The Schools of Quality

Today, I received this question from a friend: "Tell me, in your opinion where is ISO 9000 on the continum from waste-of-time to essential? Is TQM really dead leaving 6Sigma to reign?"

I think this was a pretty relevant question for Managers overseeing product development and manufacturing, so here is my response:

"Six Sigma has definitely become the quality model of choice within
manufacturing (led by the automotive and electronics industries). ISO9000 and TQM provide some meaningful guidelines, but in my experience, too much emphasis was put on passing the audits versus focusing on the right actions to actually improve quality. ISO9000 emphasizes documentation and specifies a format that seems more in line with legal contracts than with internal working documents. TQM has strong emphasis on process definition, but is best known for its Malcolm Baldridge award. When a methodology causes businesses to spend MORE money than can be gained through quality efficiencies, it has been taken too far."

"I believe it is this reaction that led to the popularity of Six Sigma which is more a collection of tools and methods employed through different phases of production. I have spent quite a bit of time learning a very small piece of Six Sigma called VOC (Voice of the Customer) and portions of QFD (Quality Functional Deployment). The tools and methods include excellent ways to capture and prioritize product requirements, and to measure results against the original requirements. The mother of all tools in QFD is something known as "the House of Quality". Good and useful stuff!"

A note to readers: Some years ago, I helped head-up an effort to make a 450 person software development organization "audit ready". We achieved ISO9000 certification and won the Malcolm Baldridge award as a result of our efforts. Early this year, I studied Six Sigma QFD with a friend who was completing his Black Belt certification. I found the tools useful and went on to apply them to my product management and design work. I therefore consider myself a quality practician, not an expert. I welcome other informed contributions on this topic.