MBP1133 | Project Management Framework Prepared by Dr Khairul Anuar

L6 – Project Quality Management

www.notes638.wordpress.com

1. Introduction to Quality Management

• During the past twenty years, there has been a revolution in quality.

• Improvements have occurred not only in product quality, but also in

leadership quality and project management quality.

• The push for higher levels of quality appears to be customer driven.

Customers are now demanding:

Higher performance requirements

Faster product development

Higher technology levels

Materials and processes pushed to the limit

Lower contractor profit margins

Fewer defects/rejects

2

1. Introduction to Quality Management

3

1. Introduction to Quality Management

• One of the critical factors that can affect quality is market expectations. The

variables that affect market expectations include:

Salability: the balance between quality and cost

Produceability: the ability to produce the product with available technology

and workers, and at an acceptable cost

Social acceptability: the degree of conflict between the product or process

and the values of society (i.e., safety, environment)

Operability: the degree to which a product can be operated safely

Availability: the probability that the product, when used under given

conditions, will perform satisfactorily when called upon

Reliability: the probability of the product performing without failure under

given conditions and for a set period of time

Maintainability: the ability of the product to be retained in or restored to a

performance level when prescribed maintenance is performed

4

2. Definition of Quality

• Mature organizations readily admit that they cannot accurately

define quality. The reason is that quality is defined by the customer.

• The Kodak definition of quality is those products and services that

are perceived to meet or exceed the needs and expectations of the

customer at a cost that represents outstanding value.

• The ISO 9000 definition is “the totality of feature and characteristics

of a product or service that bears on its ability to satisfy stated or

implied needs.”

5

2. Definition of Quality

• Terms such as fitness for use, customer satisfaction, and zero defects

are goals rather than definitions.

• Most organizations view quality more as a process than a product. To

be more specific, it is a continuously improving process where lessons

learned are used to enhance future products and services in order to

Retain existing customers

Win back lost customers

Win new customers

6

2. Types of Quality

7

• Therefore, companies are developing quality improvement

processes.

• Figure 20–1 shows the five quality principles that support Kodak’s

quality policy.

• Figure 20–2 shows a more detailed quality improvement process.

• These two figures seem to illustrate that organizations are placing

more emphasis on the quality process than on the quality product

and, therefore, are actively pursuing quality improvements through a

continuous cycle.

2. Types of Quality

8

• Figure 20–1 shows the five quality principles that support Kodak’s

quality policy.

2. Types of Quality

9

• Figure 20–2 shows a more detailed quality improvement process.

3. ISO 9000

• The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is a

consortium of approximately 100 of the world’s industrial nations.

• ISO 9000 is not a set of standards for products or services, nor is it

specific to any one industry.

• Instead, it is a quality system standard applicable to any product,

service, or process anywhere in the world.

10

3. ISO 9000

• The information included in the ISO 9000 series includes:

ISO 9000: This defines the key terms and acts as a road map for the other

standards within the series.

ISO 9001: This defines the model for a quality system when a contractor

demonstrates the capability to design, produce, and install products or

services.

ISO 9002: This is a quality system model for quality assurance in

production and installation.

ISO 9003: This is a quality system model for quality assurance in final

inspection and testing.

ISO 9004: This provides quality management guidelines for any

organization wishing to develop and implement a quality system.

• Guidelines are also available to determine the extent to which each quality

system model is applicable.

11

3. ISO 9000

• ISO 9000 is actually a three-part, never-ending cycle including

planning, controlling, and documentation.

• Planning is required to ensure that the objectives, goals, authority,

and responsibility relationships of each activity are properly defined

and understood.

• Controlling is required to ensure that the goals and objectives are

met, and that problems are anticipated or averted through proper

corrective actions.

• Documentation is used predominantly for feedback on how well the

quality management system is performing to satisfy customer’s

needs and what changes may be necessary

12

4. Quality Management Concepts

• From a project manager’s perspective, there are six quality management

concepts that should exist to support each and every project.

• They include:

a) Quality policy

b) Quality objectives

c) Quality assurance

d) Quality control

e) Quality audit

f) Quality program plan

• Ideally, these six concepts should be embedded within the corporate

culture.

13

a) Quality Policy

• The quality policy is a document that is typically created by quality

experts and fully supported by top management.

• The policy should state the quality objectives, the level of quality

acceptable to the organization, and the responsibility of the

organization’s members for executing the policy and ensuring

quality.

• A quality policy would also include statements by top management

pledging its support to the policy.

• The quality policy is instrumental in creating the organization’s

reputation and quality image.

14

a) Quality Policy

• Many organizations successfully complete a good quality policy but

immediately submarine the good intentions of the policy by delegating

the implementation of the policy to lower-level managers.

• The implementation of the quality policy is the responsibility of top

management. Employees will soon see through the ruse of a quality

policy that is delegated to middle managers while top executives move

onto “more crucial matters that really impact the bottom line.”

• A good quality policy will:

Be a statement of principles stating what, not how

Promote consistency throughout the organization and across projects

Provide an explanation to outsiders of how the organization views

quality

Provide specific guidelines for important quality matters

Provide provisions for changing/updating the policy

15

b) Quality Objectives

• Quality objectives are a part of an organization’s quality policy and

consist of specific objectives and the time frame for completing them.

• The quality objectives must be selected carefully. Selecting objectives

that are not naturally possible can cause frustration and

disillusionment.

• Examples of acceptable quality objectives might be:

to train all members of the organization on the quality policy and

objectives before the end of the current fiscal year,

to set up baseline measurements of specific processes by the end of

the current quarter,

to define the responsibility and authority for meeting the

organization’s quality objectives down to each member of the

organization by the end of the current fiscal year, etc.

16

b) Quality Objectives

• Good quality objectives should:

• Be obtainable

• Define specific goals

• Be understandable

• State specific deadlines

17

c) Quality Assurance

• Quality assurance is the collective term for the formal activities and

managerial processes that attempt to ensure that products and

services meet the required quality level.

• Quality assurance also includes efforts external to these processes

that provide information for improving the internal processes.

• It is the quality assurance function that attempts to ensure that the

project scope, cost, and time functions are fully integrated.

18

c) Quality Assurance • QA is area the project manager can have the greatest impact on the quality

of his project.

• The project manager needs to establish the administrative processes and

procedures necessary to ensure and, often, prove that the scope statement

conforms to the actual requirements of the customer.

• The project manager must work with his team to determine which processes

they will use to ensure that all stakeholders have confidence that the quality

activities will be properly performed.

• A good quality assurance system will:

Identify objectives and standards

Be multifunctional and prevention oriented

Plan for collection and use of data in a cycle of continuous improvement

Plan for the establishment and maintenance of performance measures

Include quality audits

19

d). Quality Control

• Quality control is a collective term for activities and techniques, within the

process, that are intended to create specific quality characteristics.

• Such activities include

continually monitoring processes,

identifying and eliminating problem causes,

use of statistical process control to reduce the variability and

to increase the efficiency of processes.

• Quality control certifies that the organization’s quality objectives are being

met.

20

d). Quality Control

• Project team members who have specific technical expertise on the various

aspects of the project play an active role in quality control. They set up the

technical processes and procedures that ensure that each step of the project

provides a quality output from design and development through

implementation and maintenance. Each step’s output must conform to the

overall quality standards and quality plans, thus ensuring that quality is

achieved.

• A good quality control system will:

Select what to control

Set standards that provide the basis for decisions regarding possible

corrective action

Establish the measurement methods used

Compare the actual results to the quality standards

Act to bring nonconforming processes and material back to the standard

based on the information collected

Monitor and calibrate measuring devices

Include detailed documentation for all processes 21

e). Quality Audit

• A quality audit is an independent evaluation performed by qualified

personnel that ensures that the project is conforming to the project’s quality

requirements and is following the established quality procedures and

policies.

• A good quality audit will ensure that:

The planned quality for the project will be met.

The products are safe and fit for use.

All pertinent laws and regulations are followed.

Data collection and distribution systems are accurate and adequate.

Proper corrective action is taken when required.

Improvement opportunities are identified.

22

e). Quality Audit

• A Quality Audit needs to:

• Identify all the best practices of the project.

• Identify all the limitations of the project.

• Identify all the problems in the project.

• Identify the best practices and disseminate them to other projects as

and when necessary.

• The Quality Auditor:

• Helps the project by providing positive criticism towards the

implementation of project.

• Provides positive influence on project processes.

• Stores the contributions of each audit in the lessons learned knowledge

management system.

23

e). Quality Plan

• The quality plan is created by the project manager and project team

members by breaking down the project objectives into a work breakdown

structure.

• Using a treelike diagramming technique, the project activities are broken

down into lower-level activities until specific quality actions can be

identified.

• The project manager then ensures that these actions are documented and

implemented in the sequence that will meet the customer’s requirements

and expectations. This enables the project manager to assure the

customer that he has a road map to delivering a quality product or service

and therefore will satisfy the customer’s needs.

24

f). Quality Plan

• A good quality plan will:

Identify all of the organization’s external and internal customers

Cause the design of a process that produces the features

desired by the customer

Bring in suppliers early in the process:

Cause the organization to be responsive to changing customer

needs

Prove that the process is working and that quality goals are

being met

25

5. Cost of Quality

• To verify that a product or service meets the customer’s

requirements requires the measurement of the costs of quality.

• For simplicity’s sake, the costs can be classified as “the cost of

conformance” and “the cost of non-conformance.”

• Conformance costs include items such as training, indoctrination,

verification, validation, testing, maintenance, calibration, and audits.

• Nonconforming costs include items such as scrap, rework, warranty

repairs, product recalls, and complaint handling.

26

5. Cost of Quality

• Trying to save a few project dollars by reducing conformance costs

could prove disastrous.

• For example, an American company won a contract as a supplier of

Japanese parts.

• The initial contract called for the delivery of 10,000 parts. During

inspection and testing at the customer’s (i.e., Japanese) facility, two

rejects were discovered.

• The Japanese returned all 10,000 components to the American

supplier stating that this batch was not acceptable.

• In this example, the non-conformance cost could easily be an order

of magnitude greater than the conformance cost. The moral is clear:

Build it right the first time. 27

5. Cost of Quality • Another common method to classify costs includes the following:

• Prevention costs are the up-front costs oriented toward the

satisfaction of customer’s requirements with the first and all

succeeding units of product produced without defects. Included in

this are typically such costs as design review, training, quality

planning, surveys of vendors, suppliers, and subcontractors,

process studies, and related preventive activities.

• Appraisal costs are costs associated with evaluation of product or

process to ascertain how well all of the requirements of the

customer have been met. Included in this are typically such costs

as inspection of product, lab test, vendor control, in-process testing,

and internal–external design reviews.

28

5. Cost of Quality • Internal failure costs are those costs associated with the failure of the

processes to make products acceptable to the customer, before

leaving the control of the organization.

• Included in this area are scrap, rework, repair, downtime, defect

evaluation, evaluation of scrap, and corrective actions for these

internal failures.

• External failure costs are those costs associated with the

determination by the customer that his requirements have not been

satisfied. Included are customer returns and allowances, evaluation of

customer complaints, inspection at the customer, and customer visits

to resolve quality complaints and necessary corrective action.

• Figure 20–6 shows the expected results of the total quality

management system on quality costs. Prevention costs are expected

to actually rise as more time is spent in prevention activities throughout

the organisation. 29

5. Cost of Quality

30 FIGURE 20–6. Total quality cost.