QA department in a manufacturing environment

R

Raymond Knox

Hi,

First time being on this and site and looking for some help. Been asked short presentation on the following topic.
?You're being asked to set up a QA department in a manufacturing environment but need to gain buy in from senior management. Prepare a presentation that will secure the necessary backing?.

Any help would be great.

Thanks
Raymond
 

Chennaiite

Never-say-die
Trusted Information Resource
Hi,

First time being on this and site and looking for some help. Been asked short presentation on the following topic.
?You're being asked to set up a QA department in a manufacturing environment but need to gain buy in from senior management. Prepare a presentation that will secure the necessary backing?.

Any help would be great.

Thanks
Raymond

Sounds more so an academic assignment. Assuming this,
QA Department is to a Manufacturing plant what Politicians, Lawyers and Police are for a Country. They are lawmakers like Politicians. They do policing to control deviation from established rules or laws. They play the role of lawyers and judges in nailing the root cause of the deviation. They again play it like Politicians for improvement in the system, if need be, to bring down deviations.

Also, if tax-payers can invest in under-performing Politicians, Lawyers, and Police, why not an Organization's stakeholders invest in a performing QA Department. This, of course, is only if you can afford a little bit of political satire in your assignment.:tg:
 

John Broomfield

Leader
Super Moderator
Hi,

First time being on this and site and looking for some help. Been asked short presentation on the following topic.
?You're being asked to set up a QA department in a manufacturing environment but need to gain buy in from senior management. Prepare a presentation that will secure the necessary backing?.

Any help would be great.

Thanks
Raymond

Raymond,

Best not to use a PP presentation. Instead engage the top managers by asking them questions.

First, prepare by understanding the internationally agreed definition of quality assurance. You will see that it is a feeling not a department.

They may agree the purpose of their organization is to create more successful customers.

Help them to understand that they lead an organization that works as a system with its customers and suppliers to fulfill its purpose.

Ask them if they have a process-based management system that provides them and their customers (now and in the future) with confidence their requirements will be fulfilled?

Note the focus on preventing failures to meet requirements and ask them if this is best done by designing and managing processes or inspecting their products.

If they claim they do have an effective management system then ask them how they know for sure and who looks after this management system? If they do not claim this then ask them who will help develop their management system?

This person is often called the QA Manager.

John
 

Wes Bucey

Prophet of Profit
"presentations" are not just content, but "style" - if it were just "content," there wouldn't be a necessity to ask.

First and foremost, one must consider the audience and target them with appropriate style and content level. You write
?You're being asked to set up a QA department in a manufacturing environment but need to gain buy in from senior management. Prepare a presentation that will secure the necessary backing?.
so we assume the target audience is senior management, but WHO? HOW MANY? TIME TABLE? TIME LIMIT?

Since it's senior management, the obvious focus should be on how an efficient and effective quality department will help convince customers the organization will deliver good quality on a consistent basis while eliminating the soft (but very real) costs of poor quality for the organization. I would eschew any details of WHAT the quality department would do, but I would have a cost table of equipment, personnel, and ongoing training for quality people to service an organization of various sizes.

One good reference to see how a quality guru tackled the same issue of convincing management, is to review Crosby's book, if you can find it, "Quality is Free." Some excerpts to give you an idea of its "flavor" are at http://www.philipcrosby.com/25years/read.html
 

Jen Kirley

Quality and Auditing Expert
Leader
Admin
If this is an assignment there will probably be requirements for media use and the ability to interact like we would in actual workplace meetings might be limited.

In either case it's fair to expect a sharply limited understanding of what successful QA does, some preconceived notions about QA=inspection and at least a little skepticism about the value of starting a department that financial people would consider overhead.

The myths should be addressed early on; avoid jargon. Speak in plain terms that your audience can relate to. The purpose of Quality Assurance is to help make sure only good product gets to the customer, without going broke in the process. That is the essence of the quality cost bath tub curve. The successful QA Department facilitates the process of quality, which I'll define for our purposes as doing things well. The result is a widget that works properly, made in a profitable set of activities using the Work Smarter, Not Harder principle.

How is that done? You can show the bath tub curve and describe how we want to stay in the bottom part where the right amount of work = the right amount of avoiding problems. The tippy-top of the far side of the curve - the cost of getting it wrong can be described in real numbers that are easy to get, such as the costs of the lawsuits and automobile recalls in the past two years. As is often the case, the issues involved in those lawsuits and recalls were multiplied by decisions to take no action for long periods. Doing things well (or not) includes strategy. The QA Department can provide data for good decision making to maximize profits.

In the end it's always about $$$ and that's what your audience of managers will understand. Your job is to connect the dots for them in simple terms: the QA Department facilitates planning, production controls, supplier controls, customer satisfaction, doing things right the first time and effective recovery when things go wrong.

I hope this helps!
 
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