H.-A. Crostack
University of Dortmund, Chair of Quality Engineering, Dortmund, Germany
I. Hackenbroich
University of Dortmund, Chair of Quality Engineering, Dortmund, Germany
Rorbert Refflinghaus
University of Dortmund, Chair of Quality Engineering, Dortmund, Germany
D. Winter
University of Dortmund, Chair of Quality Engineering, Dortmund, Germany
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Published in: 10th QMOD Conference. Quality Management and Organiqatinal Development. Our Dreams of Excellence; 18-20 June; 2007 in Helsingborg; Sweden
Linköping Electronic Conference Proceedings 26:72, p.
Published: 2008-02-15
ISBN:
ISSN: 1650-3686 (print), 1650-3740 (online)
The preferred application of the QM method Quality Function Deployment [QFD] is to achieve high-quality products by means of systematic processes already in the early stages of the product creation process; whereby quality in this context is understood to mean a high rate of customer satisfaction which in turn is a decisive factor for the long-term success of an enterprise. For this purpose; customer requirements must be acquired as complete as possible and accurately weighted. Only then; the finally defined product characteristics which have been derived from customer requirements be optimized to provide the best possible benefits.
A conventionally applied QFD; the method used in most cases; does not gather customer wishes with great accuracy. That means that the results will likewise be inaccurate as their significance depends decisively on the quality of the input quantity. Therefore; new considerations are looking at how to achieve increased accuracy of input quantity by employing the Analytic Hierarchy Process [AHP]. The outcome is that the weighted customer requirements are included in the calculations not as an absolute value of a defined interval scale e.g. from 1 to 5 or 1 to 10 as before but in the form of relative figures between 0 and 1. The relative weightings result from making comparisons of the requirements in pairs in order to achieve increased quality of outcomes. As the employment of relative evaluation methods based on the AHP methodology - in particular that of making comparisons in pairs - involves considerably increased time and effort; it is essential to observe that wherever possible no or only minimal loss of accuracy is incurred when integrating the relative values. Otherwise; the considerable increase in time and effort spent becomes unjustifiable.
