Customer Loyalty and Satisfaction : Customer Requirements
3.4 per Million: Integrating Inputs
Obtaining voice of the customer information is always important because a business’s survival depends on a person choosing its products over a competitor’s products....
Back to Basics: Rapid Response
Customer complaints are part of any business, and a company’s responsiveness to complaints is crucial in maintaining a mutually beneficial business relationship.
These days, there is a misconception in the business world about the true meaning...
Volviendo a los Fundamentos: Respuesta Rápida
Los reclamos del cliente son parte de cualquier negocio, y la capacidad de respuesta de una empresa a los reclamos es crucial en el mantenimiento de una relación comercial mutuamente beneficiosa. En estos días, existe la falsa idea en el mundo...
Standards Outlook: AS&D Standards? Revisions to Improve Supplier Performance
The International Aerospace
Quality Group (IAQG) is revising
the IAQG 9100 family of
standards1 to stay aligned with
changes to ISO 9001,...
Internal Customer Service: Has It Improved?
A recent survey of organizations conducted by the Metrus Group shows a dramatic improvement in internal customer service (ICS) since a similar survey conducted in 1993. Respondents to the survey believe that high levels of ICS are important to their...
Deliver Great Service By Listening and Adapting
The customer service systems of most companies worldwide are seldom adaptable enough to handle diverse situations. To avoid giving customers the impression that their contacts are a waste of time, an organization must have an actionable voice of the...
ASQ Certification Board Puts Quality Tools to Work
Recognizing the importance of customer satisfaction in strategic planning, the ASQ certification board recently used quality tools to develop customer requirements. To begin the process, a SIPOC (suppliers, inputs, outputs, and customers) diagram was...
Using a FMEA in a Service Setting
ISO 9001 requires organizations to take preventative action to avoid the occurrence and reoccurrence of nonconformities. A failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA) is a tool that allows users to predict potential for failure and plan for control through...
Reflections on the Future of Quality
Over the years, the intent of quality systems has evolved from enhancing customer satisfaction by meeting their needs to improving overall organizational performance and capabilities. But quality management systems have always lagged behind evolving...
QFD in a Managed Care Organization
The application of quality function deployment (QFD) in the healthcare industry has been limited because the healthcare product is intangible and ill defined. Recently, however, a managed care organization used QFD to redesign its member handbook. QFD's...
Baldrige - Just What the Doctor Ordered
The Robert Wood Johnson (RWJ) University Hospital Hamilton's commitment to quality has won it the 2004 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award in the healthcare category. Part of the hospital's existing quality program is its five pillars of excellence...
Does Six Sigma Work in Service Industries?
Service and manufacturing organizations have much to learn from one another when it comes to serving customers. While in manufacturing the focus on product quality distracts employees from customer service quality requirements, in the service sector the...
TS 16949 – Where Did It Come From?
TS 16949 is an international fundamental quality management system specification for the automotive industry based on ISO 9000. It was developed at the request of automotive suppliers from the Big Three automakers' quality system assessment manuals,...
Can the Gurus' Concepts Cure Healthcare?
Representatives of the movement for quality in healthcare present the views of four quality gurus as they apply to managing cost and improving the quality of healthcare. Don M. Nielsen says Philip Crosby's emphasis on prevention and zero defects has led...
Why Customer Related Processes Don’t Always Work
One of the original driving factors behind the worldwide adoption of ISO 9000:2000 was the belief it would improve customers’ confidence in the ability of suppliers to meet specified needs, requirements and quality expectations....
ISO 9001 Takes On a New Role – Crime Fighter
In July of 2003 the Phoenix Police Department’s Records and Identification Bureau (RIB) became the first law enforcement organization in the U.S. to achieve ISO 9001 registration as a means of reinforcing its reputation as a reliable information...
Basic Requirements of a Quality Manual
If your company is implementing a quality management system based on ISO 9000:2000 standards, the content of the quality manual should reflect ISO 9001 requirements, but it need not match the format. Basically, ISO 9001 asks that you document actions...
Column: Frontiers of Quality: Gathering Customer Feedback
Most people have heard the cliché, "If you are going to talk the talk, you need to walk the walk." As such, the Six Sigma community has claimed a linkage with customer values, but are we really aligned?...
Balance Your Balanced Scorecard
The intended purpose of a balanced scorecard is to provide a framework linking strategy with operational performance measures. In reality, it is an integrated report focusing on various areas of performance the organization values most. Like most change...
9 Reasons to Switch to a Single Supplier System
Airtel Mobile Phone Services in Chandigarh, India manufactures electronic assemblies for automotive customers with stringent quality requirements. To improve quality, the firm switched from a multiple supplier system (MSS) to a single supplier system...
American Statistical Association Conference on Statistical Practice
February 16–18 | Orlando, FL
Visit www.amstat.org/meetings/csp/2012/index.cfm.
ASQ Lean and Six Sigma Conference
February 27–28 | Phoenix, AZ
Visit http://asq.org/conferences/six-sigma.
ASQ members exchange comments, suggestions, questions and ideas inspired by articles or letters in Quality Progress.
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