Questions and Answers of Quality Management

What is meant by using the scientific approach?
List five factors that lead organizations to benchmarking.
Motorola, one of the original Malcolm Baldrige Award winners, has found that even after achieving best-in-class, there is much to be gained through continued benchmarking. Every new program, every
By the late 1970s, Xerox was losing significant market share to its Japanese competitors. Not only were the Japanese products excellent, but also, to Xerox’s dismay, they were sold for less than
Define JIT/Lean.
What two fundamental advantages are provided by JIT/Lean?
List the seven wastes.
Identify the two pillars of the Toyota Production System.
To whom is credit given for the development of the JIT/ Lean system?
Taiichi Ohno’s JIT/Lean system, with the elimination of practically all inventories, and using demand pull (kanban) to coordinate the flow of materials and assemblies through the production
Describe the fundamental purpose of the Design Targets.
Explain briefly the rationale for SPC.
When the U.S. forces occupied Japan at the end of World War II to set up the occupation government, they found the Japanese telephone system to be poor in quality and unreliable. General
The government invites two companies to bid for a contract to produce 100 flightline avionics maintenance systems. The design is owned by the air force, and the air force will provide all necessary
Define the term quality .
What is total quality?
Why do some quality initiatives fail?
“If you want to understand how the worldwide quality movement has benefited consumers, just look at automobiles. What used to be considered a luxury option is now just standard,” said one quality
A professional baseball team set its sights on winning the World Series. The team owner wanted to win big and win fast. Consequently, the team sank all of its resources into trading for the best
Immediately following World War II, the quality of products produced by Japanese companies was not good enough to compete in the international marketplace. The only advantage Japanese companies had
Two quality managers meet for lunch every Friday to discuss common problems, compare notes, and make suggestions to each other. Today their discussion has turned into a debate. The topic is the
“The Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) reports that only 11 to 15 percent of all machine tools in the U.S. are automated; the majority of those automated are found in large companies.” “A
Pennsylvania’s Department of Community and Economic Development maintains a network of industrial resource centers (IRCs) that are operated as nonprofit corporations managed by the private sector
Define the term ethics.
What is morality?
What is the manager’s role in ethics?
Why, in your own words, would an otherwise ethical person make an unethical decision?
Define the term corporate social responsibility.
Vanessa Jones is the manager of the phenolics department of PlastiTech, a manufacturer of industrial plastics and composite materials. She is facing a dilemma. There is an opening in her department,
Why is it sometimes necessary to change leaders to ensure cultural change?
The efforts of Public Communications Inc., to implement total quality had exceeded expectations at two of its three plants. However, the third plant just didn’t seem to be able to get things off
List the steps in the strategic planning process.
Explain why creative thinking is important in strategic planning and how to encourage it.
Write a sample vision statement for a hypothetical organization.
What is a manufacturing network?
Newspaper Concessions Corporation (NCC) manufactures vending machines for newspaper chains nationwide. The machines are placed in conspicuous locations and accessed using the appropriate combination
The Quality Institute (TQI) is a partnership of Northwest Florida State College, the University of West Florida, and the Economic Development Council of Okaloosa County. TQI is dedicated to the
Explain the role of the customer in a total quality setting.
What is a reliable customer?
What role does customer satisfaction play in the development of reliable customers?
Briefly describe what is meant by an organization that has customer focus.
“You know you have hit the big time when the purple-and orange-lettered Federal Express (FedEx) truck driven by a smiling courier pulls into your driveway or walks up your stairwell and hands you
Perhaps the most famous case illustrating the enormous cost of winning back lost customers is that of the “Tylenol Murders.” Seven people in the Chicago area died suddenly after taking Tylenol
Give a brief rationale for empowerment.
Describe the concept of MBWA.
Explain the concept of workforce readiness as it relates to empowerment.
Distinguish between empowerment and enlistment.
The employees of a midsized printed circuit-board manufacturer had been excited about their empowerment program during its first several months of operation. A number of solid suggestions for
Wanda Brown had worked hard to achieve her rapid advancement from shipping/receiving clerk to shipping/receiving manager. She had an uncanny ability to focus on a task, break it into its component
Patagonia is a world-leading textile manufacturer that specializes in clothing for children and adults. Employees are the primary source of workplace improvements in this company, where empowerment
Define the term leadership .
Lincoln Electric Company in Cleveland, Ohio, manufactures arc welding equipment. Lincoln has the highest paid workers in this extremely competitive market, and it is protected neither by patents nor
Kollmorgen Corporation is a diversified technology company that operates in the highly competitive electronics industry. Kollmorgen relies on its employees pulling together to outperform the
What are the characteristics of a good team mission statement?
Define the concept of collegial relationships.
Explain why some employees are not comfortable being team players.
It is important to learn how to develop a comprehensive, clearly articulated team charter. Assume that you and your fellow students are a team in an organization (you choose the kind and size of
Define effective listening .
What is responsive listening?
Explain four strategies for improving listening skills.
Define the following factors and explain how they affect listening: body factors, voice factors, proximity factors.
John Gill is a busy man. No matter how fast he works, it seems he’s always behind. Consequently, when an employee brings Gill a problem, he is not a good listener. He opens mail, answers the
Name 10 widely used instructional methods.
List the five factors that magnify the need for training.
What is a training objective? Write a sample training objective in behavioral terms.
What does a manager need to know to be sure that training provided satisfied the training objectives? How can these things be determined?
As an instructor, what can you do to help participants retain what they are learning?
List and explain the three components of a lecture.
Why does training sometimes fail?
What are the three major components in quality training recommended by Juran?
The Rocky Flats Plant of Rockwell International is committed to hiring hard-core unemployed people for entry-level positions with the intention of migrating them upward. However, many new employees
The CEO of ABC Inc. is dynamic and visionary in every area but one. He does not believe in providing corporate training to his personnel. In fact, he is fond of saying, “I hire personnel and pay
Give an example of internal politics in action in an organization.
List and briefly describe the most commonly used methods of internal politicians.
Describe the impact internal politics can have on the implementation of total quality.
What are the categories of negativity in the workplace?
“We have too much conflict in this organization,” said Larry Parette. “Nobody agrees on anything. It’s beginning to get to me.”“Nonsense, Larry,” said Mack Porter. “We need conflict.
The best way to describe the relationship between the design and manufacturing departments at Waverly Prestressed Concrete (WPC) is warfare . A typical conversation between the vice president for
What are the industry-specific standards for the automotive, aerospace, and telecommunication industries?
Reliance Control Systems is a large manufacturer of control systems for the electrical power generation and distribution industry. Over the past few years, Reliance has watched overseas competitors
What accounts for the disparity in NPMO between the statistical 6 and the popular Six Sigma approach?
What is the most common use of stratification?
What purpose is served by flowcharts?
In the context of the five-S philosophy, what is the intent of the word Standardize ?
What are FMEA’s three risk assessment factors?
Cignet Plastics Corporation is a contract plastics die-casting house serving a wide range of clients. Over the years, Cignet has been a favored supplier of precision die castings for a major producer
Contrast decision making with problem solving.
Define decision making as it relates to total quality.
The plant managers of ABC Corporation’s five plants have met at a common location at 8:00 am every Monday morning for 20 years. The people serving as plant managers have changed several times
New Piper, an aircraft manufacturer, issued a Mandatory Service Bulletin grounding 76 new aircraft manufactured during the first 5 months of 2004. Thirty-nine of the airplanes were in customers’
How might the quality challenges of an economy based on digital and digitally enabled products and services be addressed?
How might digital capability be exploited to maintain alignment between the actual and espoused values of an organisation?
How might digitisation of service or product delivery enable quality barriers to be overcome?
Follett proposes a collaboration between manager and worker whereas Taylor suggests a directive approach. Consider the merits and demerits of each and which will be most appropriate for Industry 4.0
Is Crosby’s work truly based on an approach rooted in engagement, exhortations and evangelism or is that merely a wrapper around an essentially mechanistic approach to achieving quality?
Deming suggests that 94% of quality problems are a function of the design of the system (the common causes of error) and therefore the responsibility of management to resolve. What barriers to their
How might the idea of ‘total quality control’ be applied to a distributed organisation such as a supply chain?
Quality circles are Ishikawa’s principle method for achieving participation. Consider how you might employ the idea of the ‘quality circle’ in the context of technology - driven, distributed
Consider the idea of ‘fitness for purpose’ as the definition of a quality product or service.How can that be translated into operationally definable characteristics? What are the particular
Oakland proposes that ‘Quality is the only issue for organisational survival’. Discuss this proposal in the light of the digital transformation and the emergence of Industry 4.0.

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