Quality Control Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Quality Control - Essay Example The above example also shows the fact that there are certain parameters which can be used to measure or identify the quality level of a certain product. These are called as ‘Quality Characteristics’ by Mitra (6). These characteristics may include the aesthetics of the product, its durability, cost, utilization factor etc. 1.1. History of Quality: The sense of maintaining the quality of products and services has been existent since times immemorial. The early Egyptians, Greeks and Romans maintained quality standards in their buildings, structures, artifacts, utensils etc. The term ‘quality’ itself is however relatively newer. During the early days of industrial revolution, the need of maintaining quality in the production industry recognized but not emphasized. As a result no special workforce was designated to check the quality control. Instead, the foreman or the supervisor was the person responsible for the quality of product being made. Hence it was entir ely on his discretion what efforts he puts in order to maintain the quality standards. As the industries grew in size and the strength of personnel reporting to a particular supervisor increased in size, it became impossible for the supervisor to check the quality of each unit produced at the industry. The task of maintaining the quality was then assigned to quality inspectors. ... This moved the engineers and mathematicians to develop statistical methods of quality control. Walter Shewhart, in 1924, proposed his quality control charts which aimed at controlling the features of a product through statistical methods (Mitra 3). In 1929 he formed ‘Joint Committee for the Development of Statistical Applications in Engineering and Manufacturing’ with the support of American Society of Testing Materials (ASTM), American Society of Mechanical Engineering (ASME), American Statistical Association (ASA) and Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS). The committee made efforts to promote the principles of statistical quality control in the industries. The use of statistical methods in the quality control procedures gained wide acceptance in the days of World War II. Good quality machinery was vital for the armies to win battles hence quality control was essential. But large amount of weapons and machinery supplies has to be produced and every single unit cou ld not be checked for quality assurance. Hence powerful statistical methods were required for ensuring quality in industries. The rules of Sampling gained were widely accepted and implemented. The American Society of Quality Control was established in 1946 to standardize the quality control procedures 1.2. Quality Control and Six Sigma: Six Sigma is a technique used to measure the degree to which a process conforms to the consumer needs. It is based on the number of units produced that comply with the quality standards set by the organization or demanded by the customers. The method was developed by Motorola Corporation in 1986. Six Sigma basically focuses