Conference 7.286::digital

  Didn't we just get "ISO 9002" certified? (Whatever in heck
  *THAT* means!)

  It must be ISO 9002 season; up here in Nashua, Edgecomb Steel
  has a huge banner on the side of their building announcing
  that they got ISO 9002 certified.

                                   Atlant

    ISO9000, 9001, 9002 are certainly good things to receive, actually they
    are great things to win when you are pursuing a specific level  of
    quality within a manufacturing facility.  We have a number of those
    in-house already.
    
    What I am geeting at is "What is our corporations vision and goal to
    Quality?"  Can anyone articulate this to me as to what kind of a
    company do we want to be when it comes to Quality.  I realize this is
    one of those philosophical strings, but I have been studying Quality
    recently and I am interested in hearing from someone what our
    "Corporate View" on quality is today and where we feel we are headed,
    that is what is the destination of our quality journey, if we are on a
    journey at all....
    
    Bill

    
    I beleive the facility (FAB) at South Queensferry in Scotland
    received its ISO 9002 before the plant in Hudson....but still they sell
    us off...  :-)
    
     SQF Jambo #1

    
    Tom,
    	I was thinking more of the 'how much can I earn'
        after all...digits profits dont pay my mortgage, but a 
    	� decent pay rise would help

Re Mr Newtons contribution to these notes in the last couple of days.

How much time have you spent typing all these notes?
Don't you think your time would be better spent doing something 
contructive like work!

TAKE A BREAK MATEY

    Thomas,                     
    
      Do an EXTR/AUTHOR=SCHOOL::NEWTON/SINCE=1-JUN-1995
      Print off the resulting files, and take them to your doctor. If
    he still thinks you are fit to go back to work, change your doctor.
      When you have come down off the ceiling, and are back at work, try
    DELETE/AUTHOR=SCHOOL::NEWTON/SINCE=1-JUN-1995 to avoid leaving all this
    stuff around for your future embarassment.
      In the meantime, would you mind entering all your thoughts in ONE note,
    rather than spreading them all over in dozens of replies? This would make
    it much easier for the rest of us to use <next reply> to avoid having to
    plough through all of them.
    
      If he won't stop it, can't the mods do something about all these ravings?
    Isn't there some way of preventing a particular author from entering
    notes? Just until he's better.
    
    Ken

    
    Can "Newtons nonsense" please be deleted so that we can continue the
    discussion of quality properly.
    
    Quality:
    I don't know what Digital's policy is for quality these days.  Six
    Sigma seemed to come and go.  I work in Quality Assurance for ALL-IN-1. 
    Developing quality software is a difficult task and takes a lot of
    control to achieve but the benefits are fantastic.  Software used to be
    in the cycle of functional release,bug fix release, functional release
    etc.  Now we can deliver functionality release after functionality
    release, this gives greater customer and job satisfaction.
    
    Just my ramblings
    
    Mike
    

>    This is a question which hopefully will span some interesting
>    commentary around Quality.  Specifically, I recall way back when that
    
    First time round, I read:
    
    This is a question which hopefully will _spam_ some interesting
    commentary around Quality.
    
    Seeing Thomas's contributions, how right I was...
    
    (For those non-Internetters: Spamming is defined as the activity of 
    sending abundant and indiscriminate postings.)
    
    And another little intereting factoid, Thomas has generated 74 
    postings in the last two days.
    
    Finally, Thomas has shown this behaviour before and indicated that
    this is due to what is called a bipolar syndrome, see note 3443.30
    where Thomas explains this and apologizes for his previous round of
    hyper-typing (nice term whoever of you who thought it up).
    
    re roelof

I suppose one could look at quality from several perspectives, one of which is
clearly whether or not the product being built performs to spec.  This is
absolutely something we need to do extremely well.  Another perspective one
might have, which I don't, it that there is high quality in the breadth of
functionality.  In other words, the developers have packed in more bells and
whistles than anyone could ever want and have met the needs of virtually every
potential customer anyone could think of.

Alas, these two are in direct conflict with each other since it usually leads
to us staying in Phase 0 for months if not years, afraid to do anything until
it's been designed perfectly the first time.  There was even a Dilbert based
on the boss instituting a new policy about getting it right the first time.
Everyone immediately became paralized.

I think companies like Microsoft are the masters of just getting enough 
functionality into a product to get it out and start learning from their
customers as to what is really needed.  In other words, they practice "good
enough" engineering.  The real good players at this game can get a release out
every 6 months or so, each one building on direct customer input.

We, on the other hand (at least in days of old), would spend years trying to
get it right the first time and would only succeed in being so late to market 
that nobody wanted it.  The good news is I think we've been moving away from 
that mode. I'll bet anyone reading this could name 1/2 dozen or more projects
that were right on target but slipped so badly as to not even be worth shipping
OR if we did ship was so disappointing that nobody wanted it. 

-mark

    There isn't a company (or Corp.) initiative on Quality. I reside
    in SSB-A which is part of the SBU M&D Organization. I can tell 
    you that quality is a major theme and focus for Chuck Goslee. He
    is driving all the right things for manufacturing for the SBU.
    
    BTW, it's Baldrige. It's also an extremely expensive venture to
    undertake. If the company were to consider entering (again),
    it would certainly be from a small scale/functional base, e.g.
    SSB-A or Storage, etc...
    
    One thing on ISO. While it is a "prize" of sorts to be registered,
    the only thing it is designed to "check" is that a group has a
    minimum set of processes and practices that are required make-up
    of a quality system. It does not deliver quality performance or
    productivity insurance. It is the initial building block/base from
    which to build.
    
    Chip

    The only perspective that makes a bit of difference is our customers'
    perceptions of the quality that we deliver to them in our products and
    services. The ISO 9000 stuff is mainly a paper exercise at this point
    and as .25 points out (accurately I might add) has little real impact
    on the processes themselves at this point. Being ISO certified means
    that you have up to date documentation about what is "supposed" to be
    happening to insure qualtiy, not that you're actually following those
    procedures. 
    
    If you want a true measure of where we are, watch what's about to
    happen over the next few weeks. If it ain't nailed down, it'll be
    shipped, working or not, ready or not, needed or not - and FY95 revenues
    will be claimed. Then watch the RA stream in early FY96. Behavior is
    driven by priorities and ours clearly is revenue first and foremost.
    
    -OFWAMI-

    -1 More clearly, it reviews documentation to insure it meets
       the respective standard then audits your operation to see
       if you are executing your procedures to your documentation.
    
       Chip

I've spent the past few years of my career focusing on (up-front) quality  -
primarily in software and currently in service delivery (yes, there are
a couple of us left :-).  More than ever, I see quality in Digital living in 
the individual organizations that deem it important.  Maybe that's good - 
I've never seen success in our attempts to work it as a central, corporate 
issue.  I believe that it is because it was promoted as something seperate 
and additional (there was hardware, software, service, quality, etc.) as 
opposed to the way things get done.

My own view of quality is that of a bell curve, with Quality on the
horizontal axis and Revenue (long term) on the vertical axis.  The
hard part is determining where the point is on that quality curve that 
maximizes quality (there is a point of diminishing returns where more
quality will mean less revenue).  Quality consists of everything that has to be
done to produce a product or service (gathering customer inputs, determining
what the product/service consists of, determining/sticking to a schedule,
creating the product/service team, marketing, sales, ....).  Optimum
quality is that point that all of these things come together to produce
the greatest amount of revenue (I'm not talking the "ship it before 30-Jun" 
if it's not bolted to the floor" type of revenue).  Too bad that point
is a moving target...

As far as awards and certifications (ISO, SEI, Baldridge) I think they are
worth achieving if they help our market reputation or are required by customers
(translate into "increase our revenue").  I don't believe that should be
looked at goals unto themselves.

My food for thought and discussion.

Anne.

Look at the old Quality notes conference.  I think there's been 2 or 3 notes in
the past 2 years.  Something like that ...

I believe there are some quality initiatives in the Software world.  From what
little I've seen, these are VERY forward thinking.  More proactive than reactive.
These are very early, and I hope these proceed.  Time will tell.

ts

    Anne is correct. I'm the manager for the USSSB. Corporate and even some
    local initiatives fail miserably for a host of reasons, e.g. interest
    below meeting numbers or managing the crisis du jour, lack of
    sponsorship at the right levels, absence of "tops-down" leadership,
    no authority, lack of solid goals/expectations, no consequences, etc...
    
    We like to think we're fairly progressive and proactive here. Overall,
    we enjoy some world class performances. 
    
    I think most groups look for some magic bullet in the names of the
    certifications and registrations mentioned earlier. There aren't any.
    It takes years of constant "dirty" and tedious work. It's the lack of
    this tenacity that also dilutes the depth and velocity of progress.
    
    Like Deming always said (God rest his soul) "it's management stupid."
    
    Chip

    Quality is a carrot on a stick - if you think you've got it you'd better
    look again.                                                             
    
    r wall

    "if you don't know you have it or can't measure it you'd better get out
    of the game" is a more appropriate axiom.
    
    naturally, the journey can nver stop because what was excellence
    yesterday is today's standard. now, if you competition were to reach
    a state of rigormortis it would be too easy.
    
    Chip 

    Interesting thing about quality is that the term is meaningful only
    when given operational definitions: meet these requirements on this
    platform in this time frame at this cost.
    
    Interesting thing about "improving quality" is finding a place to start
    that doesn't assume all the other aspects of the operation are at
    parity or better than your chosen starting place. That interrelation
    is also a benefit, as improvements in one aspect of production or
    service can affect (I didn't say "effect") improvements in other
    aspects.
    
    Storage Management Software Engineering has just launched a project to
    find where we lose time, efficiency, and marketability, and correct
    those to the extent possible given current product status, development
    team needs across 3 geographically separate sites, and development
    process flexibility & maturity. I'd be interested in hearing, either
    directly or via exchanges in the QUALITY conference, from anyone who
    has undertaken process assessments & CI initiatives in other software
    organizations.
    
    Bruce Kelsey, project leader
    SMS Quality Initiative
    dtn 522-3221

    ISO9001 certified System Integration Center in Austria since 2 years...
    ISO9001 certified MCS operation in Austria since 5 month...
    Sales not yet certified, so if there is a quality problem - must be
    sales ;-) 
                                                            
    I agree with .25,  its a process oriented aproach building a foundation 
    to a possible quality improvement. It does not by itself improve
    quality. A negativist view: 'ship sits on ground - based on procedure
    and fully auditible' 
    
    Market Pull calls for ISO9000.... (a must in government procurement) 
    
     

    .4 is in error; HLO was ISO-compliant before SQF began their
    programme.
    
    Not that this correction makes any difference at this time (and fallson
    deaf ears), but he right about the other thing--for now.
    
    						Don

    In spite of glitches here and there, DIGITAL has received the USPS'
    coveted Quality Vendor Award for our performance on our contract to
    provide PC's to the USPS.
    
    The head of the Program Office for this contract, Lynn Martin, has
    received DIGITAL's Chairman's Award for her handling of this complex
    and demanding effort.