Beyond PDCA by Praveen Gupta

[Manix]

In Reply to Parent Post by Jim Wynne

I just posted a fisking of the Gupta article here, and notified the author of the posting, and the discussion here, through his business e-mail address.

That's a right royal "FISKING" Jim!

I cannot comment on the article itself as I am not a member of ASQ, and I do not believe people should read your blog and form an opinion without reading the article aswell.

To this end this could never be an entirely open and therfore VALID arguement as the majority are not armed with the facts .

What's to say Jim's Blog is not simply a "Strawman", misrepresenting the article. I DON'T KNOW BECAUSE I CANNOT ACCESS THE ARTICLE!

Just my (except my is obviously my 2 pence!)

[Atul Khandekar]

In Reply to Parent Post by Manix

I DON'T KNOW BECAUSE I CANNOT ACCESS THE ARTICLE!

Pl. check post no 3 in this thread. The article is attached as PDF

[Manix]

In Reply to Parent Post by Atul Khandekar

Pl. check post no 3 in this thread. The article is attached as PDF

Apologies, I missed that one!

[Helmut Jilling]

In Reply to Parent Post by qualitytrec

I do not really see the differences (except in symantics) that Gupta is claiming. What really is the difference between Prepare and Plan, Perform and Do, Check/Study, and Perfect (defined by Gupta as "...assessing whether the process performed as planned..."). I see no change to the current cycle except the change of names to protect the innocent or uninformed.

I would not disparage improvements, even if they seem to be semantics. The terms Gupta applies are a tuning and clarifying of the intent of the original terms.

To us in the field, perhaps we understand them clearly enough, that they are equivalent. But many management teams clearly do not understand and apply them. They just "Plan" and "Do." They don't see the "Study" and "Act/Adjust" part of the circle.

Anything that can help reinforce that is a positive.

Besides, it is easier to teach people P-P-P-P than P-D-C-A.

[Jim Wynne]

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

Jim and Wes:

Thanks for your invitation. I love the discussion. I believe that is a primary purpose of the Forums. It is also critical to learn from such discussion, and propose solutions, rather than kill an idea, how simple and absurd it may sound.

Thank you for stopping by. If you haven't been here before, do take some time to browse and participate.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

Having said that, it appears that most of the argument is about preserving the past, resistance to change, and splitting hair, without trying to understand why would I waste my time in first researching, then writing the article, and finally take the beating for my work. I do have reasons for challenging the current model not because of its intent, but because of its implementation. We all must agree that ISO 9001 has not lived up to its potential.

I'm going to work under the assumption that you've read my extended response to your article (here, for those who missed the earlier link) and that you are now characterizing it as misbegotten conservatism and "splitting hair." If I'm wrong, please correct me. The fact that you are challenging the poor implementation of PDCA and not its intent seems to indicate that you have misidentified the problem, or have correctly identified it and are proposing a solution that doesn't address it. I think that whether or not ISO 9001 has "lived up to its potential" is largely irrelevant to the current discussion, because PDCA or your "4P's" may exist independently of the standard.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

I also challenge you guys to assess how effectively PDCA has been implemented in corporations. My experience with about 100 companies, I have not seen it is used well as intended. Thus, when practice is different from what a tool means to communicate, something must change.

I agree wholeheartedly. What I take issue with is your contention that we should get rid of perfectly good tools and replace them with shiny new ones, when the problem is that no one has been trained in proper use of the old tools. There is no reason to believe that the new tools won't be misunderstood or deliberately circumvented, just as the old ones were/are. To put it another way, my contention is that I have no need for your new tools if the old ones are properly implemented, and changing the name of the old tools doesn't help. A hammer called a "frammus" is still a hammer.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

Further, Shewhart developed his OCAP (Out of control action plan) to monitor the process output, and thus developed process control. In other words, he used process control to manage product flow.

I'm not sure of the relevance of Shewhart's intent, which is interesting mainly from a perspective of its historical value. It's a little like faulting Newton for not anticipating Einstein. Good theories develop as time passes and new knowledge becomes available, or they're discarded when new knowledge falsifies them. It seems like you're trying to do the latter, when the former hasn't been proven.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

Continually improving the process, now expectation is beyond control. The new expectation is management to achieve virtually perfect output. This requires management, which means input must be controlled.

What is "virtually perfect?" It's certainly not a universal absolute. What's virtually perfect to me might be unacceptable to someone else. We'll never get anywhere if we keep defining expectations in vague, fuzzy, feel-good motherhood statements. We all want product to satisify requirements.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

Plan is a buzz word everyone uses to the extent it loses its meaning in the context of process management.

That's an unsupported assertion, but if it's true, then we need to make sure that people understand the requirements. Replacing one buzz word with another doesn't help.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

Therefore, Prepare is suggest to change it from Plan. Besides, at the process level, it is the preparation, homework, or set up that matters. Set up guy does not plan, he prepares for the job.

You're playing with the words. I don't need to change "plan" to "prepare" if I make sure that everyone knows what I mean when I say "plan." If the change is made, you still have to explain what you want, and how you're defining the word, so what's the point?

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

I suggest you guys read the article carefully for its intent rather than a few words. I know it is a difficult topic to address, and accept the change.

If you read my response, then you know that I did read the article carefully. I think I made it clear that I can't tell for sure what your intent was. As I consider myself a reasonably intelligent person (but don't ask my wife ) I think I'm probably prepared to digest a "difficult topic," and I'm always willing to "accept the change" when I think the change makes good sense. That's why I named my blog "Common Sense Quality."

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

I recommend if PDCA works for you, continue to use it, ignore the 4P model. If PDCA does not produce the results you expect, you have a choice.

What are the alternatives? If you're saying that the choice is PDCA or PPPP, then you're presenting a false dichotomy. I always have the choice of acknowledging that there might be something wrong with my implementation and doing something to correct it. If I'm trying teach a child to ride a perfectly good bicycle and he keeps running into trees and falling off, replacing the bicycle isn't going to help.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

Even statistically, if you use the 4P model compare to current practice of PDCA, you are going to see 50 - 70% improvement.

Another unsupported assertion, I'm afraid. I mean no disrespect, but I've seen far too many claims of grand improvements and money saved that were built on shaky assumptions, and which couldn't be empirically verified.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

Initial skepticsm is understandable because it is a sensitive issue. However, it must make sense. Finally, there is no silver bullet. You have a new hammer, you use if it makes economic sense

Yes. And my point is that I don't believe that your article provides enough rational justification to start buying new hammers.

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

I hope it helps.

So do I.

[PraveenGupta]

Jim:

This Forum appears to be much more active and constructive!

In order to understand the intent of PDCA and 4P, one must understand what Shewhart was trying to do as he is the one who developed concepts of statistical thinking, and imparted intelligence into quality work. I mean intelligence through statistical thinking, and developed the predecessor to PDCA. PDCA is an aberration of the Shewhart's cycle.

Then, it is very critical to understand what is meant by quality. If one says to produce that is acceptable within specification limits, that is one definition. If one defines quality being on target, that is another definition. Virtual perfection implies close to target. There can not be many definition of saying being on target.

Acceptable within specification implies barely passing, i.e., 'C' grade performance. This product is much more sensitive to variation, testing devices, inspectors capability, etc. Such product is bound to be shoddy and expensive to build.

These are critical issues to understand. The 4P model highlights the original intent of producing close to target.

Saying what choices we have besides PDCA appears to be a limitation of some sort. That is an opportunity to improve, and that's what motivated me to developed a different solution. There could be many more. I do not know. Maybe, you may like to propose one that improves PDCA.

Of course, if you are happy with application of PDCA, you are already exceptional in its implementation. Congratulations to you!

Take care,

praveen

[Jim Wynne]

In Reply to Parent Post by PraveenGupta

This Forum appears to be much more active and constructive!

It was noted earlier that we just had registered visitor #25,000. Maybe it was you! But I don't think there's a prize, other than our thanks to you for joining us.

[Tim Folkerts]

I've always considered the PDCA as roughly equivalent to "the scientific method".

PLAN = hypothesize: consider something that you want to understand better and how you might study the idea

DO = experiment: collect some actual data related to your hypothesis

CHECK = analyze: examine the results of the experiment

ACT = reach a conclusion: is more experimenting called for? should the new-found knowledge be added into the body of accepted practice? is a completely new hypothesis called for?


If you accept the analogy, then it is pretty easy to argue that PDCA (or PDSA, or DMAIC, or PPPP) is a very good approach for tacking problems. After all, it has been working effectively in many areas or study for four or five centuries.

Tim F