Quality Management Systems: What they can mean to your company and to you

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) was created in 1947 to facilitate the international coordination and unification of industrial standards. The standards provide worldwide compatibility and assurances of quality, safety, and reliability.

Other societies and associations focused on quality include the American Society for Quality (ASQ) and the Association for Manufacturing Excellence (AME). Both offer training and seminars that emphasize quality management systems and philosophies often showcasing what different companies have accomplished after implementing quality programs.

Company achievements
So what have companies accomplished after incorporating quality systems? One example is Cirrus Design, a company based in Duluth, Minnesota, that manufactures airplanes. It was able to reduce the time it takes to design, manufacture, and test an airplane design from years to months with the introduction of its Centennial SR22. Incorporating the 100 years of aviation, the new model was introduced at EAA this year. The speed and flexibility that result from following quality practices can create new market niches and increase companies' bottom lines, a necessity in today's climate.

For programs to become more than just the flavor of the month there needs to be support from management to sustain the program, training so that goals and tools are known throughout the company, and communication so that successes (and failures) can be incorporated (or avoided) into future plans.

Such is the case with Pratt & Whitney Canada's Achieving Competitive Excellence (ACE) methodology. The ACE™ system was developed by United Technologies Corp., parent company of Pratt & Whitney, Sikorsky Helicopter, Hamilton Sundstrand, and other companies outside of the aviation field. ACE incorporates lean manufacturing and Six Sigma tools into a sustainable continuous improvement system.

The ACE philosophy is designed to identify and solve problems, improve processes, make strategic decisions through repeated applications of the program's tools, and create positive change.

According to Dominique Dallaire, director of ACE, "ACE, which stands for Achieving Competitive Excellence, was launched in 1996. It's three pillars: one, a philosophy of continuous improvement in a competitive market; two, a day-to-day operating system with a toolbox including various continuous improvement operating tools; and the third pillar is having competent, efficient people using ACE tools and methodology to achieve better business metrics.

"There is the ACE protocol," Dallaire says, "which guides every work group into a logical progression and implementation of the ACE continuous improvement tools. It's a journey where you start with a work group whether in the office or the plant and progressively apply the ACE tools to that group's activities. One of the main problems companies have today is there are many tools on the market, but there is nothing that brings all the tools together in a logical sequence. The protocol removes the flavor of the month effect of most programs. With the ACE process, tools will come in and out of the process and help it move from one level to the next."

The ACE protocol features four levels, Qualifying, Bronze, Silver, and Gold. Each level is more demanding than the previous one and is a mixture of short-term and long-term improvements or achievements. The Qualifying level is the baseline for becoming aware of the program and the tools that are available. Bronze involves more advanced training, requires 60 percent involvement of the cell or team, and full application of ACE tools to some key processes. Tools include such items as 5S (see sidebar), total productive maintenance, setup reduction, root cause corrective action, mistake proofing, market feedback analysis, and leadtime reduction. The Silver level requires actual customer satisfaction and business performance improvement, documentation and streamlining of all key processes, definition of employee satisfaction, and 80 percent organizational involvement. Gold represents best in class performance and requires 100 percent team/cell involvement.

Besides achieving company goals in the areas of equipment downtime, quality products, cost reductions, and growth, P&WC has also been able to develop a new product through the ACE program. It has made ACE available to other companies through licensing agreements and training and coaching support.

ACE tools
Among the tools available in the ACE program are the 5S. They are:
Sort: Eliminate what is not needed
Straighten: Organize what remains
Shine: Clean work area
Standardize: Keep simple, standardize
Sustain: Make 5S a culture

Benchmarking
An important part of quality management systems is to see what somebody else has done. Comparing your systems to someone else's gives you a new perspective. You can determine areas where you need improvement or where you are doing OK. This was the case at Pratt & Whitney Canada. Companies were visiting the company to see how P&WC was achieving its goals, and that led to sharing ACE concepts with others. Companies observed P&WC's methodology, and tried to return to their own companies to implement it. They discovered they couldn't do it by themselves; they needed the experience and support of P&WC.

As a result, P&WC has increased its marketing efforts in regard to the ACE program. Companies licensing the program include Alcan Aluminum, Bell Helicopter Textron, Ethiopia Airlines, and Camoplast Inc. While the idea is to make companies autonomous in how they conduct their own ACE program, P&WC's door is always open if additional training is needed.

Goodrich also conducts benchmarking, and has gone to other facilities to see what others are doing. "And it's a requirement for management within Goodrich," Lee says, "to travel to another Goodrich facility for one week each year to participate in kaizen events and to see the different kaizen practices." As a result, new ideas can be shared across the company as a whole.