Quality management leaders have it hard
these days. Growing product complexities,
increasing customer expectations,
supply chain disruptions, rising costs, step-change
organizational goals, and directives to reduce
time-to-market create a virtual pressure cooker
for those leading industrial quality efforts.
Adding to this pressure are some of the old school
ways in which quality is often still perceived.
Traditionally, industrial quality management has
been considered the responsibility of only a specific
team or department, not the entire company—
as it should be. Moreover, quality has also
taken on the imprecise image of being strictly
compliance-based, with the leaders of quality
often viewed as “policing” the organization while
others half-heartedly embrace quality because
“someone said I had to do this.”
With so much on the quality leader’s plate,
it’s only logical that they’ve had to step up their
game. “Playing by the old rules for quality is no
longer competitive in the modern industrial digital
age,” said James Wells, research analyst at LNSResearch. “Quality Leaders are now leveraging
digital technologies and tools to minimize the
bureaucracy of the work of quality and using new
insights by connecting data together in context.”
According to a recent report from LNS
Research, early adopters of Industrie 4.0 methodologies
are leveraging real-time sensor data,
smart machines, and advanced analytics as part
of their quality management processes. But while
technology is certainly an important component
of emerging Quality 4.0 improvements, it falls
short when it comes to the organizational and cultural
challenges that quality leaders must also face.
According to LNS Research, there are several
elements across people, process, and technology
that should be included in an organization’s
Quality 4.0 strategy, including empowering plant
operators with a connected frontline workforce
program, building on existing management and
production systems with digital enhancements and
agile methodologies, and leveraging a holistic data
architecture strategy. The latter includes steps
like developing robust machine connectivity in the
plant, implementing a common data model across
IT and OT (operations technology) data, and creating
date custodian roles (e.g., data engineers).
But while technology is certainly important, it
should only come into consideration after alignment
to business goals is achieved, which includes
developing strategic initiatives from those goals
and defining the architecture.
In addition to enhancements in processes and
technology, perhaps most important to creating
true transformation with Quality 4.0 are the
people strategies. Taking the holistic approach to
Quality 4.0 and scaling it beyond the focus of just
one department is key. To combat the traditional
obstacles to quality and better manage all the
spinning plates quality leadership must regularly
handle, it’s important to integrate quality across
the complete value chain. This means integrating
the entire company, suppliers, and customers.
“Manufacturing and operations teams consider
themselves responsible for producing and
shipping products out the door and perceive
quality as a roadblock to success, rather than a
business partner,” said Vivek Murugesan, senior
research associate at LNS Research. “Here
begins the organizational disconnect that leads
to challenges, such as siloed systems, duplicate
sources of data, and inadequate support from IT,
leadership, and other teams.”
To avoid this disconnect, companies need to
nurture a culture of quality. According to LNS
Research, this includes driving executive credibility,
stating mission and vision, imparting core
values, and building on existing norms and management
systems.
Most organizations, especially the ones
actively pursuing a transformation initiative, are
aware of the importance of the culture of quality.
However, LNS Research has found only very few
companies are successful at creating it because
most don’t align their departmental goals to the
broader organizational reality.
Moreover, Wells states that, in setting and
achieving organizational goals, it’s important not
to set overly aggressive objectives because it often
leads to failure. Rather, leaders who set very big
but still achievable goals meet their goals most of
the time. “In the drive to change the culture of
quality, don’t aim too high, too soon,” said Wells.
The bottom line is this: Quality management
leaders must nurture a culture of quality in their
organizations to have a chance at the meaningful
transformation that a Quality 4.0 initiative should
bring. This also will help defeat the perception that
quality is synonymous with policing. Only then
can quality achieve the desired “trusted business
partner” status that it needs within a company to
set the stage for industrial transformation.
