Beacon Quality Blog

You’ve heard it before: What gets measured gets done. Part of planning to reach an objective is measuring what must be improved in order to move forward—in a word, metrics. Metrics give companies a way to define success and a path toward achieving their goals.

Quality Standards

Plant managers and owners strive to ensure that their plants comply with quality standards. One of the best ways to achieve this is to use metrics.

Employing an array of key metrics can help assure that plant personnel identifies details that ultimately make up the objective and meet the standards quality owners and managers require. Having definite measurements, targets, and planned actions (the first three parts of the SMART mnemonic: Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Realistic, Time-Based) helps achieve the high standards managers and owners set while recognizing that goals that are too lofty often can lead to worker discouragement.

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The unique value of layered process audits (LPAs) stems from building an effective layering system where you have fresh eyes conducting audits on a consistent basis. LPAs involve employees from all levels of an organization, from operators to senior management, who devote periodic attention to core processes. Unfortunately, what makes LPAs so beneficial to your organization also makes them cumbersome—as the sheer number of audits and auditors involved can create scheduling headaches.

The good news is that you can reduce the time-consuming tasks associated with assigning and scheduling audits by using audit management software. For example, you can easily build a schedule where first-level supervisors are performing audits on every shift while top-level management representatives, such as a plant manager, complete at least one audit per week.

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A few things in life are required—we simply have no choice but to do them—like paying taxes. Some quality managers would compare the often-mandatory requirement of completing layered process audits (LPAs) to calculating taxes—both are cumbersome and are easily forgotten once the requirement is met. But what if there was an effective solution to simplifying your LPA process and at the same time adding value to your organization? 

LPAs are a sub-type of process audits; and they differ from generic process audits by requiring multiple people, including management, to conduct an ongoing chain of simple verifications to ensure that a defined process is followed correctly. LPAs provide an active view into operational process conformance and corrective actions as required by many end manufacturers (such as automakers) to maintain supplier quality. When implemented correctly, LPAs can help shape your organization’s culture into one that embraces continuous improvement. This powerful audit management methodology can:

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Research studies show that manufacturers estimate their cost of quality at approximately 10 percent of revenues, while, in reality, that figure is double that at 20 percent. While statistics like this are eye catching, it’s important to understand what is meant by the term, cost of quality. Unfortunately, it’s a widely misunderstood concept. Many organizations view the cost of quality solely in reference to failure costs. Common examples of activities related to this line of thinking include:

• Rework
• Scrap
• Returned materials
• Warranty recalls

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Understanding and applying key components of an LPA program are critical to success, but to maximize the short- and long-term effectiveness of an LPA, Ease has found that manufacturers should also integrate the following four key practices.

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In today’s competitive environment, manufacturers are more focused than ever on delivering high-quality products while reducing costs. Unfortunately, too often efforts are driven by a skewed perception of how best to achieve this goal. This is because many manufacturers pay greater attention to the cost of poor quality (CoPQ), comprising internal and external failure costs, over the cost of good quality (CoGQ), comprising proactive prevention and appraisal costs. As a result, they make reactive investments that yield less return and later prove to be insufficient.

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While nearly every manufacturer has employed audits to identify issues with staff output and process compliance, an LPA is distinctive in that it focuses on driving cultural change throughout an organization to improve quality and reduce failure rates. LPAs are part of a formalized system for providing constant attention to an organization’s core, high-risk processes and controls to ensure minimal variation.

Created by the Automotive Industry Action Group (AIAG) nearly a decade ago, LPAs were first applied in Daimler Chrysler and Toyota plants, and since have become required practice for most auto manufacturers. Over time the practice has spread to other manufacturing industries, but with only varying degrees of success.

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As we have discussed to great lengths, effective safety performance is built on a foundation of involved safety leadership from the top down, and engaged safety activity from the ground up. It sounds great in principle—and perhaps simple, but in reality is a lot more challenging in execution.

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