You can never ‘inspect’ Quality into a Product . This was the poster put up by the Quality Manger of the Organisation Mr. Gunvaandhari . A machine operator – Mr. Kuchkat read this and came to Mr. Gunvaandhari . ‘Sir , with due respect , what does this poster even mean ? I’m not able to grasp its message’ he said .
Mr. Gunvaandhari just smiled and asked simply – ‘Does Inspection create Quality ?’
‘No’ , said Kuchkat .
‘Then how is Quality created ?’ , asked Mr. Gunvaandhari .
‘Well , by doing your job properly !’ , answered Kuchkat .
‘What do you mean by “properly” ?’asked Mr. Gunvaandhari .
Kuchkat was confused . They recently had had a session on Quality with Mr. Gunvaandhari where he defined Quality for them . He went back to his desk and searched for his notebook he had taken for the session . He found the book , and started reading the sentence which struck a cord with him . ‘Quality is conforming to requirements’ . He began thinking . He went back to the poster .
‘Whose requirements am I supposed to conform to ? The Inspector ? The Manager ? The Owner ? God – what a mess ! I don’t even know whose requirements I’m supposed to conform to !’
He went back home and sat down to have his dinner . When his wife served him his food , she asked him how the meal was . He smiled and said , ‘you should know , you must have tasted it , right ?’
‘Of course I tasted it , but I made it for you , and if you like it , then I feel like I’ve done a good job !’ .
‘That’s it !’ exclaimed Kuchkat . ‘That’s whose requirements I need to conform to ! The person who works on what I make .’
The next day he went to the worker who processed the output of his process . Kuchkat had a long chat with that worker about what he wanted and expected from him and his out put . He realised that he was not focusing on what was important to the next worker , but only on himself all along .
After taking the inputs , Kuchkat made changes to his equipment and process and then started delivering his out put to the next operator .
After a week , the operator came and thanked him and said , ‘you know what ? I don’t even need to inspect your work . Otherwise , the work had to go through multiple checks and I used to waste my time throughout the day ! Inspection does not do anything to the product – it only qualifies it !’
It dawned on Kuchkat why Mr. Gunvaandhari put up that poster . Indeed , you can not ‘inspect’ Quality into a product . You design it in with the intent of meeting Customer Requirements .
………and they all lived Qualitively ever after !
Lessons Learned
- There are no short cuts .
- Talk to your Customer and understand Quality before creating it .