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502<br />

Part Three<br />

Planning and control<br />

Conformance to specification<br />

Conformance to specification means producing a product or providing a service to its design<br />

specification. It is usually seen as the most important contribution that operations management<br />

can make to the customer’s perception of quality. We shall examine how it can be<br />

achieved in the remainder of this chapter by describing quality management as six sequential<br />

steps. This chapter, and Chapters 18, 19 and 20, will deal with these steps.<br />

Step 1<br />

Step 2<br />

Step 3<br />

Step 4<br />

Step 5<br />

Step 6<br />

Define the quality characteristics of the product or service.<br />

Decide how to measure each quality characteristic.<br />

Set quality standards for each quality characteristic.<br />

Control quality against those standards.<br />

Find and correct causes of poor quality.<br />

Continue to make improvements.<br />

Quality characteristics<br />

Step 1 – Define the quality characteristics<br />

Much of the ‘quality’ of a product or service will have been specified in its design. But not all<br />

the design details are useful in controlling quality. For example, the design of a television may<br />

specify that its outer cabinet is made with a particular veneer. Each television is not checked,<br />

however, to make sure that the cabinet is indeed made from that particular veneer. Rather<br />

it is the consequences of the design specification which are examined – the appearance of the<br />

cabinet, for example. These consequences for quality planning and control of the design are<br />

called the quality characteristics of the product or service. Table 17.1 shows a list of the<br />

quality characteristics which are generally useful.<br />

Table 17.1 Quality characteristics for a car, a bank loan and an air journey<br />

Quality characteristic<br />

Car (material<br />

transformation process)<br />

Bank loan (information<br />

transformation process)<br />

Air journey (customer<br />

transformation process)<br />

Functionality – how well<br />

the product or service<br />

does its job<br />

Speed, acceleration,<br />

fuel consumption, ride<br />

quality, road-holding, etc.<br />

Interest rate, terms and<br />

conditions<br />

Safety and duration of journey,<br />

onboard meals and drinks, car<br />

and hotel booking services<br />

Appearance – the<br />

sensory characteristics<br />

of the product or service:<br />

its aesthetic appeal,<br />

look, feel, etc.<br />

Aesthetics, shape, finish,<br />

door gaps, etc.<br />

Aesthetics of information,<br />

web site, etc.<br />

Décor and cleanliness of<br />

aircraft, lounges and crew<br />

Reliability – the consistency<br />

of the product’s or service’s<br />

performance over time<br />

Mean time to failure<br />

Keeping promises (implicit<br />

and explicit)<br />

Keeping to the published flight<br />

times<br />

Durability – the total useful<br />

life of the product or service<br />

Useful life (with repair)<br />

Stability of terms and<br />

conditions<br />

Keeping up with trends in the<br />

industry<br />

Recovery – the ease with<br />

which problems with the<br />

product or service can<br />

be resolved<br />

Ease of repair<br />

Resolution of service<br />

failures<br />

Resolution of service failures<br />

Contact – the nature of<br />

the person-to-person<br />

contact which might<br />

take place<br />

Knowledge and courtesy<br />

of sales staff<br />

Knowledge and courtesy of<br />

branch and call centre staff<br />

Knowledge, courtesy and<br />

sensitivity of airline staff

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