back chat: Chris Morgan

摘要

Afew months ago in this column I made light of the prevalence of six sigma, which has led to me now having a ninja auditor. The same argument I used then holds true with respect to any quality tool - each has its merits. But it has to be applied correctly and appropriately at distinct and discrete stages within an overall system for it to have a sustainable, positive effect. Overall I think that most quality tools can be effective in the right hands. Making sure that you use the right tools for any job is surely an absolute necessity. The same applies to us in quality, of course. I've been working with a few quality tools for some time now (no, I'm not being rude about my peers) and I've had some really good outcomes and some less successful ones. Well-worn tools such as process mapping and flowcharting are well embedded here, and have been used to good effect. Explaining the use of some of the more 'exotic' tools can be more difficult though. My health and safety manager went all wide-eyed and started to look a bit dizzy when I tried to explain Ishikawa's fishbone diagrams - cause and effect - for the first time. But eventually he understood it, adopted it and we're seeing the benefits of understanding what causes certain problems, rather than what we thought happened.