Changing Quality Objectives

[insect warfare]

The objectives come from the policy...(per ISO 9001) Your policy sets a frame work for setting objectives. You may need to rethink this as there's little room for improvement with a policy which sets out your aim as the stars!

I'd still put it to you that, if your policy is to "exceed expectations"...what will you use to objectively determine that you have done this? Expectations are, by their very nature, often unstated. When you go to McDonalds, you never say "I'd like Hot, Safe, fries"...but that's what you expect...

Andy, you make a good point with the "exceeding expectations" jive....

Since anything and everything one puts into their quality policy becomes auditable, it can just as easily be picked apart by an auditor like you described. As it seems, this handy document (which I refer to more and more these days) has two accepted definitions of "expectation", which are:

- (noun) belief about (or mental picture of) the future
- (noun) wishing with confidence of fulfillment

I personally do not like to paint myself into a corner with verbiage such as "meet or exceed expectations" or the like, when the standard only calls for inclusion of "a commitment to comply with requirements and continually improve QMS effectiveness".

Going further into the word "expectation" - it is extremely difficult to be aware of what one expects, unless it is explicitly stated. In the realm of customer satisfaction, this can muddy the waters as one could falsely state that customer expectations were exceeded when, unbeknownst to them, the customer may not have even been aware of the expectation, or had an alternate (tacit) expectation. On the flipside, an auditor must also possess an intuition as to when some things cannot be audited objectively (like implied expectations), and record them for reference.

Brian

 

[AndyN]

Nice explanation, Brian. Indeed, some customers don't want anything but meeting needs. Take delivery, for example. Some want it at 10.00am on the dock, every Wednesday. So don't even try to exceed this by delivering earlier - they have no place to put the product! This is called "just in time" and is simply a meeting of requirements...

I covered some of this mythology about Quality Policy in my book, BTW...

 

[insect warfare]

Nice explanation, Brian. Indeed, some customers don't want anything but meeting needs. Take delivery, for example. Some want it at 10.00am on the dock, every Wednesday. So don't even try to exceed this by delivering earlier - they have no place to put the product! This is called "just in time" and is simply a meeting of requirements...

I covered some of this mythology about Quality Policy in my book, BTW...

Tell me about it....I get aggravated especially when I go to a fast-food joint like Sonic, tell them that I want a medium-size drink - then when they send me a 44-oz and it doesn't fit quite right in my cupholder, they wonder why I am dissatisfied. Their perception of my satisfaction was "more is better" but it turns out I just wanted my order met for a completely different reason altogether. That is a prime example of what can happen when you proclaim to "exceed expectations". They just didn't understand what I truly wanted (at that time), and even though I told them specifically what I wanted, there was no surefire way for them to "exceed my expectations" without being a little psychic.

Brian