Quality Management
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Quality is the degree to which a set of characteristics meets requirements. In the PMBOK Guide's eighth edition, quality is treated as a principle that applies in every domain rather than as a separate area: the principle is to embed quality in processes and deliverables (BrainBOK, n.d.; Scanme, n.d.).
Quality Planning, Assurance, and Control
| Activity | Question | Example |
| Quality planning | What standards apply and how will we meet them? | Agree the format, referencing style, and evaluation criteria for the thesis |
| Quality assurance | Are we using the right processes? | Follow a protocol; hold peer reviews of the method |
| Quality control | Do the results meet the standard? | Check data accuracy; proof-read; test the prototype |
Continuous Improvement
Deming's (1986) Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) cycle is the basis of many quality systems: plan a change, try it, check the results, and act on what you learn. This is also a good way to think about each cycle of a research or development project.
Cost of Quality
The cost of quality includes the cost of conformance (prevention and appraisal) and the cost of non-conformance (rework, failures, and reputational damage). It is generally cheaper to prevent defects than to fix them later.
The Seven Basic Quality Tools
Ishikawa (1985) popularized a set of simple tools:
Cause-and-effect (fishbone) diagram for finding root causes.
Check sheets for collecting data.
Histograms for showing distributions.
Pareto charts for identifying the vital few causes (the 80/20 idea).
Scatter diagrams for relationships.
Control charts for monitoring process stability.
Flowcharts for describing processes.
Reviews, Testing, and Definition of Done
Use reviews (peer review, design review, supervisor review) and tests at each stage rather than only at the end. Agile teams write a Definition of Done, a shared checklist that an item must satisfy to count as complete (Schwaber & Sutherland, 2020).
Quality in Research
Research quality includes validity, reliability, reproducibility, and ethics. Practices that protect quality include pilot studies, pre-registration of hypotheses where appropriate, careful documentation, version control for code and data, and following the FAIR principles of data management (Wilkinson et al., 2016).
Lean and Six Sigma
Lean methods aim to eliminate waste and maximize flow, while Six Sigma uses statistical analysis to reduce variation and defects. Both are widely used in manufacturing, health care, and services, and students in engineering and science will meet them in industry.
CHAPTER 12