Jane Cowan, Quality Assurance
Departmental Relations At one time, we designed a handful of systems. Easy to manage, easy to get quality. As we scaled up, quality suffered. So RichardWright, Brian Johnson (who was then head of R&D) and myself got together and developed a process where R&D designed for ‘ease-of-manufacture.’ And we supervised from newly installed inspection stations. Today, we build quality right into the process. Quality Focus Here, quality refers to accuracy (which is the sensitivity of our sensor technology) and durability (think about how much abuse the product can take before failure). The trick is holding our commercial products to the same standards as our military products. The Solution Two things: more inspectors and more training on quality for employees. Do the training, reject rates fall and the sav- ings pays for additional inspectors and quality improves. Quality Situation Product variation requires inspectors to be super- attentive. Given the variation of the product mix, my team is understaffed and overworked. We catch a lot, but not enough. Quality Standards We have to build quality right into the products, so we are developing a closer working relationship with R&D to report quality issues to them and to work at root causes to get better designs. This feedback loop is helping us maintain the quality standards we have.
Your Role We’ve got a reputation for quality in the marketplace. I protect it. And improve it, of course. Manufacturing Department We aren’t to set up to handle all the product variation that the commercial market requires. Right now when sales in commercial are relatively low, our defect rate is close to 4%. What’s going to happen when volumes pick up? The Problem As Marketing forces more product variation, product quality becomes tougher to maintain. Supervisors are spending more time addressing quality problems than ever before … which means production slowdowns … which means more overtime … which increases costs … which means thin margins. It’s a vicious spiral. We either have to lower quality standards or organize the manufacturing process differently.
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