another milestone reached…

Last week another major milestone was reached in the team’s quest for Zero Defects. Six months ago it was not uncommon for the final quality check to discover 20% to 30% of the products needed some amount of “rework” prior to shipment. These orders would then flow back upstream for various amounts of fixing prior to yet another round through the QC department. At the time, we began tracking and focusing more on quality, on getting it right the first time, on First Time Through Perfect, and even re-crafted the bonus system to reward quality rather than quantity.

Last Friday the QC department registered ONE quality defect for the day…amazing progress in a relatively short time. How did they do it? I believe a number of key factors helped with this turnaround: 1) moving a QC person into the process midway, 2) helping teams find root cause problems rather than fixing (enabling) issues during the process, 3) training and making people aware that quality comes first and that speed and quality can go hand in hand (but never at the expense of quality). 

This is a beginning, and the teams have accomplished something they did not believe was possible. What fun!!