Quality Function Deployment

Nazmie Ali Harri Pirttinen Suprasanna Sarkar

"Time was when a man could order a pair of shoes directly from the cobbler. By measuring the foot himself and personally handling all aspects of manufacturing, the cobbler could assure the customer would be satisfied," lamented Dr. Yoji Akao, one of the founders of QFD.

QFD Introduction
A definition
QFD is a structured planning and decisionmaking methodology for capturing customer needs and translating those requirements into product requirements, part characteristics, process plans and quality/production plans through a series of matrices.

QFD History
Developed in Japan in the late 1960s by Professors Shigeru Mizuno and Yoji Akao to design customer satisfaction into a product before it was manufacturered. 1966 by Kiyotaka Oshiumi (Bridgestone Tire in Japan) used a process assurance items fishbone diagram to identify each customer requirement (effect) and to identify the design substitute quality characteristics and process factors (causes) needed to control and measure it. In 1972, with the application of QFD to the design of an oil tan ker at the Kobe Shipyards of Mitsubishi Heavy Industry, the fishbone diagrams grew unwieldy. Katsuyoshi Ishihara introduced the Value Engineering principles used to describe how a product and its components work. Merged with these new ideas, QFD eventually became the comprehensive quality design system for both product and business process.

Some Approaches to QFD

There are many approaches to QFD. Almost everyone agrees that for QFD to be successfully implemented within an organization, it must be adapted to the particular situation surrounding its use.
The Four-Phase approach The Matrix of Matrices approach was developed by GOAL/QPC. This approach is best described in a book titled "Better Designs in Half the Time"; available from GOAL/QPC. The International TechneGroup, Inc. (ITI) QFD approach for Concurrent Product/Manufacturing Process Development

QFD:Software Engineering Context

Software engineering benefits from the customer involvement, cross -functional teams, and emphasis on quality that QFD brings to the table. SQFD fulfills a specific role in the software development life cycle (SDLC), most often as the means for eliciting requirements

QFD:Requirements Engineering Context

QFD - prerequisites
Voice of the customer (requirements)
QFD requires that basic customer needs are identified different needs ? voices are diverse all requirements must be considered to develop a succesful product breakdown requirements from hat how to w use of requirement management avoids misinterpretation ,creeping elegance and saves time

SQFD gives requirements engineers the framework for articulating and tracing the voice of the customer through the development process. QFD is the concept of requirements prioritization using either the Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP) or a modified version of it.

QFD methodology flow: 4-phase approach

1. 2. 3. 4. Product Planning Part Deployment Process Planning Process/Quality Control

4-phase Approach and House of Quality

A four phases approach is accomplished by using a series of matrices . Each phase has a matrix consisting of a vertical column of Whatsand a horizontal row of Hows . Whatsare Customer Requirements; Hows are ways of achieving them . At each stage, the Hows are carried to the next phase as Whats .

1st Phase: Product Planning

House of Quality

1a.Define Customer Requirements

Use affinity or tree diagram Must reflect the desired market segment, address unspoken needs The matrix can be decomposed into smaller modules or subsystem

1b.Quantify Customer Requirements

COMFORTABLE EASY TO PUT ON FITS OVER DIFFERENT CLOTHES 5 5 4 4 3 3 2 2 1 1

2.Planning Matrix
Evaluate your planned product against competitive products.
Consider the current strengths and weaknesses against your competitors. Identify in what areas the competitors are better, equal or worse at. Identify what should be done to the product to reach expectations.

Importance Weighting COMFORTABLE EASY TO PUT ON FITS OVER DIFFERENT CLOTHES 5 1 COMFORTABLE 2 EASY TO PUT ON FITS OVER DIFFERENT CLOTHES Our product 2 1 3

Company A's product 4 3 1

Company B's product 2 4 5

2.Planning Matrix
Customer Satisfaction existing products fulfilling specified requirements. Improvement Ratio = Planned Performance / Existing Performance Sales Point weight for marketability Overall Weighting = Importance Weighting x Improvement Ratio X Sales Point

3.Technical Requirements
Engineering Characteristics, Voice of the Company. Identify Measurable Characteristics related to Customer Requirements. May have more than one technical requirement to convey one customer requirement.

4.Interrelationships
Develop relationships between all customer requirements and product requirements.
Technical Requirements

5.The Roof
Considers impact of technical requirements on each other Feature to feature comparison Augment or impede? Critical Question: Does improving one requirement cause a deterioration or improvement in another requirement?

Harness weight

High Medium Low Customer Requirements

(9) (3) (1)

Light weight Does not restrict movement Safe Technical Priority

3.0 11.2 6.0

Are there product requirements that don't relate to any customer needs?
Use symbols for strong, medium , weak and none relationships.

Overall Weighting

Critical Question: How significant is technical requirement A in satisfying customer requirement B?

Webbing strength

# of buckles

6. Targets
Develop preliminary target values for product requirements Analyze the matrix and finalize the product development strategy and product plans. Results from previous steps:
Customer requirements Prioritized customer requirements Technical requirements Correlated requirements Feature interdependencies

6. Targets
Technical Priorities
Calculate technical priorities
Assign a weighting factor to relationship symbols Multiply each interrelationship weighting by the overall weighting from the Planning matrix Sum them to their own columns .

Made up from three parts:

1. Technical priorities 2. Competitive bencmarks 3. Final Product Targets

6. Targets
Competitive Benchmarks
Matrix values are simply the measure of the technical requirement. The goal is to determine the relative positions of existing products with regard to each of the identified technical requirements

6. Targets
Final Product Targets
Analyze the matrix and finalize the product development strategy and product plans.

House of Quality

House of Quality Summary

Inputs:
Customer requirements Technical requirements Customer priorities Market reality / competitive analysis Organization strengths & weaknesses s

Outputs
Prioritized technical requirements Measurable, testable goals

2nd phase: Part Deployment

The product requirements or technical characteristics and the product specification serve as the basis for developing product concepts. Product benchmarking, brainstorming, and research and development are sources for new product concepts. Once concepts are developed, they are analyzed and evaluated(cost & trade) using the concept selection matrix .

Part Deployment (contd.)

Using the selected concept as a basis, develop a design layout, block diagram and/or a preliminary parts list. Determine critical subsystems, subassemblies or parts.

Part Deployment(contd.)
Analyze the matrix and finalize the subsystem/subassembly/part deployment matrix. Determine required actions and areas of focus. Finalize target values. Consider interactions, importance ratings and difficulty ratings.

3rd phase: Process Planning

Concept selection matrix can be used to evaluate different manufacturing process approaches and select the preferred approach. Based on selected approach, the process planning matrix is prepared Important processes and tooling requirements can be identified to focus efforts to control, improve and upgrade processes and equipment

Process Planning (contd.)

4th phase: Process/Quality Control

Detailed planning related to process control, quality control, set -up, equipment maintenance and testing can be supported by process/quality control matrix . The process steps developed in the process planning matrix are used as the basis for planning and defining specific process and quality control steps in this matrix.

The Four Phases of Traditional QFD

Benefits of using QFD Products meet customer expectations better Improved design traceability Reduced lead times Reduced product cost Improved communication within organisation and with customer

Problems & pitfalls When applying QFD do not underestimate the amount of work involved. Extra time and resources early in the project. Management must be prepared for this, and not press for visible results too early . The scope and objectives of the project must be agreed at the beginning Avoid trying to include too much detail. Too large a matrix results in too much data to analyse Avoid gathering perfect data. Avoid technical arrogance and the belief that company personnel know more than the customer. Best results are usually obtained by using an independent QFD facilitator to control the QFD process, leaving the rest of the team free to concentrate on the product.

QFD is
Understanding Customer Requirements Quality Systems Thinking + Psychology + Knowledge/Epistemology Maximizing Positive Quality That Adds Value Comprehensive Quality System for Customer Satisfaction Strategy to Stay Ahead of The Game

References:
http://www.dci.ir/ravabet/f/shahin.pdf http://198.173.227.38/qfd-2a.html http://www.ucalgary.ca http://www.npd-solutions.com/qfd.html http://www.qfdi.org

Recommended reading: http://www.gsm.mq.edu.au/cmit/qfd-hoqtutorial.swf