or generated items against a specified list of categories. Examples include production planning and analyzing customer statements in the Voice of Customer Table.
Relations diagrams:-
Relations diagrams or Interrelationship Di-graphs can be used to discover priorities, root causes of problems and unstated customer requirements.
Process Decision Program Diagrams (PDPC):-
PDPC are used to study potential failures of new processes and services.
The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP):-
AHP uses pair wise comparisons on hierarchically organized elements to produce an accurate set of priorities.
Blueprinting:-
Blueprinting is a tool used to illustrate and analyze all the processes involved in providing a service.
The House of Quality:-
The "House of Quality" matrix is the most recognized form of QFD. It is utilized by a multidisciplinary team to translate set of customer requirements, drawing upon market research and benchmarking data, into an appropriate number of prioritized engineering targets to be met by a new product design. There are many slightly different forms of this matrix and this ability to be adapted to the requirements of a particular problem or group of users forms one of its major strengths. The general format of the "House of Quality" is made up of six major components which are completed in the course of a QFD project:
1. Customer requirements (How’s):- a structured list of requirements derived from customer statements.
2. Technical requirements (What’s):- a structured set of relevant and measurable product characteristics.
3. Planning matrix:- illustrates customer perceptions observed in market surveys. Includes relative importance of customer requirements, company and competitor performance in meeting these requirements.
4. Interrelationship matrix:- illustrates the QFD team's perceptions of interrelationships between technical and customer requirements. An appropriate scale is applied, illustrated using symbols or figures. Filling this portion of the matrix involves discussions and consensus building within the team and can be time consuming. Concentrating on key relationships and minimizing the numbers of requirements are useful techniques to reduce the demands on resources.
5. Technical correlation (Roof) matrix: - used to identify where technical requirements support or impede each other in the product design .Can highlight innovation opportunities.
6. Technical priorities, benchmarks and targets: - used to record the priorities assigned to technical requirements by the matrix, measures of technical performance achieved by competitive products and the degree of difficulty involved in developing each requirement. The final output of the matrix is a set of target values for each technical requirement to be met by the new design, which are linked back to the demands of the customer
INTRODUCTION
Quality function deployment (QFD) is a “method to transform user demands into design quality, to deploy the functions forming quality, and to deploy methods for achieving the design quality into subsystems and component parts, and ultimately to specific elements of the manufacturing process.”, as described by Dr. Yoji Akao, who originally developed QFD in Japan in 1966, when the author combined his work in quality assurance and quality control points with function deployment used in Value Engineering.
Quality function deployment (QFD) is defined by Cecilia Temponi, John Yen and W.Amos Tiao as “a multiattribute measurement method that brings together major components of an organization and the complex task of capturing customer’s expectations and ultimately delivering customer satisfaction”.
Quality function deployment is a customer driven tool in implementing total quality management. Among lots of TQM methods, QFD has been used to translate customer needs and wants into technical design requirements by integrating marketing, design engineering, manufacturing, and other relevant functions of an organization.(Akao, 1990)
As an approach to design, QFD is a concept that Akao introduced in Japan in 1966. It was first put into use at Mitsubishi’s Kobe shipyard site in 1972,and then Toyota and its suppliers developed it further for a rust prevention study. After the concept of QFD was introduced in the US by King in 1983, many US firms, such as Procter Gamble, Raychem, Digital Equipment, Hewlett-Packard, AT&T, ITT, GM and Ford applied QFD to improving communication, product development, and measurement of processes and systems (Park,1998).
QFD is designed to help planners focus on characteristics of a new or existing product or service from the viewpoints of market Segments Company, or technology-development needs. The technique yields graphs and matrices.
QFD helps transform customer needs (the voice of the customer) into engineering characteristics (and appropriate test methods) for a product or service, prioritizing each product or service characteristic while simultaneously setting development targets for product or service.
Quality function deployment (QFD) is a planning tool used to fulfill customer expectations. It is a disciplined approach to product design, engineering, production and provides in-depth evaluation of a product.
QFD focuses on customer requirements often referred as “voice of customer”. Words used by customers to describe their expectations are known as voice of customer.
QFD is a team based management tool in which customer expectations are used to drive the product development process
QFD stands for quality function deployment. Quality function deployment is a structured method in which customer requirements are translated into appropriate technical requirements for each stage of product development and production. The QFD process is often referred to as listening to the voice of the customer and is considered a tool of concurrent engineering. Basically, QFD relates the customer requirements (product specifications) to the product design parameters in a mathematical manner. The result of this is a product design driven by math.
The advantages that would be realized through the use of QFD include a reduction in the time required for product design as well as a reduction is those costs associated with the process. This is possible because the design alternatives are realized much earlier in the process thus reducing the number of corrections and design errors. Also, a higher level of clarity for decision making is gained through the use of this tool.
Yoji Akao defined QFD as a method for developing a design quality aimed at satisfying the consumer and then translating the consumer's demands into design targets and major quality assurance points to be used throughout the production phase. The main features of QFD are its focus on meeting customer needs through the use of their actual statements (termed the "Voice of the Customer"), its facilitation of multidisciplinary team work and the use of a comprehensive matrix for documenting information, perceptions and decisions. This matrix is commonly referred to as the "House of Quality" and is often perceived to represent QFD in its entirety. In addition to the "House of Quality" matrix, QFD utilizes "Seven Management and Planning Tools” which are used in many of its procedures:
1. Affinity diagrams.
2. Relations diagrams.
3. Hierarchy trees.
4. Matrices and tables.
5. Process Decision Program Diagrams (PDPC)
6. The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP)
7. Blueprinting
Affinity diagrams:-
This is a powerful method used by a team to organize and gain insight into a set of qualitative information, such as voiced customer requirements. Building an Affinity Diagram involves the recording of each statement onto separate cards which are then sorted into groups with a perceived association. A title card which summarizes the data within each group is selected from its members or is created where necessary. A hierarchy of association can be achieved by then sorting these title cards into higher level groups.
Hierarchy trees:-
A Hierarchy tree or Tree Diagram also illustrates the structure of interrelationships between groups of statements, but is built from the top down in an analytical manner. It is usually applied to an existing set of structured information such as that produced by building an Affinity Diagram and is used to account for flaws or incompleteness in the source data. Working down from the top a team can amendments at each level and the completed hierarchy can be drawn.
Matrices and tables:-
The matrix is a tool which lies at the heart of many QFD methods. By comparing two lists of items using a rectangular grid of cells, it can be used to document a team's perceptions of the interrelationships that exist, in a manner which can be later interpreted by considering the entries in particular cells, rows or columns. In a prioritization matrix the relative importance of items in a list and the strength of interrelationships are given numerical weightings (shown as numbers or symbols). The overall priority of the items of one list according to their relationships with another list can then be calculated.
Tables are also used in QFD to study the implications of gathered or generated items against a specified list of categories. Examples include production planning and analyzing customer statements in the Voice of Customer Table.
Relations diagrams:-
Relations diagrams or Interrelationship Di-graphs can be used to discover priorities, root causes of problems and unstated customer requirements.
Process Decision Program Diagrams (PDPC):-
PDPC are used to study potential failures of new processes and services.
The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP):-
AHP uses pair wise comparisons on hierarchically organized elements to produce an accurate set of priorities.
Blueprinting:-
Blueprinting is a tool used to illustrate and analyze all the processes involved in providing a service.
The House of Quality:-
The "House of Quality" matrix is the most recognized form of QFD. It is utilized by a multidisciplinary team to translate set of customer requirements, drawing upon market research and benchmarking data, into an appropriate number of prioritized engineering targets to be met by a new product design. There are many slightly different forms of this matrix and this ability to be adapted to the requirements of a particular problem or group of users forms one of its major strengths. The general format of the "House of Quality" is made up of six major components which are completed in the course of a QFD project:
1. Customer requirements (How’s):- a structured list of requirements derived from customer statements.
2. Technical requirements (What’s):- a structured set of relevant and measurable product characteristics.
3. Planning matrix:- illustrates customer perceptions observed in market surveys. Includes relative importance of customer requirements, company and competitor performance in meeting these requirements.
4. Interrelationship matrix:- illustrates the QFD team's perceptions of interrelationships between technical and customer requirements. An appropriate scale is applied, illustrated using symbols or figures. Filling this portion of the matrix involves discussions and consensus building within the team and can be time consuming. Concentrating on key relationships and minimizing the numbers of requirements are useful techniques to reduce the demands on resources.
5. Technical correlation (Roof) matrix: - used to identify where technical requirements support or impede each other in the product design .Can highlight innovation opportunities.
6. Technical priorities, benchmarks and targets: - used to record the priorities assigned to technical requirements by the matrix, measures of technical performance achieved by competitive products and the degree of difficulty involved in developing each requirement. The final output of the matrix is a set of target values for each technical requirement to be met by the new design, which are linked back to the demands of the customer
