Quality: history

Paolo Carbone, Antonio Moschitta

 Pre-industrial Quality
• In ancient times chinese, greeks, romans and other populations developed important architectural
installations by applying criteria of increasing complexity and a set of knowledge regulated by norms on
quality e.g.: in China (during the 30 years of the Shaoxing emperor – 1160, 2 imperial edicts regarding
arms productions):

• The related arms must be meticulously made that are to be examined by the departments, level by
level. When the volume ordered to be made is fulfilled, samples of them should be packaged by the
departments and sections, level by level, and submitted for examination

• Take the names and the units of arms manufactured in every 10 days and ask the supervising official to
look and examine them over in person and have them counted, recorded, and sealed up for
safekeeping …

Standardized Dou Gong

architectural system used to build
this pagoda in 1056 a.D.
under cost and quality control
 Key point: today ...

• if simple goal as ‘satisfy customer needs while searching for product

excellence’ is set by everyone within the company, profit will follow

• Different views about quality (consumers, manufacturers, managers,

operators, markets, ...)

• Different actors: consultants, regulators, auditors, quality

representatives

• Different cultures: differences in languages and experiences, barriers

to communication and effective implementation
 Pre-industrial Quality

• In the bible you can find references to consumers’ rights:

• “And if thou shalt sell aught to thy neighbor, or buy aught of thy neighbor's hand, ye shall not
oppress one another” (Leviticus, 25-14)
• In the Babylonian Talmud there are references to ‘contractual quality’: four different laws
are applicable to sales. If one has sold wheat as good, and it turns out to be bad, the buyer
may withdraw from the sale. If sold as bad, and it turns out to be good, the seller may
withdraw. If as bad, and it was found to to be bad; or as good and it was found to be good
neither may withdraw.

The age of craftsmanship: craft guilds, masters, journeyman, apprentices

“It is pathetic to see the many efforts carried out with chemistry, mathematics and electronics
to reproduce the sound of the violin that the semi-an-alphabet Stradivari made in his everyday
work” (1986 – Polanyi)

Craftsmanship production DOES NOT imply low quality!

Craftsmanship production (still valid today)

• Low production volumes

• Production is not standardized (prototypal, customer tailored)
• Small market and high production costs
• Universal machines (adaptable to many different working situations)
• Technical culture is simple; however extremely flexible behavior
• Lack of metrological culture
• Direct owner management (Centric organization)
• High request of qualified and poly-functional manpower
• The owner/craftsman is proud of the produced item
• Quality determined using the final inspection/test (often with the customer)
• The customer becomes faithful
• Processes are documented by training young craftsman/apprentices
• The work is self certified
 Craftsmanlike production
Characteristics

Exercise: which of the following applies to craftsmanlike production?

➢ Low production volumes

➢ High craftsman specialization

➢ Complex vision of the production process

➢ Work structure breakdown in small sub-phases

➢ Operator knowledge

➢ Standardization

➢ Measurements on products

➢ Process control

➢ Centrality of management

➢ Final inspection

➢ Personnel motivation

➢ Intense training of manpower

 Craftsmanship production
Weaknesses
Strengths

• Excessive dependence on the

entrepreneur
• Flexible production • Lack of strategic planning
• Motivated manpower • Lack of standardization
• Centrality of management • Lack of a systematic approach
• The customer is faithful • Large number of defects, not
• Management costs are kept low conforming material
• Low reliability of complex product
• No design for maintenance
 I and II industrial
revolutions
• New energy sources: machines for textile and mechanical
production
• ‘Factory system’: elementary company models, replaces
‘putting out/domestic system’
• Improvement/diffusion of transport systems
• Small enterprises with simple organizations (sets of
craftsmen)
• Lack of policies that regulate the economic systems (laissez-
faire - no welfare state)
• Quality is "fitness to use" and it is expressed by the product
price
 I and II industrial
revolutions
• New production paradigm: mass production
• Managerial enterprise: separation between control and
ownership
• Stakeholders influence leading decisions
• cost/price is the competitive variable
• welfare state substitutes laissez-faire
• Origin of the Scientific Management: science as an
action criterion and a legitimate mean to promote new
production styles (one best way)
 Mass production
• Separation between ideation-control-production;
Taylor: ‘Others are paid to think instead of you’
• Impoverishment and repetition of executive duties
• Mortification of workforce (artisan ->worker)
• Ford: integrates Taylorism with endless chain driven
conveyor: workers remained stationary while the
product moved from one place to another
 Mass production
• Model T designed for production
• 1913: Ford employed 13000 workers
• 1920: 2 million cars per year
• 1920: GM as a new competitor
• Sloan introduces concepts of multidivisional firm management
• Unions start playing a role
• 1955 mass production reaches its apex
 Mass production & quality
• Craftsmanlike production: workers dominate quality!

• Mass production: workers are mono-functional (simple/repetitive operation): do not see

the whole process. Workers are passive, are dominated by the process

• Separation between production and quality function: someone produces, someone

inspects. Quality is made by workers but determined by inspectors

• Quality means conformance to requirements assured through Product Quality Control:

• activities carried out in critical points along the production chain to verify by means of
measurements and assure conformance of product characteristics to predefined values
(specified in technical documents)

• Necessary to find critical points

Mass production & quality

• Techniques for product quality control:

• Forks to separate conforming from not conforming products along the chain
• Statistical sampling methods (introduced by Bell in the ‘30s)
• Process tuning is performed by analyzing repetitive defects
• Still a technique in use today

• Can not be fully applied to services or intellectual products (e.g. SW)

• Sensitive to consumer’s and producer’s risks
• Requires basic metrological competencies, calibration
 Mass production Quality

Strengths Weaknesses

• Engineering concept of specified • go/no-go logic hides tendencies

requirements/tolerance intervals • Sustained control demotivates people in production
to aim at perfection (is quality a responsibility of
• Measurements needed to prove
those who measure?)
acceptance/rejection
• Lack of defect prevention
• Standardization of procedures to
• Costs of control: quality costs and if it works it
obtain systematization discards products!
• Use of statistical methods to govern
• Design is not under control: design errors are not
variability: variability thinking detected. Quality is a production problem!
• Use of technology to improve • Not applicable to services
productivity
• Ignores market needs
Mass production & quality
• Test: In the historical evolution of quality management models, the Product
Quality Control (PQC) approach employed in the mass control production system
is characterized by the following attributes (one applies):

• measurement of customer satisfaction;

• quality circles;

• inspection and final tests;

• statistical methods;

• internal audits;

• qualification of processes and personnel;

 Mass production & quality
EXERCISE

The Product Quality Control (PQC) employed in many companies, in what differs with
regards to quality from the so-called craftsmanlike production?
a possible answer:

• In the craftsmanlike production the product quality control is limited to a final inspection
performed on the basis of a “go/no-go” approach;
• Product Quality Control applies when the piece or material is verified at critical points
along the production chain against tolerance and acceptance limits, from the warehouse
to the finite product;
• The control is performed by inspectors that apply a “go/no-go” approach by using
statistical methods (sampling);
• This type of test requires knowledge of metrology and statistics, that the traditional
craftsman does not have.
 Quality Assurance
• Assurance = to trust, to be sure ...

• ... so that the customer is trustworthy that the good will satisfy his requirements

• QA includes PQC, that is used at production level

• QA introduces a specification for the company organization

• Motivated by critical applications (military sector, aero-spatial and nuclear

sectors)

• The Apollo Program (a.k.a. Project Apollo, i.e. preparing and landing the first
humans on the moon, 1968-1972) was managed used QA (std MIL-Q-9858 - 1958)

• Apollo 11 mission lands Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the moon on July 20,
1969
 Quality Assurance
The law 10 CFR 50 contains 18 criteria that became the basis for all contractual
norms on QA developed from the 70ies up to ISO 9000 (1988->2015)
Some of the criteria are PQC criteria
1. Organization
2. Quality assurance program
3. Design control
4. Procurement document control
5. Instructions, procedures and drawings
6. Document control
7. Control of purchased material, equipment, and services
8. Identification and control of materials, parts and components
9. Control of special processes
10. Inspection
11. Test control
12. Control of measuring and test equipment
13. Handling, storage, and shipping
14. Inspection, test and operating status
15. Nonconforming materials, parts or components
16. Corrective actions
17. Quality assurance records
18. Audits
 Quality Assurance

Strengths Weaknesses
• Economic factors are ignored
• Lack of continuous improvement (static
approach)
• PQC extended to all processes
• Integration of activities that concur to • Bureaucracy and formalism (paper is more
product quality important than products)
• Planning and systematic actions • Action limited to conformance (risk of fiscal
• Use of documentation: instructions application of QA)
and records • QA demands the firm to define what is to
• Qualification of suppliers and be done and how to do it, however does
personnel not require some of the today’s needed
• Applicable to services characteristics (efficiency, flexibility,
dynamism, improvement, …)
 Quality Assurance

EXERCISE:
The QA model developed in the 60’s - 70’s is:

• The set of properties and characteristics that confer the product the ability to
satisfy stated or implied needs;
• The product conformance verification against design specifications;
• The control and tuning of the productive process using repetitive defect analysis
and cause finding;
• A system of production methods that realizes economically goods and services
satisfying consumer needs;
• A methodology that assures that a product provides the required performance
under the specified operating conditions, by means of planned and systematic
actions.
 quality assurance
EXERCISE:
The QA model is capable to assure customers

• By finding his stated or implied needs

• By choosing a product competitive price
• By controlling the productive process
• By controlling design and suppliers
• By using an integrated set of systematic actions that allow control of all activities
that influence directly the product quality
 A NEW PERSPECTIVE:
The Toyotism
Japan after II World War:

• Large percentage of unproductive companies

• Help programs by USA (because of political-economical reasons), in particular on
QC techniques
• Small territory
• Few internal resources
• Poor internal market: export is necessary
• External competitive market

Elements in favor to the development of a Japan industry (Ishikawa)

• Solid industrial tradition

• High instruction level
• Vertical society (pride in doing the job), emphasis on hierarchy
• Democratic capitalism (the company is owned by many)
• Govern support (cultural campaigns, financial support)
 A NEW PERSPECTIVE:
The Toyotism
Tajichi Ohno (Toyota):
Change in productive approach (innovation with respect to Taylorism)
Induced by competitive market and lack of grants for large plants :

From a large volume to a low volume production

Reduction of break-even point by reducing fixed costs
From a sufficiently good product to a product in continuous evolution (decrease in
defects, costs, improvement in productivity) from a static to a dynamic vision

LEAN Production integrated with the company-wide quality control (CWQC)

Started in the 50’s has its major effects in the 80’s

(money invested in quality goes a long way before coming back)
 A NEW PERSPECTIVE:
The Toyotism
LEAN PRODUCTION (ORGANIZATION of the PRODUCTION PROCESS)
· fewer pieces are produced
· workcycle is less repetitive
· Quality is embedded (is everyone’s responsibility)
· technological craftsman (worker is trained and polyfunctional)

INTEGRATION
· quality and quantity
· concurrent engineering
· codesign with suppliers
· team work
· comakership
 A NEW PERSPECTIVE:
The Toyotism
FLEXIBILITY
In addressing market demand by low volume production
· time-to-market
· just-in-time approach
push model (Ford approach) substituted by pull (production is pulled by
demand)

HUMAN RESOURCES
Partecipatory management/empowerment (workers suggest
modifications and help taking decisions)
 LEAN
• Elimination of waste in all forms

• MUDA (a Japanese term translated into

«waste») and the 7 wastes:

• Defects, Transportation, Inventory, Motion,

Waiting, Over-processing, Over-production

• Recently, the skill MUDA was added to the

initial 7 MUDA
 LEAN
Best quality - lowest cost - shortest lead time - best safety - high
morale
by eliminating waste

People & teamwork

Selection
Just-in-time Common goals Jidoka
Right part, right Ringi decision making (in station quality)
amount, right time Cross-training Make problems visible

- Automatic stops
Continuous improvement - Andon
- Person-machine
- Takt time planning Waste reduction separation
- Error proofing
- Continuous flow
Genchi Genbutsu - in-station quality
- Pull system
- Quick changeover 5 Why’s control
- solve root cause of
- Integrated logistics Eyes for waste
problems (5 Why’s)
Problem solving

Leveled production
Stable and standardized processes
Visual management
Toyota way philosophy

from: J. Liker, The Toyota way, McGraw-Hill, 2003

 LEAN
• Genchi Genbutsu: managing by wandering around
[1]
• Poka-yoke: error-prof tools (e.g.: restrict the ways a
tool can be used)
• Heijunka (Production leveling), takt-time (product
assembly duration needed to match the demand),
kanban
• Jidoka (Autonomation): Automation with a human
touch, Intelligent Automation
• Andon(visual management): system used by https://hygger.io/blog/online-kanban-board/

operators and managers in lean manufacturing to

easily determine and display the status of
production lines. [2]
• 5 why’s (drill down technique to find the deep root
of a complex problem/defect)
https://www.clarityvisualmanagement.com/technique/vm-visual-management/
 Company-wide quality
control
Quality comes first (not earnings, that are a consequence)
( long-term revenues investment, continuous improvement, research)
· the whole production chain is pulled by the customer
(the following operator is the internal customer)
· decide on the basis of data (statistical methods)

Modern company is a network of processes :

marketing (customer surveys), product specification, design, supplier
management, production process planning, production, production control,
inspections and testing (PQC), inventory, packaging, distribution, customer service,
product dismiss, research and development, …

product quality depends on the quality of all company processes

CWQC is the PQC extended to all company processes to assure and manage the
whole product quality
 Company-wide quality
control
The CWQC quantitative reference model is the Deming Prize
CWQC definition (Deming Prize ed. 1996)
CWQC is a set of systematic activities carried out by the entire organization to effectively and
efficiently achieve company objectives and provide products and services with a level of quality
that satisfies customers at the appropriate time and price

STATISTICAL THINKING
awareness of the importance of objective data
· each process, activity is affected by variability
data without dispersion are inaccurate
without statistical analysis QC is not there
most of company problems are solvable using the seven tools
· technical personnel in the company must know and use statistical methods

Methods
· elementary (seven tools): everyone can use them
· intermediate (estimation, ANOVA, …)
· advanced (DOE, ..)
Quality history
Current/future challenges
(according to ASQ-2008)

• Globalization

• Social responsibility

• New dimensions of quality

• Aging of population

• Health care

• Environmental concerns

• Technology impacts
 References

1)https://mag.toyota.co.uk/genchi-genbutsu/
2)https://safetyculture.com/topics/andon/