Quality Improvement
Achieve greater customer satisfaction, competitiveness, and financial growth.
What is quality improvement?
Quality improvement is the process of making incremental changes to products, services, and workflows, ultimately resulting in an enhancement of customer satisfaction, productivity, and efficiency.
It is a systematic approach where we identify the root of the problems, generate potential solutions based on data, implement these solutions, and finally evaluate their achieved effect.
Quality improvement is a continuous process as it involves regularly addressing new customer demands, new technology, or stricter requirements for documentation, among other things.
It’s not about doing things “right,” but rather about doing things better than before.
Why is quality improvement important?
By focusing on quality improvement, you as a business can provide your customers with the best possible service or product. You can enhance your competitiveness, both in terms of meeting your customers’ wants and needs, as well as economically by reducing costs.
Thus, quality improvements can help reduce errors and waste, improve efficiency, and enable you to better predict future costs and plan proactively accordingly.
We work on multiple levels
We offer competent sparring and leadership at all levels in the organisation when you need to implement your next quality project.
Operational level
We identify “the root” (The Systemic Root Cause) of your challenges, so we have a deep understanding of the problem’s extent and the underlying causes. Once we know the causes, we can find solutions to eliminate the challenges (by developing countermeasures). We ensure quality through follow-up and control at critical checkpoints.
Tactical level
We work with quality improvement as a continuous improvement process (Continuous Improvement Management – CIM) and apply Maturity Models, which assess current effectiveness and clarify which abilities are necessary to achieve the desired improvements.
Strategic level
We are proactive and dare to set the direction to ensure the best possible quality. We work comprehensively, systematically, and continuously with quality and improvement work, balancing control, planning, and development of quality. Learning and development occur in relation to daily work.
Benefits of quality improvement
Quality improvement is essential for a company’s growth. It can help you stay competitive and meet customer demands. Quality improvements can reduce your costs, increase productivity, and improve the quality of your products or services.
While many companies think of quality improvement in relation to their products or services, improvements can be made across all areas of the company’s operations: marketing, sales, finance/accounting/banking, etc.
How can you achieve quality improvement?
However, quality improvement doesn’t happen overnight. It takes time and dedication from all involved parties for an organisation to see lasting changes in their operations or products/services.
Working with eye4improve on key projects has yielded significant improvements in our processes and methods. Their structured management style and trust-building approach enhanced our collaborative effectiveness. Utilising the DMAIC methodology and Six Sigma principles, we have implemented substantial changes in the organisation.
– Ole Hørlyck Sørensen, Vestas Manufacturing
Quality improvement: Optimisation of documentation for an International producer of advanced production facilities
Challenge/cause
- The company was really good at delivering the facilities in the right quality and on time. However, the accompanying documentation for the facilities could be up to 180 days delayed.
- Customers had previously turned a blind eye to the delay because the facilities could be used without documentation if necessary.
- However, new EU rules meant that customers would no longer be able to use the facility before the right documentation was available.
- In addition, the company had started to outsource the production of sub-elements to other countries. This increased the complexity of the documentation process further
- Therefore, there was a need to manage the documentation so that it could be delivered alongside the facility. If unsuccessful, there was a real risk that the company would lose customers.
- The project had previously been attempted to be solved using experience and intuition, and not based on data, which could confirm or refute whether the approach was correct. This is a challenge we often see in solution and action-oriented businesses.
Solution
- In the project, we needed to identify and understand the causes of variation in delivery times before we could optimise the process (Root Cause).
- The project structure was based on the DMAIC project model from the Six Sigma method.
- We assembled a cross-organisational team of employees for the task, representing the entire process, from sales to shipping. This gave us insight into the whole process, and ensured all key stakeholders were involved.
- With the team, we mapped the process from start to finish, gaining an understanding of the complexity of the entire workflow.
- To understand the causes of the variation in delivery time, measurements and data were systematically collected and analysed until we could either confirm or refute our hypotheses. Then, we could make informed decisions regarding the company's challenges.
- Through our analyses, we identified several points that posed significant challenges:
- Many customers ordered an entire documentation package without actually needing it.
- The requirement for documentation was posed (too) late.
- Delivery times varied greatly from: country to country, seller to seller, and customer to customer (in the same country).
- A significant backlog on documentation meant no documentation could be delivered on time.
- For smaller standard packages, the "lead time" was quicker and with less variation.
Benefits
- With the new and improved understanding of the process and the problem, where the causes were known and tested, the solution almost lay right before them. The process was redesigned and streamlined, and all non-value-adding (NVA) steps were removed.
- Item numbers were established for the documentation packages. Thus, the customer could order the desired documentation at the same time as the actual facility.
- Extra documentation could be purchased for an additional cost. This resulted in the customer actively starting to consider which documentation they wanted to be delivered.
- Dedicated efforts were made to clear the backlog, so the documentation process could start without delays.
- The company could now deliver the documentation on time – along with the facility itself!
- The company started to make money from the delivery of the documentation, as additional documentation now was a service that could be billed.
- The documentation department could start their work simultaneously with the production of the facility.
- Upon order placement, both the company and the customer knew exactly what deliveries were expected: product, documentation, regulatory approvals, insurances, and certificates, etc.
* Often, our work is subject to non-disclosure agreements (NDA), as we assist customers with quality challenges they do not wish to make public. Therefore, our cases are anonymised and cannot be traced back to the specific companies. However, you can still gain a good insight into what a process with us might look like, and the results our clients have achieved through collaboration.
How eye4improve can help you
- Eye4improve offers professional consulting in quality improvement with documentation and education tailored to your needs.
- Our consultants assist you in evaluating your business processes, identifying areas for improvements, creating an implementation plan, and ultimately guiding you to ensure all requirements are met in all stages.
- We work closely with our clients to ensure that they meet their strategic goals through process improvements. Our team of experienced professionals works within your budget to deliver measurable results that contribute directly to improved performance and increased revenue.
Our Core Services
Project Management
Project Consultancy
Education & Training
Let’s have a chat
Do you need help and guidance for specific challenges that you and your company are facing?
Don’t hesitate to contact us for a non-binding conversation. Just fill out the form, and we will contact you.
+45 22996900
(09.00 – 17.00)