Quality Alchemist (品質煉金術師): Hong Kong QFD Symposium 2016

Hong Kong QFD Symposium 2016 was organized by Hong Kong Quality Function Deployment Association (HKQFDA) and co-organized by Asia Quality Function Deployment Association, Hong Kong Society for Quality (HKSQ), System Engineering and Engineering Management (SEEM), CityU on 17 Dec 2016. Prof. Yoji Akao had first suggested QFD in Japan in 1966. So the symposium aimed to celebrate the important milestone of 50^th Anniversary of QFD and it was also the 2^nd time held in Hong Kong. Before the symposium, Minda and I took a photo in front of banner – 50 years of QFD.

Mr. Peter Fung (Chairman, HKSQ) was the master of ceremonies (MC) and he introduced today’s schedule and all guest speakers.

Then we took a group photo.

In the beginning, Dr. Catherine Chan (President, HKQFDA) gave a welcome speech. She said that QFD had been widely applied in various industries and this year was 50 years of QFD developed which was told by Prof. Yoji Akao when she studied with him.

The first speaker was Mr. Koji Tanaka (CEO, Kanjie Associates) who awarded Akao Prize in 2004 and he was director of Knowledge Management Society of Japan. He promoted QFD in JUSE. He had served MTR Cheung Sha Wan Station in 1973. His presentation today entitled "QFD in Japan & Future Development of QFD".

Mr. Tanaka said the traditional QFD expanded the practical use range and evolution of the job function deployment that created the 3^rd generation QFD (e7-QFD). The total structure included basic knowledge of QFD, “Ba” and the expansion of the applied domain.

Then Mr. Tanaka briefed the “Ba” (場) that “The management is not to manage the member. It is to make information between people and the stage of mutual sitmulation of the psychology.” The characteristic of “Ba” is that “All the members can understand the contents by “Ba” and get possible to practice tacit knowledge such as the thought of the manager or the expert know-how”. I found that it was similar to my paper using Magnetic Field domain approach which presented in ANQ Congress 2003 in Beijing. So I will translate “Ba” to “Field” in English.

Mr. Tanaka further explained “Ba” using Knowledge Conversion Model (Socialization, Externalization, Combination and Internalization (SECI)) to utilize QFD making “Ba”.

Finally, he explained the expansion of the applied domain. There were two types of improvement included business processes and quality of duties. Improvement of business processes included the following stages:

- Clarification of the goal that you should achieve

- Clarification of the job function

- Connecting the goal with the job function

- Setting of a guarantee item and the guarantee level for the accomplishment

- Practice development of a design and the management of duties

At the end, Mr. Tanaka stated new product development aiming at value creation. He mentioned the Value Creation System to us and concluded “The practice of the manager produces result of QFD” and “Even with managers, they cannot change the direction of the wind, but can control the sail freely.”

Dr. Catherine Chan (President, HKQFDA) presented appreciated certificate to Mr. Koji Tanaka.

The second speaker was Dr. Catherine Chan (President, HKQFDA; Secretary General, Asia QFD Association & Council Member of International Council for QFD) and her topic named "QFD from Japan to Global". She said there were many new tools and skills added into QFD for the past 50 years. Then she briefed the history of QFD since 1960s in Japan. In that time, Japan companies faced from B2B to B2C. One of pioneer companies employed QFD was Toyota.

Then Catherine introduced Prof. Yoji Akao’s two earliest books in Japan in 1988. In 1990s, Prof. Yoji Akao issued “Introduction to Quality Deployment” and co-authored with T. Ohfuji & M. Ono for two more books named “Quality Deployment Methodology Part I (1990) and Part II (1994)”.

After that Catherine briefed the development of QFD in USA from 1980s to 2000s. For instance, some institutes and companies employed QFD such as American Supplier Institute (1987), Kaizen Institute (1987), Ford Motor (1987) and General Motor (1990). Then Prof. Yoji Akao’s books were translated into English since 1990. QFD Institute was established in 1994 by Glenn Mazur.

Catherine said House of Quality named by USA but it named as Quality Table in Japan. At that time, many vehicle industries employed QFD so the 4-Phase Model (Design Requirement → Part Characteristics → Manufacturing Requirement → Production Operations) was very popular. But it was one of models in QFD. Voice of the Customer (VOC) then was focused. Some people simplified QFD to Blitz QFD using one-page & all-at-one-glance design to speed up the operation of QFD. Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) was also employed into the scoring that made its ranking more mathematically.

In Asia, the first country introduced QFD was Korea through Korea Standards Association (1978 – 1995). And then QFD came to Taiwan and the first Chinese QFD translated book in 1986. QFD introduced to China by Prof. Akao in 1994. QFD came to Hong Kong and HKQFDA established in 2009. Catherine said it was similar development path in China from B2B to B2C and the main concept changed from “Product Out” to “Market In”. So QFD would become more important in China.

During the break, we celebrated the 50^th anniversary of QFD. We prepared the birthday cake and sang a song for it.

All guests cut the cake together.

Then we distributed the cake and enjoy with all participants.

I took some photos with friends and quality professionals

(Left: Dr. Catherine Chan, Mr. XXX, Mr. Koji Tanaka, Mr. Jesmer Wong (SSI), Dr. Victor Lo, I, Mr. James Wang (Philips-China), Dr. Rita Wan (ISSC) and Dr. Jason Kong (ISSC))

(Left: Dr. Rita Wan (Chairlady, ISSC), Dr. Victor Lo and I)

(Left: Mr. Ricky Cheng (Managing Director, QP Group), Dr. Janson Kong (ISSC) and I)

The third speaker was Dr. Victor Lo (Founder, Institute of Systematic Innovation HK; Honorary Lecturer of IMSE Dept., HKU) and his presentation named "Form QFD to Innovative Quality Improvement (IQI)". Firstly, he briefed QFD was one of the best tools to translate VOC to Product Specifications.

Dr. Victor Lo then used Kano Model to express the requirement of customer increased time to time. He quoted Catherine’s presentation in the 1^st QFD symposium (2012) “QFD and Innovation” that had relationship among them. Dr. Lo proposed QFD process had Innovation during concept generation and evaluation as well as detailed design.

After that Dr. Lo said innovation needed Method and System. He explained “What is Innovation?” using his own definition that “Novel ways to solve problem that bring values”. He believed Innovation equal to Problem Solving.

Dr. Lo introduced Innovative Quality Improvement (IQI) model which based on Design Thinking, TRIZ, Six Sigma and CWQC. It involved Innovation tools & techniques, Project Management and People & Team.

Finally, Dr. Lo demonstrated his product 50 flash cards based on TRIZ principles and using PKII phases for problem solving.

Dr. Catherine Chan (President, HKQFDA) presented appreciated certificate to Dr. Victor Lo.

Prof. Xiong Wei (Director, Centre for Quality Management, Zhejiang University; VP, Asia QFD Association; Council Member, International Council for QFD) was the last speaker and his topic called "QFD in China and Chinese QFD theory". He said “Akao gave his first QFD speech in China at an event of State Bureau of Quality Technical Supervision in June 1994 (with Ms. Lin MA as interpreter)”. Then Prof Yoji Akao gave lecture on QFD at Zhangjiajie, Hunan in 1997.

Prof. Xiong Wei said QFD in Japan was employed very common but it was not in China because of different in culture. Then Prof. Xiong Wei came back to China and established QFD research team in 2003 and started to invite research student since 2006.

Prof. Xiong Wei focused on Chinese culture such as “Relationship”(講情面), “Almost / Near” (差不多) and “Mild” (中庸), and then using different methods & models to solve these problems.

After that Prof. Xiong Wei introduced the “Made in Zhejinang” and its positioning such as Innovation, Advancement, Responsibility and Collaboration.

The following model explained two important supports included Innovation and Quality through QFD. So Prof. Xiong Wei concluded that we needed to make QFD more localization.