Chapter 5

Quality Control
• Introduction
• Tools and techniques of Quality Control
• Six Sigma
• Pareto analysis
• Quality control charts
• The Cause and Effect Diagram
• Histogram
• Flowchart
• Outputs of quality control
Quality Control

• Quality assurance is often confused with quality control;

• quality control;
– is done at the end of a process
– or an activity to verify that quality standards have been met.
• Quality control ;
– by itself does not provide quality,
– although it may identify problems and suggest ways to improving it.
• In contrast, quality assurance;
– is a systematic approach to obtaining quality standards
• Quality assurance;
– is something that must be planned
– from the earliest stages of a project,
– with appropriate measures taken at every stage.
• Unfortunately;
– too many development projects are implemented with no quality
assurance plan,
– and many of these projects often fail to meet quality expectations of
the donor and beneficiaries.
• To avoid such problem;
– the project must be able to demonstrate the consistent compliance
with the quality requirements for the project.
• Quality control;
– is the use of techniques and activities that compare actual quality
performance ,
– with goals and define appropriate action
– It is the process that monitors specific project results ,
• to determine if they comply with relevant standards
• And identifies different approaches to eliminate the causes for the unsatisfactory
performance.
• Quality control also includes how the project performs in its
efforts to manage
– scope, budget and schedule.
• Quality Control (QC) may be defined as a system that is used to
maintain a desired level of quality in a project, product or service.
• It is a systematic control of various factors that affect the quality
of the product.
• QC is a broad term, it involves inspection at particular stage but mere
inspection does not mean QC.
• Quality control aims at prevention of defects at the source, relies on
effective feedback system and corrective action procedure.
• Quality control uses inspection as a valuable tool.
• According to Juran
• “Quality control is the regulatory process through which we measure
actual quality performance, compare it with standards, and act on the
difference”.
• The quality control process involves inspecting, testing and reporting the
project outputs.
• The purpose is to ensure that the project outcomes meet the quality
requirements outlined at the start of the project
• Quality control is achieved by ensuring conformance, decision-making
steps and process improvements (which are outlined in the quality
assurance process)
• Quality control identifies that outputs provided are at the expected
level.
• Quality is also about the issues of:
1. Acceptance;
• the beneficiaries,
• the donor
• or other key project stakeholders;
– accept or reject
–the product or service delivered.
–Acceptance occurs after;
• the beneficiaries or donor
• evaluated the product or service
2. Rework;
– is the action taken
– to bring the rejected product or service into compliance
with the;
• requirements,
• quality specifications
• or stakeholder expectations.
• Rework;
– is expensive
– that is why the project must make every effort to do a good job
– in quality planning and quality assurance to avoid the need for rework.
• Rework and all the costs associated with it,
– may not refundable by the donor
– it is the organization may end up covering those costs.
3. Adjustments;
– correct or take the necessary steps to prevent
further,
• quality problems
• or defects based on quality control measurements.
– Adjustments are identified to;
• the processes that produce the outputs
• and the decisions that were taken that lead to the defects and errors.
– are changes, taken to the Change Control processes of
the project.
Quality Control
 The project management should be aware of the following
among other subjects:
- Prevention ( keeping errors out of the process)
- Inspection (keeping errors out of the customers hand )
- Attribute sampling (for conformity of results)
- Variable sampling (where the results are rated on a continuous scale
that measures the degree of conformity or non conformity
- Tolerances ( specified range of acceptable results )
- Control limits ( thresholds, which can indicate whether the process is
out of control )
Quality Control Flowchart
Inputs To Quality Control
1) Project Management Plan
2) Quality Metrics
3) Quality Checklists
4) Work performance measurements
 Planned vs. actual technical performance
 Planned vs. actual schedule performance
 Planned vs. actual cost performance
Inputs To Quality Control
• 5) Approved change requests
• 6) Deliverables
• 7) Organizational process assets
• Quality standards & polices
• Standards & work guidelines
• Issue and defect reporting procedures and communication polices
Tools and Techniques for Quality Control

• Kaoru Ishikawa once said

“As much as 95% of quality problems can be solved with seven
fundamental quantitative tools”.
• These tools were first categorized as Quality Control Tools by
Ishikawa in his book Introduction to Quality Control.
Tools and Techniques

• What are these 7 fundamental tools for problem solving & continuous
improvement:
• Flow Charts
• Check Sheets
• Pareto Charts
• Cause & Effect Diagrams
• Control Charts
• Scatter Diagrams
• Histograms
• So why are these seven tools so effective?
• They all share two characteristics that make them very effective in problem
solving (and continuous improvement).
• First – they are all visual tools. You’ve heard the saying – a picture is
worth a thousand words.
• These tools prove that point.
• Second – they all deal with facts or data, not opinions or conjecture.
• Problems are solved with facts and data.
• Improvements are made with facts and data.
• When we combine a fact-based approach with a visual tool we are able to
solve problems more easily.
Six Sigma
• Six Sigma was developed in the 1980’s at Motorola company
• The Six Sigma process in quality management involves embedding
continuous improvement into the organization and projects.
• Six Sigma aims for the project to have consistent and predictable
outputs
• To successfully implement the quality management process, there
needs to be top-down endorsement and support.
• The process focuses on measurable outcomes, leadership, and a
commitment to make data-informed decisions throughout the
project.
• Six Sigma was originally developed as an iteration on the then-
popular TQM methodology, which later resulted in Motorola winning
the first ever MBNQA (Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award) in
1988 for excellence in manufacturing.
• The concept of a process, and process capability, is central to Six
Sigma and so many other concepts in quality engineering.
• Every process has 3 common features: inputs, the process and
outputs.
• The outputs of a process are the product features and specifications
that our customers desire.
• The quality of our products, and the quality of these outputs depend
on the process.
• Quality within the Six Sigma method focuses on consistency, reducing
issues and the predictability of the outputs.
• Within statistics, Six Sigma is 6 times the sigma (standard deviation)
from the mean.
• Therefore, the data point needs to be up to 6 standard deviations
from the mean.
• This allows for 99.99966% of deliverables to be free from issues and
equates to 3.4 defects per million.
• The term six sigma reflects the number of standard deviations that fit
within the specification limits.
• The image below shows the percentage of the population that fits
within each standard deviation.
• So 68.3% of a normally distributed population falls within one
standard deviation of the mean, 95.5% falls within two standard
deviations, and 99.7% falls within three standard deviations.
• if the specification limits are only 1-sigma away from the mean, then
a large portion of the distribution will be non-conforming.
• If the specification limits are 6-sigma away from the mean, then very
few failures are likely to occur.
• Having a process where six standard deviations of variation fit within
the specification limits can be described as the ultimate goal of six
sigma.
Sigma and Defective Units

Specification Range (in plus Percent of population within Defective Units per Billion
or minus Sigmas) Range

1 68.27 317,300,000

2 95.45 45,400,000

3 99.73 2,700,000

4 99.9937 63,000

5 99.999943 57

6 99.9999998 2
Sigma Conversion Table

Sigma Yield Defects per Million Opportunities (DPMO)

1 31.0% 690,000
2 69.2% 308,000
3 93.3% 66,800
4 99.4% 6,210
5 99.97% 230
6 99.99966% 3.4
• Within Six Sigma, there is a primary methodology used to understand
quality control.
• According to Deming et al. (2012), DMAIC can be used to improve a
project’s outcomes or create a quality control
process.
• This is outlined in Figure below.
DMAIC project quality control 5-phase process,
• The 5 phases within DMAIC are:
• Define: define the problem space, project outcomes or system, based
on the requirements set by the clients or stakeholders which meet
the project goals or outcomes.
• Measure: data needs to be collected on the current process, to
ensure that there is a baseline, and continue to be collected
throughout the project.
• Analyze: data needs to be analyzed in order to understand causation
and relationships between all factors. This helps identify the root
causes of a problem or issue.
• Improve: the optimization of the current process is based on data
analysis, in order to create new future processes.
• Control: future processes ensure deviations are responded to and do
not lead to problems. This process should be ongoing to ensure the
quality level is maintained.
• The DMAIC improvement process is a key part of the Six Sigma
process.
• However, it is not only used within Six Sigma and is often used as a
framework to support the improvement of quality within projects,
systems and products.
• Six Sigma can be used to support quality control using many tools and
techniques.
Cause and Effect Diagram/fishbone diagrams
• Cause and Effect Diagram,
– also known as fishbone diagrams
– or Ishikawa diagrams
• named after Kaoru Ishikawa,
– a Japanese quality control statistician,
– who developed the concept in the 1960s,
– and is considered one of the seven basic tools of quality management.
• It is named fishbone diagram;
– because of their fish-like appearance,
– it is an analysis tool that provides a systematic way of looking at
effects,
– and the causes that create or contribute to those effects
• The Ishikawa Diagram;
–is employed by a problem-solving team,
–as a tool for assembling all inputs,
–i.e., as to what are the causes of the problem they're addressing;
• systematically and graphically,
• with the inputs usually coming from a brainstorming session.
• This diagram can provide the problem-solving efforts by “gathering and
organizing the possible causes, reaching a common understanding of
the problem, exposing gaps in existing knowledge, ranking the most
probable causes, and studying each cause”
• It enables the team to focus on;
– why the problem occurs,
– and not on the history
– or symptoms of the problem,
– or other topics that digress from the intent of the session.
• It also displays;
– a real-time 'snap-shot' of the collective inputs of the team as it is
updated.
• The possible causes are;
– presented at various levels of detail in connected branches,
– with the level of detail increasing as the branch goes outward,
– i.e., an outer branch is a cause of the inner branch it is attached to.
• Thus, the outermost branches usually indicate the root causes
of the problem.
Pareto Charts
• Pareto Charts;
– based on Pareto’s rule,
– which states that 80 percent of the problems are often due to 20 percent of
the causes.
• The assumption is that;
– most of the results in any situation are determined by a small number of
causes
– and helps identify the vital few contributors that account for most quality
problems.
• The chart;
– Is a form of histogram;
• that orders the data by frequency of occurrence;
• it shows how many defects were generated by a type of category of identified cause.
• The Pareto Chart is a bar chart that allows for analysis of data in search of
the Pareto Principle or the 80/20 rule.
• The 80/20 rule was first identified by an Italian researcher, Vilfredo Pareto,
who was studying wealth and land ownership in Europe, and found that
80% of the land in Europe was owned by 20% of the population.
• The 80/20 rule was popularized by Joseph Juran, who names the Pareto
Chart after Vilfredo Pareto.
• Juran went on to say that the Pareto Chart helps us separate the vital few
from the trivial many.
• Essentially, the pareto chart is a prioritization tool that allows us to focus
on the issues that are causing the biggest problem, and thus maximize our
impact.
• Mechanically, the Pareto Chart is simply a bar chart that displays data
that from various discrete categories.
• This data might come from a check sheet.
• It shows the relative importance of variables, prioritized in descending
order from left to right side of the chart.
• The categories of data are typically arranged from greatest to least on
the X-axis.
• The Y-axis is a count of defects, but this number can be cost, or any
other variable. Pareto Charts also frequently include a cumulative
frequency line to assist in the analysis.
Example
• Let’s analyze the above Pareto Chart. There are 15 total defect
conditions (A-N).
• The top 3 defects (Defects A, B & C) make up only 20% (3 out of 15)
of the defect conditions, however they contribute to 72% of the total
number defects.
• IF we could eliminate just these 3 defect conditions, we could
eliminate 72% of the defects.
• That’s the Pareto Chart and the 80/20 Rule at work.
Control Charts
• Control Charts;
– is a graphical display of data that illustrates;
• the results of a process over time,
• the purpose of a control chart is;
– to prevent defects,
– rather than detect them or reject them,
• The chart allows to determine ;
– whether a process is in control
– or out of control over specified length of time.
• Control charts are often used;
–to monitor the production of large quantities of products,
–but can also be used,
• to monitor the volume and frequency of errors in documents,
• cost an schedule variances
• and other items related to project quality management
• A control chart is a statistically based tool that analyzes the variation
of a process.
• A control chart is a time-based line graph that reflects the behavior of
a process over time including normal variation and any special cause
variation.
• Control charts are used to document if a project’s quality performance
meets expectations.
• These charts graphically display how the project quality changes over
time by comparing the current data to historical control data limits
• A control chart can also be described as a visual communication tool
that graphs analyzed data in real-time and reflects the stability of a
process.
Example of a control chart
A point is in control and B point is out of control.
• The control chart contains upper and lower control limits that are
statistically based, which allow the user to identifying instances
where the process appears to be behaving abnormally.
• These control limits and centerline represent the “voice of the
process” and are simply a reflection of the process – both the average
value of your process and the natural variation of the process.
• The primary benefit of a control chart is its unique ability to separate
the normal variation within your process from the special cause
variation.
• Special cause variation causes problems. It represents an
opportunity for improvement.
• Normal cause variation can also be an opportunity for improvement,
however reducing normal cause variation can be difficult because it
can often require making substantial changes to the process itself.
• Using control charts allows you to proactively monitor your process,
detect when a problem is occurring (or has occurred), which is the
starting point for an improvement project.
• A control chart is like a scoreboard. It can be used at the end of an
improvement project to indicate if an improvement was successful or
not.
• Control charts can also be used to the project management
areas, such as;
– schedule and budget control,
–to determine whether the costs variances
–or schedule variances are outside the acceptable limits set by the
donor.
Flow Charts
• A Flow Chart is a visual tool that depicts the flow or sequence of a
process.
• This can include the flow of information, tasks, people, material or
decision.
• The Flow Chart’s value lies in its ability to visually communicate the steps
and sequence of a process.
• The Flow Chart makes the complex become simple, and promotes a
common understanding of a process, which is the foundation for
improvement.
• The Flowchart is an excellent starting point in the Problem-Solving Process,
as it allows your problem-solving team to see the entire process and
identify improvements.
• Flow Charts are also powerful in their application.
• You can make them super detailed, or you can stay at a high level,
depending on the goal of the flow chart.
• The flowchart shows a process or a project.
• It visualizes the events or activities completed in their order or
parallel to one another
• Flow Chart Example
• Let’s say we’re a manufacturer of toasters, and we’ve been asked to
put together a high-level flow diagram of the entire manufacturing
process.
• Remember, each of these steps in the process could have its own
more detailed flow chart.
Flow chart
Check Sheets

• A check sheet is a structured document, which is used to collect and

analyze quality data
• Check sheets are generic forms; however, they can be tailored to
meet the requirements of the project, the manager and the team.
• The check sheet is a simple tool for collecting, organizing and
analyzing data.
• An example is provided in Figure below
Example of a check sheet
• There are 6 key steps involved in creating a check sheet:
1. Document the problem statement.
2. Determine what data collection is required, and the period during which it
will be measured.
3. Design the check sheet, and ensure the process is easy to follow.
4. Clearly label the form.
5. Trial the check sheet over a period of time and ensure that the data is
appropriately collected and easy to follow.
6. As an event occurs, record it.
• A check sheet is used to simply tally the occurrence of events and supports
the application of the continuous improvement process (as outlined in our
previous modules).
Scatter Diagrams
• A Scatter diagram is a visual analysis tool that is meant to reflect the
possible relationship between two variables.
• The Scatter Plot visually plots pairs of data on an X-Y graph in order
to reveal the relationship between the data sets.
• The relationship between the two variables can be positive, negative
or non-existent. The strength of the relationship can also be analyzed
visually by how closely the points fall on the line of best fit.
• The strength of that relationship can be expressed mathematically
using the Pearson Correlation Coefficient, which is a number that
ranges from a strong positive correlation (+1) to a strong negative
correlation (-1).
• Scatter Plots require pairs of data, one set of data in the pair is
normally referred to as the Independent Variable (X) with the second
half of the data set being your observed measurement also known as
the Dependent Variable (Y).
• When a Positive Correlation exists between two variables a positive
increase can be expected from the dependent variable (Y) when the
intendent variable (X) increases.
• The opposite is true for the Negative correlation. A negative
correlation means that when the independent variable (X) increases,
the dependent variable (Y) will decrease.
• No Correlation results when the two variables have no measurable
effect on each other. That is a change in X, does not impact Y.
• The scatter plot is often used in the problem-solving process when
we’re studying a process to understand which input variables
(independent variables) are contributing to a negative outcome in a
response variable (dependent variable).
• This chart is fairly easy to create using tools like excel or other
statistical analysis packages, we can collect data using a check sheet,
and we’re specifically collecting paired data.
Histogram
• The Histogram is a tool used to visualize the distribution of
continuous data.
• Histogram is very useful tool to describe a sense of the frequency
distribution of observed values of a variable.
• More specifically, a Histogram is a type of Bar Chart that graphs the
frequency of occurrence of continuous data and is a useful tool for
displaying, summarizing and analyzing data.
• A histogram shows the shape of numerical data distributions, which is
used to determine if the output is normally distributed
Example of a histogram
A histogram of the frequency of defects in a
manufacturing process.
Outputs for Quality Control
• Quality Control Measurements
Documented results of quality control activities in the format
specified during quality planning.

• Validated changes , where the inspected items will either be accepted

or rejected and those rejected may be reworked
• Validated deliverables
Outputs for Quality Control
 Organizational Process Assets Updates
 Completed checklists
 Lessons learned
 Change requests
 A change request should initiated in accordance with the defined perform
integrated change control
Outputs for Quality Control
 Project Management Plan Updates
 Quality management plan updates
 Process improvement plan updates
 Project document updates
Outputs for Quality Control
• Completed Checklists, which become a part of a project record when
they are used
• Process Adjustments, which involves immediate corrective or
preventive action as a result of quality control measurements. In
some cases the adjustment may need to be handled according to
procedures for overall change control.