Quality (business) facts for kids

In the world of business, engineering, and manufacturing, quality means how good something is. It's about whether a product or service is excellent and does what it's supposed to do. Think of it as being "fit for its purpose" and making customers happy.

Quality can feel a bit different to everyone. What one person thinks is high quality, another might see differently. For example, customers might look at how a product compares to others. Businesses, though, might focus on how well they made the product. Was it made correctly? People who fix things might care if a product is reliable and easy to fix. Even though quality can feel personal, businesses use clear ways to measure it. They use numbers and facts to see if they are meeting their quality goals.

In simple terms, good quality in business means making a product or service right the first time. It also means making the right amount at the right time. The product should not be too good or not good enough. Making something "too good" (overquality) can cost too much money. So, it's about finding the perfect balance.

What is Quality in Business?

Quality in business covers many things. It's about how a company makes its products or provides its services. This includes all the steps, tools, people, and money involved. All these parts work together under the idea of quality. The main way businesses handle quality is through something called quality management.

How Businesses Manage Quality

Quality management has four key parts:

• Quality planning: This is like drawing a map for success. Businesses figure out who their customers are and what they need. Then, they plan how to make products or services that meet or go beyond those needs.
• Quality assurance: This is about making sure things go right from the start. It's like checking your work as you go to prevent mistakes. Businesses measure things, compare them to standards, and watch their processes. This helps them be confident that their products will meet their goals.
• Quality control (QC): This is about checking the final product or service. It's like a final inspection. Businesses look at everything involved in making the product. They make sure it meets their goals. This often involves checking and testing the finished item.
• Quality improvement: This is about making things better all the time. Businesses look at how well their processes work. They find ways to make them more efficient and effective. This can be done with big changes or small, continuous steps.

A Brief History of Quality

The idea of quality in business isn't new. Back in the early 1900s, people like Frederick Winslow Taylor and Henry Ford saw problems with how things were made. They started using quality control and checking products. Later, in the 20th century, experts like William Edwards Deming and Joseph M. Juran helped improve quality even more. Their ideas first became popular in Japan and then spread worldwide.

Customers really care about quality. Businesses know that good quality can make their products stand out from competitors. In recent years, the difference in quality between competing products has become smaller. This is partly because many companies now make their products in other countries, like China and India. These countries have also improved their quality standards to meet global demands. The ISO 9000 standards are well-known international rules for quality management. There are also special standards for things like medical labs (ISO 15189) and environmental management (ISO 14001).

Different Ways to Define Quality

Over time, people have thought about quality in different ways. Here are a few ideas:

• American Society for Quality: Quality means meeting the needs and hopes for a product or service. It also means a product or service has no problems.
• Philip B. Crosby: Quality is simply "meeting requirements." If a product does what it's supposed to, it has quality.
• W. Edwards Deming: Quality is about making what the market expects in a smart way. He believed that better management leads to better quality, lower costs, and higher productivity.
• ISO 9000: Quality is how well a product's features meet certain needs or expectations.
• Joseph M. Juran: Quality is "fitness for use." This means the product works well for the customer's purpose.
• Six Sigma: This method measures quality by how few mistakes there are. It aims for almost no errors.

Quality in Different Industries

Quality is important in all kinds of businesses, but it looks a bit different depending on the industry.

How Operations Management Sees Quality

Operations management is about finding the best ways to create and deliver products or services. Quality is one of five main goals for how well a business performs:

• Quality: How well a product or service meets its planned standards.
• Speed: How quickly a customer gets a product or service after asking for it.
• Dependability: How consistently a product or service is delivered as expected.
• Flexibility: How fast a business can change to meet new market needs.
• Cost: The money and resources needed to make and improve the product or service.

These goals support each other. If a business focuses on quality, it often becomes more dependable, costs less, and makes customers happier.

Quality in Manufacturing

In factories, quality has become a huge focus. In the 1920s, manufacturers started moving from just making as much as possible to carefully controlling quality. Standards like ISO 9001 help companies create a system to manage quality. Also, good manufacturing practice (GMP) rules make sure that products like food, drinks, medicines, and medical devices are always high quality. Ideas like Six Sigma and Lean Six Sigma have also pushed quality to the front of how factories operate. At the heart of these efforts is often a Quality Management System (QMS). This is a set of plans, methods, and tools a company uses to make sure its products are top-notch.

Quality in Services

Making sure services are high quality is a bit different from making products. Products are physical and easy to see. Services, however, are often not physical. Think about getting a haircut or help from a customer service agent. It's harder to measure.

For services, things like being dependable, quick to respond, understanding, skilled, and even clean can make a big difference in how customers see the quality. Customer expectations are still key, but the way a service interacts with the customer really shapes how good they think it is.

Quality in Japanese Culture

In Japan, there are two interesting ideas about quality: atarimae hinshitsu and miryokuteki hinshitsu.

• Atarimae hinshitsu (当たり前品質): This means things work exactly as they should. For example, a pen writes, or a wall in a house stands strong. It's the basic, expected function.
• Miryokuteki hinshitsu (魅力的品質): This is about things having a special, appealing quality. It's more than just working. For example, a pen not only writes but feels nice to hold and makes beautiful lines. A wall might have a lovely color or texture. These aspects add extra value and make the product more desirable.

When designing products or services, combining both atarimae hinshitsu and miryokuteki hinshitsu helps make sure they work well and are also something customers truly want.

Quality Management Techniques

Here are some ways businesses work to improve quality:

• Quality management systems
• Total quality management (TQM)
• Design of experiments
• Continuous improvement
• Six Sigma
• Statistical Process Control (SPC)
• Quality circles
• Requirements analysis
• Verification and validation
• Zero Defects
• Service quality
• SERVQUAL
• Theory of Constraints (TOC)
• Business process management (BPM)
• Business process re-engineering
• Capability maturity models
• Quality function deployment (QFD)

Quality Awards

Many awards celebrate companies that achieve high quality:

• Deming Prize
• EFQM Excellence Award
• Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award

See also

In Spanish: Calidad para niños