qfd basics

Quality Function Deployment

Business Improvement Software

Copyright © 2000 Qualsoft LLC

725 S. Adams Road, Suite 70Birmingham MI 48009

248.433.3380 Voice248.433.3384 Fax

[email protected]

User Guide

Business Improvement Software

Copyright © 2000 Qualsoft LLC

725 S. Adams Road, Suite 70Birmingham MI 48009

248.433.3380 Voice248.433.3384 Fax

[email protected]

User Guide

Notice to U.S. government end users. The software and documentation are"commercial items," as that term is defined at 48 C.F.R. §2.101, consisting of"commercial computer software" and "commercial computer softwaredocumentation," as such terms are used in 48 C.F.R. §12.212 or 48 C.F.R.§227.7202, as applicable. Consistent with 48 C.F.R. §§227.7202-1 through§§227.7202-4, as applicable, the commercial computer software andcommercial computer software documentation are being licensed to U.S.government end users (A) only as commercial items and (B) with only thoserights as are granted to all other end users pursuant to the terms andconditions set forth in the Qualsoft, LLC standard commercial agreement forthis software. Unpublished rights reserved under the copyright laws of theUnited States.

© 2000 Qualsoft LLC. All rights reserved

©2000 QualSoft LLC 248.433.3380 i • • • •••

Chapter 1Chapter 1Chapter 1Chapter 1Profit PotentialProfit PotentialProfit PotentialProfit Potential. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1111

Market Power . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Leadership and Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

A Purposeful Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Problem Definition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

What is Your Business Improvement Problem? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Boosting Revenues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Lowering Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Business Improvement Applications. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Identifying The Customer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Executive Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Cause and Effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Quantifying Cause and Effect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Matrix Power - Modeling Interactions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Matrix Power- Creating a Knowledgebase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Team Oriented Business Improvement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Establishing Your Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Business Improvement Steps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Implementation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

CONTENTS

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Chapter 2Chapter 2Chapter 2Chapter 2Implementation OverviewImplementation OverviewImplementation OverviewImplementation Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27272727

Two-Dimensional Thinking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Rich Data Expression . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Boosting ROI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Simplify Redesign . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Exploring “What If” Scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Enhancing Teamwork . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Leverage the “Paper Effect” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Learning The Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Chart Region Building Blocks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Data Collection and Recording . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Business Improvement Steps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Quality Elements (HOWs Checklist) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Leveraging Supporting Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

QuickStart Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

Chapter 3Chapter 3Chapter 3Chapter 3Software BasicsSoftware BasicsSoftware BasicsSoftware Basics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61616161

Installation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Beginning a Project. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Adding A Chart To The Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Entering a Chart Title . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

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Formatting Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Entering WHATs and HOWs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Sizing Chart Regions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

Inserting Levels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Deleting Levels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

“Zooming” to Scale The Chart View . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Inserting a List of Text or Numbers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

Entering Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Splitting the Chart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Setting Chart Position . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

Organizing and Grouping Entries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

“Drag and Drop” to Quickly Move Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

Cut, Copy & Paste. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

Entering Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

The Symbol Bar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77

Entering Symbols in Rooms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

Deleting Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Entering Matrix Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Marking and Displaying Reviewed Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

Entering Data in Custom Rooms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

Entering Symbol Room Data. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

Entering Numeric Room Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Refreshing Chart Numbers with Recalc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Entering Assessment Room Data. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83

Entering Text Room Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

Printing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

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Printer Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

Printing with “Fit to Page” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Print Preview. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Printing “As Displayed” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Printing Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Exporting the Chart Image . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Chapter 4Chapter 4Chapter 4Chapter 4Customizing ChartsCustomizing ChartsCustomizing ChartsCustomizing Charts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91919191

Configuring Chart Regions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

Numeric Rooms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Configuring Symbol Regions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

The Chart Legend . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106

Replacing Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106

Leveraging Supporting Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

Configuring AppLinks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108

Placing An AppLink . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

Playing An AppLink . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Weblinks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Videolinks and Audiolinks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112

Inserting Custom Chart Rooms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112

Deleting Rooms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Hiding and Unhiding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Entering Text in the Relations Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

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Chapter 5Chapter 5Chapter 5Chapter 5Power ToolsPower ToolsPower ToolsPower Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119119119119

Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

Creating Templates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

Organizing Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

Sorting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122

The High Priorities Report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123

Phase Progression . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

The Power of Linked Charts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

Viewing Links . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

Cascade Delete. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Creating Subset Charts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130

Comparing Assessments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131

Duplicating/Copying an Entire Chart. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134

Showing Blanks and Fill % . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

Copying Data to Another Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

Clearing the Relations Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137

Appendix A - Appendix A - Appendix A - Appendix A - TemplatesTemplatesTemplatesTemplates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139139139139House of Quality I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140

House of Quality II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141

House of Quality III . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

Simple Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143

Market Segmentation Matrix. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144

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Customer Voice Table I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145

Customer Voice Table II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146

Phase I - House of Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147

Pugh Concept Selection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148

Phase II - Parts Deployment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

Phase III - Process Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150

Phase IV - Production Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151

Hoshin Audit - Policy Deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

Executive Strategies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

Managing Executive Strategies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154

Management Factors to Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

Design Failure Mode & Effects Analysis - DFMEA . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156

Process Failure Mode & Effects Analysis - PFMEA . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

Best Practices Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158

Quality Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

Appendix B - Appendix B - Appendix B - Appendix B - File ConversionFile ConversionFile ConversionFile Conversion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161161161161Converting Version 3.15 Files - Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Running “Convert V3 Data” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

INDEXINDEXINDEXINDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163163163163

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1

Chapter 1 Profit Potential

Market Powern today’s rapidly evolving marketplace, needs are in a constant state of flux.They ebb and flow with the winds of the competitive environment, oftenchanging rapidly and dramatically. Lately, the internet and sheer momentum of

technological evolution have begun shifting market preferences.

???? Facing the challenges of ever evolving marketplace needs, how will your business respond . . .

To assure mediocrity, simply ignore changing marketplace needs. To prevent it,seek a profound understanding of the cause and effect relationship betweencompany actions and the achievement of business requirements.

**** It is imprudent to ignore the benefits of understanding your market. Without such an understanding, your company will flounder in response to inevitably evolving market needs.

Indeed it is difficult to be anything but average unless you obtain this knowledge ofcause and effect. Lacking such knowledge places you at a disadvantage from thosecompanies that assemble it and synthesize it. The market share winners in yourindustry not only have and use this key information, they continually leverage it.They find new ways to use the data to make better business decisions and increasemarket share.

"640K ought to be enough for anybody."

Bill Gates, 1981

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**** Market leaders proactively seek market knowledge. Followers just passively react.

Mediocre businesses are seldom able to justify their product1 offerings. They oftenwaste valuable resources as a result of a misguided strategy; “let’s just build it thensales can take a crack at selling it.”

If you wait till the competitive environment has shifted to begin on the road to gainingcomprehensive market knowledge, you will be on the defensive. Your company willbe treading water while your proactive competitors swim shark-like into newmarkets.

Get on track now and establish a business improvement framework. Record criticalsuccess factors and interrelationships to form a knowledgebase that can be refinedand made more accurate with time. Build such an internal knowledgebase and youwill reap the benefits of improved quality, increased market share and high profitsfor years to come!

You can generate market power. Start by cultivating good leadership throughplanning.

1. For brevity, the word product will be used throughout the text. It implies any market offering ofyour company including processes, services or other project deliverables.

Profit Potential 3 • • • •••

Leadership and Planning

???? How can you lead in your market without planning? No time to plan . . . are you too busy “fighting fires?”Has the ripple effect of poor planning caught up with you? Are problems occurring due to “diving in” without a plan in the past? Without a corrective plan, what makes you think those same problems won’t just reoccur in the future?

Perhaps you have a short-term focus. Try to focus longer-term. Sometimes, the ROI(Return on Investment) boost from planning and coordination takes a little time tomaterialize but it inevitably does.

Planning affects the individual and collective outcome of the many internal activities necessary to complete a project. Planning brings about a “reinforcement” between internal activities and a subsequent positive profit impact.

Conversely, uncoordinated project activities often work at cross purposes and tend to have the reverse effect, driving profits down. Profit damage results from misaligned actions that squander effort and cause schedule extensions. In addition, the lost opportunities due to missing critical market timing can incur even more injurious results.

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What is most insidious is that these misaligned actions chip away at the bottom line covertly and usually undetected as everyone works furiously harder not smarter.

**** It is an endless cycle. . . Without planning, you will never gain the efficiencies and optimiza-tions that free resources and boost profits.But, you will never have enough time to plan if you don’t start planning!

To create a plan which you can lead by, start with a purposeful mission statement.

A Purposeful Mission

???? Can you lead without a clear focus of the intended results?How can you draft a plan if you do not have a mission with a very clearly and accurately defined purpose?

This is a powerful quote. It refers to the impact of purposefulness. You may beatyour competitors in the market with even an average team if you are a strong leaderwith a clear mission and keen direction.

To be like the proverbial lion, you must know which way to turn. To turn correctly,you must know where you want to go. Your decisions must be swift, accurate andpurposeful, not muddled and scattered.

The business world is no different. To lead the way for your team or company, youwill need to develop a concrete, tangible definition of the accomplishment requiredat the outset of your project.

Create a focused project mission statement. Here are a few examples:

“An army of deer led by a lion is more to be feared than an army of lions led by a deer.” Philip II of Macedon


“We will boost sales of the xyz product 10% in the Northern U.S. sales region by year end”

“We will increase customer satisfaction ratings 30%+ for service sector product users by year end”

“We will satisfy our internal customers, reducing scrap rates 15% by end of quarter, without impacting current throughput levels”

It is important that your statement be general but still objective enough that you canmeasure the attainment of success. It must capture the essence of your goal. Striveto include a completion timeframe and the definition of the target customers(internal or external) for whom you are working to increase satisfaction.

**** Strong leaders draft comprehensive plans starting with a focused definition of success.

After creating your vision of success, you can begin outlining and defining thoseproblems which must be overcome. Determine which ones are obstacles to yourachievement of success.

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Problem Definition

???? How many times have you attempted to solve a problem only to be stumped at the outset trying to define it? Have you ever thought you solved a problem only to discover you did not fully understand it and did not get at the problem’s root? Was that because you were originally unclear on project require-ments?

You can be more effective solving a big problem by breaking it down into smallerelements to simplify it. Expressing a complex problem as a compilation of smallersubtasks can work wonders. Smaller tasks are easier to grasp and easier to actupon. A seemingly overwhelming problem can suddenly become manageable.

**** Without a detailed problem description, you will likely solve no problem or the wrong problem, wasting resources in the process.

Most business problems can be defined as financial performance problems whoserequirements are a list of financial achievements. The next section describes howmost of these problems can be reduced into their financial components. It presentssome tools which can be employed to help solve them.

What is Your Business Improvement Problem?Most business improvement problems are profit increase problems. Profit increasesare sought via one of the two profit components


Boosting Revenues On the revenue side, it is well accepted that high revenues accrue from high marketshares. So then, how can you drive up market share?

A strong link has been found between high customer satisfaction and quality(relative to competition) and higher market share.

And, one factor, above all others, drives market share the strongest. It is quality. Ithas been shown that high quality levels and superior market share virtuallyguarantee profits.1

The quote below from John F. (Jack) Welch, Jr., Chairman and CEO of GEdemonstrates his recognition of high quality as the only path to sustained profits.

Increasing quality to drive higher customer satisfaction is a business improvementgoal of paramount importance. It has a major profit impact.

1. Robert Buzzel & Bradley Gale, The PIMS (Profit Impact of Market Strategy) Principles (The FreePress, 1987), p.103.

Cost

Revenue The goal is usually either to boostrevenues by selling more orreduce costs by improvingefficiencies.

“Quality is our best assurance of customer allegiance, our strongest defense against foreign competition and the only path to sustained growth and earnings”1

Jack Welch, CEO General Electric

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Lowering Costs On the cost reduction side, applying good planning techniques to your product orservice development coordinates company activities to optimize expenditures andreduce duplicate efforts. That encourages cost reduction.

Software Implications QFD Designer helps you develop better products and communicate more efficiently.Its use can lead higher customer satisfaction which in turn drives higher profits. Ituses two major approaches to do so.

To enhance the positive quality attributes of your product or service, it helps you torecord, analyze, prioritize and deploy those elements which you have control overand that drive up satisfaction.

It does this primarily by using QFD (Quality Function Deployment) methodology toanalyze and address the positive performance “drivers” in your product or service.


No other tool allows you to visually model your business problems and explore theinteractions between goals and factors like QFD Designer. You can even use it tocreate strategic business plans then “drill down” into the detailed requirementsnecessary to make those plans actionable. You may have heard of that use of thesoftware referred to by any of several names; Policy Deployment, PolicyManagement, Hoshin Kanri or sometimes “Catchball.”

To minimize the detractors of quality, performance failures that drive satisfactiondown, it allows you to perform Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA). UsingFMEA, you anticipate failures which might occur in your design then prioritize howrisky they are. Then, you redesign as necessary to reduce the risk of those failures.Using FMEA, you can adjust your design or planning to preempt major dissatisfiersbefore they hit the market and affect your sales.

These two disciplines (QFD and FMEA) only scratch the surface of the capabilitiesof the software. There are a myriad of applications for which you can use QFDDesigner. You are only limited by your imagination and motivation to improve.

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Business Improvement ApplicationsThe table below highlights some common business problems and improvementmethods, which you can perform with the software, to help solve them.

???? Can you spot a business problem below that you need to address?

For These Problems Try This Method To Get These Results

Profits Low

Market Share Low

Sales Revenue Low

Satisfaction Low

Profits generated by company products and/or services are lackluster.

Product and Service market offerings don’t satisfy customers.

QFD

Quality Function Deployment

A powerful systematic approach to deploy the “Voice of the Customer” throughout the design and manufacturing process.

High priority product or service design measures; those that drive satisfaction, are focused upon and improved. Products or services are redesigned.

Higher satisfaction drives higher sales and market share.

Profits increase.


Corporate Strategies are not actionable

Company actions do not support strategies.

Corporate strategies are formulated but deploying them to management roles and subsequently to tactical implementors is difficult. There is misalignment in company activities wasting time and resources, driving costs up.

There is a failure to link the achievement of top management goals with TQM initiatives at operational levels. This is often a cause of loss of momentum in change management.

Hoshin Kanri

Policy Deployment

Policy Management

Brings a strategic focus to daily work. A planning, implementation, and review system for managed change (Akao, 1991).

A framework for successful total quality management (TQM).

Link strategies to actionable tasks which can be deployed to any corporate level or functional group.

Form a powerful communication system which transmits changes in strategies to stakeholders within the corporation fostering alignment of internal activities. Reduces costs and optimizes business effectiveness.


12 Chapter 1 • • • •••

Product or Process failure related costs too high

May include:

• Warranty• Service/support• Returns • Litigation

Products sales revenue lackluster due to poor satisfaction.

Company’s market reputation diminishes.

FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects

Analysis)

Reliability Deployment

Anticipates failures and their associated risks. Drafts action plans that preempt and reduce high priority risks.

Designs get changed before problems occur.

Resulting implementations are more reliable, safer from dangerous defects and generate higher sales.

Customer needs are misunderstood

Product or service designs fail to satisfy consumers. Sales revenue is lackluster.

Voice of Customer (VOC) Deployment

Uncovers true customer needs through analysis of spoken and unspoken requirements and context of use.

Generate product and service designs that achieve high satisfaction levels and high sales volume.



Competitor’s products achieve better results than ours

Competing products or services achieve higher satisfaction levels than ours. This leads to competitors winning the sales and market share contest.

Need a method to analyze competitive environment along actionable dimensions.

Competitive Benchmarking

Identify high priority customer needs which require strong competitive positioning.

Benchmark our performance versus our competitors along market dimensions and along our internal product/process performance dimensions.

Get a better picture of where our market offerings stand relative to competition.

Explore opportunities to imitate key techniques of our competitors (those which have netted high market and/or performance ratings).

Product/Process concept is outmoded

A framework is needed to compare alternative design concepts to choose which one best implements required performance.

Pugh Concept Selection

Allows comparison of alternative design concepts to a datum/benchmark. Tallies “better” and “worse” entries for each alternative rated against design criteria.

Choose and implement the best choice of the alternative design concepts.

Product development is not coordinated well with manufacturing

There is no mechanism for developer to transmit the manufacturing implications of their design decisions.

Manufacturing Deployment

Developers specify components of design, facility requirements and vendor selection criteria for manufacturing planners.

Optimize manufacturing procedures including adherence to product specifications.


14 Chapter 1 • • • •••

Software templates for the methods in the table above will be described in furtherdetail later in this document.

What is important to know now is that in general, each method above is matrixbased and has as its input, an itemized statement of goals. These goals are typicallyderived from customer’s requirements and/or other internal business needs.

So, to begin using most of those methods, you begin by identifying the “customers”of your business, be they external or internal, and set out to assemble the list of theirneeds.

These assembled requirements become the inputs to your analysis and theformulation of your problem is really to deliver on the itemized list of requirements.

Production Costs are too high, yields are too low

Resources are being allocated to processes that are not crucial to production.

Production Deployment

Critical production process requirements are determined along with quality procedures, standard operating procedures, start-up settings etc.

Costs are reduced and production yields improved.

Tasks are taking too long to accomplish and are inefficient

Action plans need to be created to get product developed or service launched.

Task Deployment

Breaks down service and business processes (including job descriptions) and standardizations.

Design and development gains from planning are implemented to increase efficiencies.


“The formulation of a problem is far more often essential than its solution, which may be merely a matter of mathematical or experimental skill.”

Albert Einstein


Identifying The CustomerAny person or company that receives the outputs or results of your labor is a“customer.” There is no business without them, they are everywhere if you lookclose.

Try to envision the “deliverables” or outputs which need to be provided upon yourproject’s completion. Whomever receives these deliverables is a customer. Indeed,there may be more than one type or group of customers that you serve. Identify asmany as possible for they may all have differing needs.

You should be able to envision these deliverables even if you are in a servicebusiness.

Even businesses with a non-physical product like “...compiled information on aninternet website” can think about their deliverables in this way. Their customers arethe browsers of their “delivered” information on the internet. Their customer’ssatisfaction is directly tied to the perceived quality attributes of that information (e.g.is it timely, accurate, comprehensive etc.).

Suppose you are a doctor, lawyer or a governmental agency employee. This needto identify the customer and deliverables still applies.

As you can see, regardless of your business or organization type, there arecustomers on the receiving end somewhere in the process.

If you are creating a product for the external market or end-user, you will need todefine who the targeted customers are for your product or service and solicit theirrequirements. Often, these requirements are obtained and prioritized via marketingsurveys or focus groups.

**** Most people immediately think of their customer as the end-user of their product or service. Do not use too narrow a definition of customer. Remember, customers may be either ‘internal” or “external.” If you forget the internal ones, you risk missing important opportu-nities to improve an intra-company project.

16 Chapter 1 • • • •••

If you are working on an internal project, survey the needs of company personnel toobtain a clear list of the desired outcomes.

These internal applications are often untapped sources of potential profitimprovement. Don’t lose sight of the fact that fixing internal problems adds to thebottom line just like fixing projects with marketplace deliverables.

When you are faced with an internal project, clearly define who the key internalconsumers of your deliverable product or service will be. Round them up and surveythem for their needs. For example, engineering may be customers of marketingsince marketing may have to deliver to them a report or analysis. Or, accountingmay have as its customer a manager who makes decisions based upon compiledaccounting information.

You may benefit from creating a process map detailing the inputs and outputs of thedevelopment process at the point you want to improve it. This will help define thoseinput factors that directly affect success and help you see the “big picture”; how yourproject fits into the overall process.

**** Generating a solution in a process vacuum can hinder success. It is often imperative that you know how your solution will interact or integrate with existing business functions and processes.

Executive PlanningAre you an executive or strategic planner?

If so, you are an internal customer with some very important requirements. You seekto satisfy your plans for the company or entity. You have become a proxy orsubstitute for your organization’s internal needs and the executive level or strategic


goals which you are advancing should represent them. This assumes you havesolicited and synthesized stakeholder’s needs. If you have not, there’s no bettertime to start than now!

???? Isn’t the management and satisfying of stakeholder requirements your executive “deliverable?”

If you represent several constituencies or stakeholders, record their requirementsand, don’t forget stockholders as important customers in the planning process.Increasing shareholder value is a key business improvement driver.

While this section has set out to get you to begin thinking about these issues, wehave left the implementation details for later. The framework described later,actually an incarnation of QFD called Hoshin or Policy Deployment will assist yougreatly. It allows you to arrange stakeholders into groups and categorize theirissues. Add them together with your organization’s internal issues and you have thegroup of requirements which will be used as inputs to drive your improvementprocess.

If you have identified the customers, you will need to assemble their requirementsor needs. Those are the desired effects that you want to accomplish. You need tounderstand what will cause those results and to what degree.

Cause and EffectTo succeed in your business improvement projects, you need to identify the desiredeffects1 and causes2. In the model used by the software, the marketplace demands,project goals or customer requirements (sometimes known as WHATs) are thedesired effects. They are your project inputs.

1. Effects are Goals - WHAT the external market or our company wants to accomplish.2. Causes are Measures - HOW we can get the desired outcome through controllables.

18 Chapter 1 • • • •••

You may need to take a broad view of the effects in order to understand how togather them. For example, consider the case of an attorney for a moment. She mayrecord desired effects to begin framing a successful outcome.

The degree to which those causes are satisfied dictates who wins in the courtroom.

A lawyer arguing in front of a jury has to deal with cause andeffect. To succeed, she must convince the jury. That maymean causing cognitive effects in each juror like thefollowing:

• “believes lawyer is credible”• “understands lawyers presentation of the law”• “perceives lawyer as fair” The list of causes may include:

• “a clear coherent argument”• “using understandable vocabulary”• “appealing to juror’s emotions”• “addressing each element of the law”


Start with the end in mind. Record customer’s needs then you can generate a list ofcontrollable causes which affect the delivery of those needs.

???? Can you identify which causes play the greatest role in achieving the desired effects? How can you insure they get most of the allocated resources?How can you make sure that you identify causes for each need without overlooking anything?How can you visually show the interactions between causes and effects?

Business problems can be very complex as they are brimming with so manyinteractions between causes and effects.

Business improvement would be simple if a company could do “A”, and “B” wouldresult all the time.

In the example, only “Damaged Material” causes theproblem. Business problems are rarely that simple.

Problem

Material

DamagedMaterial

20 Chapter 1 • • • •••

To solve such a problem in the real world, you will probably need to fix the materialand a whole host of other causes, all to varying degrees at different times andpossibly even for different customer groups or profiles.A more realistic view with multiple causes

In some cases, after determining the WHATs of your project, you may be able toquickly generate a list of measures or HOWs which will affect their outcomes. But,stopping there and taking action could lead to misappropriation of resources.

Quantifying Cause and EffectUndoubtedly, the graphic above is helpful in identifying the measures or causes andeffects. What is missing is information about the strengths of their relationships toone another.

To be able to prioritize, you need to go further to find out how those measures “stackup against one another”, to determine which ones play the stronger roles in drivingyour project’s successful outcome.

**** Knowing the relationships between causes and effects is essential to problem solving and assessing the strengths of these relation-ships is the key to prioritized solutions.

Using a matrix with special weighting calculations is a perfect model!

Problem

MethodMeasurement Material

Machine Personnel Environment

ExcessiveWear

PoorTraining

InsufficientLight

Worn Cutter

WrongSpecification

IncorrectSequence

Bad Material

DamagedMaterial

PoorPlanning

Poorvisibility

Stored toolong


Matrix Power - Modeling InteractionsThe matrix format provides a framework whereby you can not only record causeand effect relationships, you can assess the strengths of those relationships.

It can visually express interactions and by applying weighting calculations, it willilluminate and prioritize those key factors which more strongly affect the outcome ofyour goals.

It highlights those measures you should concentrate on first.

???? What can you do about talent “walking out the door”, the risk you face when key employees and their specialized knowledge become unavailable?

Consult your matrix library filled with a treasure of specialized design information.

Matrix Power- Creating a Knowledgebase

As you create matrices to define and study your problems and design challenges,you are generating a great base of knowledge which can be consulted in the future.

The matrices express and quantify the cause and effect relationships critical to yourdesign. They are a repository of useful information.

22 Chapter 1 • • • •••

They can often represent rich formulations of the problems facing your companyand the solutions used to tackle those problems.

They are your knowledgebase.

Employees can consult these repositories of knowledge to find out how yourcompany has addressed market challenges in the past. A library of matricesbecomes a powerful resource and can help you avoid “recreating the wheel.” Somecompanies even use them to educate new employees.

When you set out to create a new product, service, or strategic plan, or redesign anexisting one, use your knowledgebase to dramatically increase your productivity.You can start from a more informed position and then adjust from there if marketpreferences or requirements have changed.

Team Oriented Business ImprovementNow, you have a good overview of a customer-driven problem solving framework.Let us delve into more specific implementation tasks.

The Business Improvement Steps which are coming up outline actions which youcan take to improve your business and become a more proactive customer-drivencompany. And, the steps are representative of a thinking style which can be appliedto solve most any size problem or issue.

You may be setting corporate strategies, designing a product or subsystem, ordesigning a better process. The basic procedure is the same. As you will soon learn,QFD Designer software helps you manage and accomplish all the Improvementsteps we are about to discuss. The benefits which you can achieve are enhancedby doing your improvement analysis in a team setting. So, before you begin takingthe steps in the next section, make sure you have a good team in place.


Establishing Your Team

???? Ever develop a good workable idea only to be foiled by people in your company that would not support or implement the solution?

You may have underestimated the importance of participation and consensusbuilding. The steps below are very powerful. Doing them alone is valuable but if youwork in a team, problem analysis will likely be more accurate and generate betterresults. In addition, members that participate gain broader understanding and areoften more willing to implement solutions which they helped generate.

**** Generating solutions in a people vacuum, without participation and buy-in from key stakeholders, can backfire. It can lead to outright rejection of good ideas. Or something worse known as “lip service”, agreeing to implement but never taking action.

And, you can tap the collective intelligence of your organization. Some of the bestsolutions generated often come from sources which were unanticipated. It issuggested that you form a cross-functional team especially if you are trying toimprove a product or process with cross-functional implications.

For example, in product design, you will probably benefit greatly by includingdiverse members on your team like Finance, Process Engineering, ProductEngineering, Manufacturing and Marketing.

Please keep in mind that the steps below should be performed as a team if at allpossible.

24 Chapter 1 • • • •••

Business Improvement Steps

Step Description

1

Gather WHATs

These are the desired effects you are trying to bring about. Usually these are obtained and summarized from a survey of customer’s needs.

• If a project for external customers, this takes the form of target market customer requirements analysis.

• If a project for internal customers, it still works. They become your target customers, analyze their requirements.

2Quantify WHAT Importances

The importance of each summary need is ranked or rated by customers

3Gather Competitive Ratings

You need to obtain external (customer) ratings of your product or service’s current performance and that of competitor’s offerings for each need.

4

Determine Required Improvement

Armed with customer importances and market competitive ratings, you can add company goals into the mix to arrive at a final aggregate importance rating for each need.

5

Brainstorm HOWs (causes)

• Ideally, these are controllable, measurable, objective factors that cause or influence the desired effect.

• These should be global in nature, not solutions but measures.

6Determine relationships (HOWs vs. WHATs)

Rate how strongly each factor leads to each goal.

7Make Internal Competitive Ratings

Rate performance of your product vs. competitors for each measurable factor or HOW

8Establish Performance Targets

Performance targets are usually established by considering competitiveperformance positioning and company performance goals.


�Do as much of the above planning as possible to optimize your plan “on paper” before committing resources and investing in hard assets.

Follow the steps above and you MUST improve your business results!

Successful businesses do. They implement these steps in one form or another,offering products and services geared towards satisfying marketplacerequirements.

They work up-front to develop an accurate understanding of their customer’srequirements and relative importances of each. Some forward thinking companieseven try to anticipate “latent” or unspoken market needs. Those are things thatcustomers want even though they are unable to verbalize them as needs.

They survey the market to obtain external benchmark data (obtained fromcustomers). This benchmarking, or measuring of customer perceptions, helpsdetermine how customers view the company’s performance versus its competitors.

It helps uncover successful competitive practices so that they may be emulated. Inaddition, sales points may be uncovered where the company is doing far better thancompetitors. In that case, a louder marketing message should be sent about howthe company’s products or services shine over those of its competitors.

Internal benchmarking and testing is employed to uncover performance gaps foreach measure or factor. All this data gets recorded on the matrix.

9Enter Correlations between HOWs (factors)

Evaluate intersections between each HOW pair to determine if the HOWs are correlated positively (they are supportive) or negatively (they are contradictory).

10

Sort HOWs by Importance

Locate and focus on the top tier factors, those which most strongly drive customer needs and requirements. Allocate resources on those highest priority measures first and lower priority measures later.

Refine your design. Focus on high priorities.

• As time and resources permit, enter the high priority measures from the step above as the inputs into a new matrix and repeat the analysis.

• In this way, you establish a more detailed comprehensive improvement plan with a new breakdown of more specific downstream causes that lead to the measures.

Step Description

26 Chapter 1 • • • •••

The successful business will benefit by timing and optimizing its expenditures. It canexpend its resources on the high priority factors first, saving the less importantelements for later. It can allocate more resources on those factors which will yieldthe “biggest bang for the buck.”

Some creative individuals use this method of problem solving for their own personalgoals. After all, in your life, you are the most important customer. And hey, gettingyour importance ratings is quite straightforward!

ImplementationWhile the benefits you can obtain by taking these structured steps should beobvious, you may be wondering about how to actually record, analyze and use datagenerated at each step.

???? What framework can be used to implement these steps? How should a business begin? Can the information be recorded in a meaningful format? How should the information be analyzed so that it is actionable?

The unique matrix problem solving capabilities of QFD Designer is the answer. It isthe software that will help you do it!

The next chapter explores the method and implementation in more detail.


• • • •••

27

Chapter 2 Implementation Overview

Two-Dimensional ThinkingQFD Designer visually models business problems in two dimensions,Goals vs. Factors. The ability to express and quantify the interactionsbetween goals and factors makes the software unique. No othersoftware allows you to create information packed diagrams in such aconcise form. Only your imagination limits how you model yourbusiness problem.

Rich Data ExpressionReal world problems need to be expressed with real world data. Thesoftware provides a unique set of tools to let you do that. With it, youcan record and interrelate an incredibly rich catalog of data:

• Video• Audio• Weblinks (internet/intranet)• AppLinks (applications)• Numbers• Calculations• Bar Charts/Histograms• Symbol Graphics (including custom)• Text• Competitive Assessments

Use the rich data set to make your problem formulation moreconcrete. You now have a way to express and model virtually anybusiness improvement challenge. The software will help you achievehigher investment returns from your business projects.

28 Chapter 2 • • • •••

Boosting ROINot only can you create comprehensive matrix charts, you can linkthem together. With this linkage, the diagrams become much morethan prioritization tools, they are communication conduits thatincrease design decision coordination.

Change data in an upstream matrix and see the downstream effectson your design. Use these linked matrices to help align companyactions more coherently with strategies resulting in higher projectReturn on Investment (ROI). The ROI boost stems from enhancedcoordination and market satisfaction.

This is most evident when the software is deployed over a corporateintranet where design decisions and priorities are disseminated tothe project team members dynamically in real time. They are thusimmediately actionable by all regardless of their geographic location.

Simplify RedesignThe software is an especially great time and money saver when youare charged with redesigning. In that case, leverage yourknowledgebase of previous designs. You may begin with yourprevious analysis, perhaps last model’s design charts. They shouldalready embody the basic cause and effect relationship of yourproblem. Then, you can restructure the charts as needed with newmarket data and design data to make them “state of the art.” Oncecurrent, you can begin exploring “what if” scenarios.

Exploring “What If” ScenariosWhen you adjust the requirements list and/or the importance valuesof market demands, the effects will ripple through to the downstreamlinked charts. There, you may note some rank reversals of thepriorities of your controllable factors. In this way, you can quicklyexplore the changes in business strategy or design priorities whichare necessitated by these shifts in market needs.

Implementation Overview 29 • • • •••

Wastefully misapplying resources is a thing of the past. Now, you caneliminate the “noise” that clouds decision making and execution.Spotlight key issues and optimize your resources.

Enhancing TeamworkUsually, best results are obtained through a high degree of peopleinvolvement. By creating your analyses with your development team,you will improve communication and the coherence of team actions.You can leverage the graphical interactive interface to do so.

Many users employ the software in a team meeting setting whileusing a computer display projecter. That allows you to completestudies dynamically with your business team, fosteringcommunication and consensus in the process. The result is a deeper,more profound understanding of market requirements by all andusually a much greater commitment by those involved. In addition,the objective presentation of problems and improvementopportunities helps remove personality conflicts from the mix. Itreduces subjectivism and clearly identifies the highest priority workthat needs to be done.

Leverage the “Paper Effect”QFD Designer leverages the “paper effect.” This notion of “learnwhile you plan” has you making many of your improvement anddesign activities on paper where they can be improved and optimizedat little or no cost.

The “paper effect” minimizes the expensive proposition of “learningwhile doing”, avoiding wasteful hard asset investments made out ofintuition or poor planning rather than facts.

If you have to scrap anything, make it an inexpensive businessimprovement diagram, not tooling, equipment or an improperlydeployed workforce.

Let us now delve into the specific concepts you need to understandto use the software most effectively.

30 Chapter 2 • • • •••

Learning The SoftwareTo get the greatest benefit from the software, you should understandthe following concepts:

• Chart Region “Building Blocks”• Data Collection and Recording• Leveraging Supporting Data• QuickStart Templates

To use the software most effectively, you will need to know how toinsert custom regions like Numeric, Symbol, Text and Assessment tohold the data specific to your problem. It is easy to arrange theseregions on your charts. They are the chart “building blocks.”

Understanding when and how to add these regions to your charts willenable you to easily customize any chart you create. It also enablesyou to more effectively use the template charts provided with thesoftware.

Opening a template is a great way to begin your analysis quicklysince you can probably find a template that relates to your particularbusiness problem. If you can customize charts, you can then makethe template even more effective by modifying it for your purpose.

Additionally, you can get further benefit from customized charts bysaving them as templates for future reuse. To do this, you simply usethe menu choices “Save As Template” to save it and “OrganizeTemplates” to categorize it.

This helps greatly to standardize improvement methods within yourorganization. When you develop and validate a chart layout thatworks well for your organization, you can publish its template to teammembers for reuse. This will allow teams to assess new problemsusing the framework generated and validated in previous analyses.Such templates can even be grouped and structured to embody yourcompany’s Best Practices.


Chart Region Building BlocksLet’s explore how charts are composed. The various regions whichcomprise charts and the types of data each region can express willbe described.

A basic chart or matrix is often referred to as the House Of Qual-ity(HOQ) because it looks like a house with its triangular roof region at the top of the diagram. Expanding upon that analogy of building a “house”, the various regions of these charts are referred to as “rooms.”

A basic House of Quality chart is shown on the next page.The various room types that make up the chart are labeled.

32 Chapter 2 • • • •••

Typical House of Quality (HOQ) Chart with Rooms Labeled

Your chart will always have WHAT and HOW rooms though eithercan be hidden from view.

WHATs, which are usually expressed hierarchically, are the rowentries on the left where your goals are listed. HOWs, also expressedhierarchically, are the column entries on the top where the factors ormeasures are normally listed.

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In addition, you may use a Side Roof left of the WHATs and a TopRoof above the HOWs. These roof regions allow you to exploreinteractions between items of the same type like (WHATs vs. WHATs)or (HOWs vs. HOWs) to find positive and negative effects. Mostusers employ the Top Roof more often than the Side Roof so, onmany templates, the Side Roof is hidden.

Every chart, no matter how basic, has a Relations Matrix betweenWHATs and HOWs.

The table below provides more details about these rooms which areat the core of all charts.

Mandatory Chart Rooms

ROOM DESCRIPTION

WHATs

There is always a WHAT room on each chart. It is mandatory though it can be hidden if desired.

In this region you enter “WHAT you want to accomplish.” WHATs are the goals of your improvement effort, usually needs voiced by customers. They are the “effects” you want to obtain.

Side Roof

This optional triangular region allows you to compare the WHATs to each other to see if they reinforce or hinder one another.

Normally you will look for either positive (reinforcing) or negative (contradictory) correlations. WHATs that are positively related may be reflecting the same requirement. In addition, if you are able to provide a WHAT to a high satisfaction level, check for other positively correlated WHATs as you may get a performance bonus.

34 Chapter 2 • • • •••

HOWs

There is always a HOW room on each chart. It is mandatory though it can be hidden if desired.

Here, you enter “HOW you will accomplish the WHATs.” It is a list of the factors or causes which will lead to your goals. HOWs should be measurable objective design or technical factors that affect the outcome of the WHATs.

Top Roof

This optional triangular region allows you to compare the HOWs to each other to see if they reinforce or hinder one another. Sometimes, improving one HOW improves other ones. In the roof, this would be expressed with a positive correlation symbol. If improving one HOW negatively affects another HOW, this would be noted as having a negative relationship and the corresponding symbol would be entered in the roof.

Consult the top roof if the HOWs are modified. Especially check negatively correlated items. These are factors which may be at odds with your design objectives. As such, negative symbols are a sort of “red flag” to the designer to encourage a thorough assessment of the implications of design changes.

An example of a negative relationship may be between “Fuel Economy” and “Horsepower.” As one goes up, the other goes down. If you change Horsepower in your design, you had better double-check that you can still meet Fuel Economy performance.

Negative relationships can suggest the need for innovation or invention. You may wish to desensitize your design to eliminate or at least reduce the effect of negative relationships.

ROOM DESCRIPTION


Relations Matrix

Since every chart has a WHATs region (formed of row entries) and a HOWs region (formed of column entries), there is always a Relations Matrix. It is the intersection region where every WHAT and HOW intersect.

This region records the relationships between all the WHAT and HOW pairs. Usually, the WHATs and HOWs are compared to find the strengths of their relationship to one another. That strength is entered symbolically.

To determine the strength of the relationship, consider

“If the design requirement (HOW) is met at the right target value, how strong will the effect be on the customer’s perception that the WHAT (at the intersection) has been accomplished?”

Usually, one of three classic relationship symbols is inserted at the intersection of the WHAT and HOW or, it is left blank.

Additionally, text can be entered into the matrix or any number can be typed in.

This is the classic use for the matrix though you may define and enter custom symbols to use it for most any analysis of WHAT vs. HOW interactions.

ROOM DESCRIPTION

36 Chapter 2 • • • •••

You now know the core chart rooms. Sometimes, this basic matrixwith just the core rooms, WHATs vs. HOWs and the Relations Matrixand roofs may suffice but most likely, you will need more. Noproblem, just insert one or more custom rooms.

Custom or “user-defined” rooms add the specific types of data thatyou need to help you solve your problem. You need to understand thetypes of rooms you can insert to customize. Chart customization iskey to getting the most meaningful results.

It is very easy to insert any of the following custom rooms on yourcharts.

Custom Rooms

All charts are just the basic core rooms combined with one or manyof the room types above.

For example, a basic House of Quality (shown on a previous page),is comprised of the core rooms and some custom rooms which aredescribed below. You will see the rooms below, or similar ones, onmany charts and templates.

Room Type Data Expressed

NUMERIC User-entered numbers or calculated numbers.

TEXT User-entered, free format text.

SYMBOLUser-entered symbols which can have any user-defined meaning including numeric

ASSESSMENT

User entered symbols for benchmarking either marketplace (external) perceived performance or testable (internal) performance.


Typical Custom Rooms (from HOQ)

ROOM DESCRIPTION

Customer Importance

A User Entry NUMERIC room that records the importance of each WHAT.


A User Entry NUMERIC room that usually records an evaluation of concerns within the organization. Usually, the difficulty level of the organization to achieve a new or difficult design objective (HOW).

Weighted Importance

A calculated NUMERIC room that multiplies Customer Importance by each symbol weight and sums vertically. It is a measure of how strongly each HOW relates to satisfying the WHATs or chart objectives.

Relative Technical Importance

A calculated NUMERIC room that shows percent contribution of each HOW’s Technical Importance to the overall Technical Importance.

HOW MUCH

A TEXT room that shows the target or amount of each HOW necessary to achieve customer satisfaction. Should include objective “units” which can be tested (i.e. volts, lbs., market penetration rate, market share % etc.)


A SYMBOL room which displays graphics that represent if “more is better”, “less is better” or “nominal is best” for each HOW.

Customer Assessment

An ASSESSMENT room listing a survey or benchmark of performance for each WHAT as stated from the customer or “market” perspective.

Technical Assessment

An ASSESSMENT room listing a benchmark of performance for each HOW obtained from “in-house” testing or other objective measurement methods.

38 Chapter 2 • • • •••

Now that you understand the various regions that comprise charts,you can begin building them yourself. You can follow the steps belowto collect and record the data for your charts.

Data Collection and Recording Now that you have covered basic chart organization, let us focus onthe steps of data acquisition and recording. We will focus on theBusiness Improvement Steps described in an earlier chapter andshow how each step can be accomplished with the software.

Business Improvement Steps

Step Description

1

Gather WHATs

These are the desired effects you are trying to bring about. Usually these are obtained and summarized from a survey of customer’s needs.

• If a project for external customers, this takes the form of target market customer requirements analysis.

• If a project for internal customers, it still works. They become your target customers, analyze their requirements.

2Quantify WHAT Importances

The importance of each summary need is ranked or rated by customers

3Gather Competitive Ratings

You need to obtain external (customer) ratings of your product or service’s current performance and that of competitor’s offerings for each need.

4

Determine Required Improvement

Armed with customer importances and market competitive ratings, you can add company goals into the mix to arrive at a final aggregate importance rating for each need.


“Gather WHATs”“WHATs” is a broad term. The WHATs are really just the goals oreffects you are trying to obtain. But, the method you take to go aboutassembling them is critical. You not only need to assemble anaccurate list of them, you need to quantify their importances.

5

Brainstorm HOWs (causes)

• Ideally, these are controllable, measurable, objective factors that cause or influence the desired effect.

• These should be global in nature, not solutions but measures.

6Determine relationships (HOWs vs. WHATs)

Rate how strongly each factor leads to each goal.

7Make Internal Competitive Ratings

Rate performance of your product vs. competitors for each measurable factor or HOW

8Establish Performance Targets

Performance targets are usually established by considering competitiveperformance positioning and company performance goals.

9Enter Correlations in Roof

Evaluate intersections between each HOW pair to determine if the HOWs are correlated positively (they are supportive) or negatively (they are contradictory).

10

Sort HOWs by Importance

Locate and focus on the top tier factors, those which most strongly drive customer needs and requirements. Allocate resources on those highest priority measures first and lower priority measures later.

Refine your design. Focus on high priorities.

• As time permits, enter the high priority measures from step above as the inputs into a new matrix and repeat the analysis.

• In this way, you establish a more detailed comprehensive improvement plan with a new breakdown of more specific downstream causes that lead to the measures.

Step Description

40 Chapter 2 • • • •••

As they are usually driven by customer’s needs (either internal orexternal), to gather them, you will need to first identify who yourcustomer or market segment is. Then most likely, you will surveypotential and/or actual customers in that segment to obtain theirdetailed requirements. This is usually called obtaining the “Voice ofthe Customer” or VOC.

In determining the market segment, you can employ a MarketSegmentation Matrix. This matrix helps you analyze the marketsegments you will pursue. One is shown below.Market Segmentation Matrix

Segment 1 Segment 2 Segment 3 Segment 4

Mar

ket F

acto

rs

Demographics (Age, Sex,Education Level, Marital Status,

Family Composition)

Want are there key wants?

What products or services dothey currently buy?

Which companies compete fortheir business?

If they are current customersalready, what do they like in our

company?

If they are current customersalready, what do they dislike in

our company?

Percent of total customers

(should add to 100% across)

Percent of total Sales Volume


Market SegmentationMatrix


Once you’ve decided upon the key segment or segments ofcustomers for which you want to increase satisfaction, you will needto obtain the Voice of the Customer (VOC) for that segment.

Often, observational techniques are employed to obtain the VOC. Itis critical to see firsthand, the actual “use cases” of your product orservice. You need to determine exactly what it is about your productor service that is most valued by the customer.

A technique that will help you gain a broad understanding of these“use cases” is to observe customers using your product or servicefirsthand and record what you see. The compiled info is qualitative innature. It is usually entered into a Voice of the Customer matrix.Templates for this are included with the software.

Essentially, the Voice of Customer analysis is done by collecting andrecording answers to the “five Ws and the H.”

Voice of Customer Analysis

Five W’s and one H Described

WHY? Why do you need or want this product?

WHAT? What will it be used for?

WHO? Who uses it now and who will use it in future?

WHEN? When does the customer use it or when will the customer use it?

WHERE? Where will it be used?

HOW? How is or will the product be used?

42 Chapter 2 • • • •••

A Voice of the Customer template is shown below.Voice of Customer I Template

Try to record “verbatims”, the word-for-word statements made bycustomers during interviews or focus groups. Then, for eachverbatim, you can address the five Ws and one H in the template.

You may consider the following methods of helping obtain and refineVOC data:

• Focus Groups• Interviews (telephone, one-on-one, mail, e-mail etc.)• Product Clinics• Customer Contact Database• Direct Observation• Primary and Secondary Market Research

Once you have completed the Voice of Customer I table, you cantransfer verbatims into the Voice of Customer II table. There, you canreword customer verbatims to summarize the root wants that have

Ref

eren

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rnal

/Ext

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WHY?

Why do you need orwant this product?

WHAT?

What will it be usedfor?

WHO?

Who uses it now?Who will use it?

WHEN?

When does thecustomer use it?

When will thecustomer use it?

WHERE?

Where will it beused?

HOW?

How is or will theproduct be used?

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1.00

2.00

3.00

4.00

5.00

6.00

7.00

8.00

9.00

Customer Voice Table


been uncovered. From the reworded data, you will try to consolidatethe root wants into Demanded Quality items. These are atransformation of the VOC into statements that you and yourcompany understand enough that they can be designed against.

Another Voice of Customer Table is show below.Voice of Customer Table II

Using VOC Table II, you can further analyze the rewordedsummarized customer needs.

“Quantify WHAT Importances”When you are finished and you have a summarized list of needs, goback to your customer group and ask them to prioritize thoserequirements. You may use any of the following methods to prioritize:

• Rank each need• Rate each customer need on a scale (1-10, 1-5 etc.) • Percentage allocate needs• Use the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) to “pairwise

compare” needs. “Gather Competitive Ratings”

• Rate your product vs. competitor’s products for each customer need on a scale (1-10, 1-5 etc.)

Ref

eren

ce #

Customer'sReworded

DataCustomer's

NeedCustomer's

ProblemAddressed

Product/Process

Function or Task

Product/Process

CompanyMeasure

Design

Cost

Design

Reliability

Design

Technologies

Design

Failure Modes Project Social Organizational

Cus

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1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

Voice of Customer TableII

44 Chapter 2 • • • •••

“Determine Required Improvement”Then, once you’ve assembled these ratings, you can enter these intoa Pre-Planning Matrix. A template for this is provided with thesoftware and is shown below.

This template includes pre-defined calculations which derive anImprovement Ratio. That is, how much you need to improve yourperformance for each marketplace need. It then applies a rating ofthe sales and marketing benefit of higher performance and calculatesa final Absolute Weight for each marketplace need.

Pre-Planning Matrix

Once you have finished your pre-planning analysis, you haveactually reached an important milestone. You have converted theVOC into summarized needs and applied competitive judgements

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and company improvement goals. It is suggested that you then sortthe needs in descending order based upon the resulting “AbsoluteWeight” Numeric room from the Pre-planning chart.

Then, to optimize your resources, you may want to focus on only asubset of all listed needs.

This is essential!�You are about to perform your first prioritization by only transferring the

most important needs into your House of Quality chart. Keeping the needs list short will reduce downstream analysis. The number of relationships you will have to eventually consider is reduced. In addition, it keeps your analysis focused on delivering those needs most critical to success.

Once sorted, transfer the subset needs list into the House of Qualitychart. Make sure to also enter the Absolute Weightings from the Pre-Planning analysis into the Customer Importance room.

“Brainstorm HOWs (causes)”Now, you can begin to brainstorm a list of controllable factors orcauses which will provide the WHATs. You can enter them into theHOWs region of the chart. You can group them into meaningfulcategories as you enter them. It’s easy to regroup them anytime, justdrag and drop them into the desired categories.

A very helpful list of potential HOWs is shown below for your review.These are guidelines that you can use when drafting HOWs tostimulate thought and discussion.

46 Chapter 2 • • • •••

Quality Elements (HOWs Checklist)

Category Elements

Physical Property

• Exterior characteristics (size, length, weight, thickness)

• Dynamic characteristics (speed, pulling force, strength, brittleness)

• Physical properties (air permeability, heat retentiveness, thermal stability, elasticity)

• Optical properties (transparency, opaqueness, luminosity)

• Acoustic properties (tone, sound-blocking capability, audio output, signal-to-noise ratio)

• Information-related properties (redundancy, quantity of information, accuracy)

• Chemical properties (corrosion resistance, non-flammability, explosion resistance)

• Electrical properties (insulation properties, conductivity, induction)

Mechanical

• Efficiency (energy efficiency, ease of handling, automation)

• Safety (freedom from harmful effects, foolproof design)

• Versatility of function (multi-functionality, diversification through combining functions)

• Portability (portable, fixed)• Experience of users (amateur level, professional

level)

Human

• Image (high quality, name brand)• Uniqueness (custom-made, imported, natural)• Familiarity (traditional, newfangled)• Sensory qualities (finish, feel, taste)• Sense of fulfillment (intellectual fulfillment,

emotional fulfillment)• Trend toward super quality (service, features not

found in other products)


Source: Mizuno & Akao, “QFD: The Customer-Driven Approach to QualityPlanning & Deployment ”, APO 1994.

While you are developing the HOWs, keep these things in mind:1 Use the type of language that your company uses.2 Do not enter solutions! Enter controllable, measurable factors that can

be worked on to satisfy the customer need. Enter factors that are “global” in nature (do not imply any specific design intent).

3 You do not have to enter too many HOWs for each WHAT, try to keep the ratio of HOWs to WHATs in the range of 1 to 1.5.

4 Try to draft HOWs that can be measured by calculation or simulation. That eliminates the need to create prototypes or samples.

Time

• Resistance to the elements (resistance to cold, humidity, dust)

• Effects of time (continuity of effect, immediate effect)

• Durability and maintenance (useful product life, failure rate, repairability)

• Disposability

Economic • Advantages (low price, low maintenance cost)• Premiums, extras

Production

• Operation factors (man-hours minimized, rework minimized, no special skills required, flexibility of operating standards)

• Raw materials (flexible quality tolerance, storability, inspectability, adaptability to process)

• Yield (high yield, ease of reworking, convertibility to other products)

Market

• Timeliness (fashion, seasonality)• Product variety (wide selection)• Trust• Reason for purchase decision (personal criteria,

opinion leaders, third-party evaluations)• Life cycle (long life cycle, short life cycle but

utilitarian)

Category Elements

48 Chapter 2 • • • •••

You can use the default room called “HOW MUCHs” to record theunits of measurement for each HOW. This is done in preparation forthe Internal Assessment.

For example, if you entered a HOW like

• “Temperature Loss Over Time”, then record something like the following in the HOW MUCHs

• “Degrees/Minute” as a measurement unit. This will be the criteria for measurement ofyour performance versus competitors in your internal assessment.

“Determine relationships (HOWs vs. WHATs)”Next, you can rate how strongly each factor leads to each goal. Thisis done by entering a numerically weighted symbol which expressesthe relationship strength at each intersect between a HOW andWHAT entry.

Symbols available by default are shown below.

For more choices, you may consider “configuring” the Relation Matrixto customize the group of valid symbols to those below.

You can decide which entry to make by considering this questionIf we achieve our performance target for the HOW (columnentry), how strongly will that create customer satisfaction forthe WHAT (row entry)?


Of course, if there is no relationship, leave the intersection blank.

“Make Internal Competitive Ratings”In this next step, you will make internal performance ratings. You willneed to use objective testing methods. The tests must be capable ofanalyzing the performance of your company’s product or serviceagainst competitor’s performance for each factor.

Remember that you must test performance along the dimension ofthe measurable “UNITS.”

Using the example shown earlier,

If you analyze the HOW below

• Temperature Loss Over Timethen you will create a test to measure the Units below

• Degrees/Minute“Degrees/Minute” is the performance measure.

“Establish Performance Targets”Performance targets are usually established by consideringcompetitive performance positioning and company performancegoals. Enter your performance targets into the HOW MUCHs room.

The strong symbol in thisexample is worth 9 points.It means that the HOWitem “strongly” causes the“WHAT” to occur.

50 Chapter 2 • • • •••

“Enter Correlations between HOWs (factors)”Evaluate intersections between each HOW pair to determine if theHOWs are correlated positively (they are supportive) or negatively(they are contradictory).

Normally, you will use the symbol set below to establish thesecorrelationships.

Working to improve some HOWs will automatically improve othersthat are positively correlated. If they are negatively correlated, animprovement in one will harm the other one’s performance.

The recording of these relationship is done in the chart Roof.

�The data in the roof can be particularly important in the case where perfor-mance levels have to be adjusted. If your team needs to adjust a perfor-mance target for a HOW, you should consider the effect it will have on other HOWs with which it is correlated.

There is a strong negativecorrelation expressed in thisroof intersection. That meansthat improving HOW1 mayactually harm performance ofHOW4.


“Sort HOWs by Importance”Locate and focus on the top tier, most important factors. The highimportance items are those which most strongly drive customerneeds and requirements. This can be seen easily by the RelativeImportance Histogram. Additionally, you can employ a numeric roomusing the Rank function to rank the HOWs by their technicalimportance ratings.

Allocate resources on those highest priority measures first and lowerpriority measures later.

Charts before and after Sorting HOWs by Technical Importance

“Refine your design. Focus on high priorities.”To drill-down and continue with your business improvement at a moredetailed level, use the Phase Progression capability of the software.This allows you to carry the high priority factors from one chart to thegoals region of a new chart. There, you can refine your design,adding new factors at a more detailed level.

When you use Phase Progression, a data linkage is created suchthat changes in the upstream chart will be linked to downstreamcharts.

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52 Chapter 2 • • • •••

Leveraging Supporting DataAs you perform the steps above, entering data into your chart, youwill undoubtedly want to be as clear and concrete as possible. Youare studying real world problems and especially if you are workingwith a team, you want all the information on the chart to be supportedwith as much background information as possible. Your real worldproblems must be modeled with real world data. The softwaresupports you very well towards that end.

Never before have you been able to bring so many different types ofinterrelated information together in one place. You have the flexibilityto enter many interrelated data types on one chart to gain a richunderstanding of real world strategy, development and deploymentissues.

For example, on one chart, you may enter WHATs and HOWs (i.e.goals and factors that affect the outcome of those goals) into thematrix. Then, you may annotate these WHAT and HOW entries withbackground or supporting data. This data may be in any of severalformats (e.g. video, audio, weblinks etc.). Suddenly, the inclusion ofthe supporting data on the matrix has made it a much more dynamicrecording and analysis tool.

The table below describes each of the many types of data which youcan represent on your charts:

Data Type Example Usage

TEXT

“Defect Rate”

“Material Stays Pliable”

“Easy to Hold”

Text is used all over your charts to enter WHATs, HOWs, Performance Targets etc. and any number of custom data entries.


SYMBOLS

There is a built-in symbol library with lots of useful symbols. They can represent anything meaningful that you define.

The software lets you attach numeric weight values to any symbols so they can be used in calculations.

Alternatively, symbols can be defined as AppLinks so that they can launch other software.

You can even design your own bitmap symbols, import them in and establish definitions for them.

All symbols (including custom ones) are automatically added to the chart legend and can be used in subsequent calculations.

NUMBERS

Directly key-in numeric data in “User Entered” numeric rooms.

Use any such rooms as “arguments” in custom calculations.


54 Chapter 2 • • • •••

CALC’D VALUES

Choose from over 20 built-in calculations.

Several calculations are provided which operate on symbol data in the matrix (e.g. Abs.Tech.Imp. can automatically multiply relationship data to derive factor importance ratings).

Calculated values can be depicted with a bar chart to enhance visual presentation and understanding.

VIDEO

Drop links to video almost anywhere on the chart. This allows you to provide visual descriptions to enhance understanding and concreteness.

The uses of this are limitless.

Examples:

Enter video of a customer using your product or service in a real world setting to foster greater understanding of latent needs. Or, enter video of your focus groups to allow review of actual customer verbatims.


linked to: C:\winnt\clock.avi


AUDIO

Drop links to audio almost anywhere on the chart to provide aural descriptions that increase understanding of the concept. The uses of this are limitless.

Example:

Enter audio from a management presentation expressing key internal needs or project goals. Or, enter a link to audio from a customer focus group session.

WebLinks

Links to Internet/ Intranet Sites

Weblink Symbol

Link to any of the millions of useful internet sites with data relevant to your improvement project.

Example:

Link to your company’s corporate intranet site to show detailed specification data or project requirements.


56 Chapter 2 • • • •••

Now that you are aware of the many possible ways of creating charts,let’s explore how you can use template charts to begin your analysesvery rapidly.

QuickStart TemplatesTo start your improvement project quickly, you can use any of the pre-defined templates included.

• QFD - House of Quality Matrices• Corporate Strategy Development and Deployment• Product Development (from Voice of Customer to Shop

Floor)• Production Planning• Process Controls• “Pugh” Concept Selection• Customer Voice Analyses and Market Surveying• FMEA (Failure Mode Prevention Analysis)

AppLinks

Links to other applica-tions (and associated data files)

Setup an AppLink (a symbol associated with another software application) then a simple double-click launches that application and loads any data file you define.

Example:

Use an AppLink to bring up your project management software and track schedule progress.

Or, setup an AppLink to a spreadsheet to help your team understand the cost data associated with certain project requirements.


Excel

AHP

Access

Project


Why not use one of the above built-in templates as the basis of youranalysis? Then, you can easily add new regions or remove existingregions to tailor the chart to your specific improvement task.

When you open a new chart, the template dialog box from thesoftware appears. It is shown below. It allows you to select a pre-defined chart format designed for a specific purpose.

As you create charts to model your problem, you arrange themtogether into a comprehensive project.

Build a knowledgebase not only with completed charts but by re-using effective chart layouts on new projects.

You can create and organize your own templates since you can saveany chart as a template, even if it has data in it. Once you establishan effective format, pass the chart layout and calculations on to otherteam members or teams for reuse on future projects.

Your projects can include the summary charts (that express a highlevel “bird’s eye view” of the issues). And, they can include linked“downstream” charts, created via phase progression. These linkedcharts show how you have “drilled-down” into finer detail in analysisof your problem. They show prioritized factors leading to your goalsand how you have zeroed-in on an effective solution.

58 Chapter 2 • • • •••

Included templates and examples are described below.

Application Description Template/Example Included

QFDStandard Quality Function Deployment Templates included in the General Tab

House of Quality I

House of Quality II

House of Quality III

Simple Matrix

Failure Analysis

Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA) templates included

Design FMEA

Process FMEA

Customer Voice Tables

These tables allow you to enter and analyze “verbatims” or actual customer statements.

Eventually, these verbatims are summarized and entered into a pre-planning chart so they can be prioritized before becoming inputs into the business improvement process.

A richer understanding of customer needs can be generated and the primary source of customer data is available to the team.

Customer Voice I

Customer Voice II


Product or Service Dev’t

The classic model used to perform QFD which can deploy the voice of the customer all the way to the manufacturing shop floor.

Phase I - House of Quality

Phase II - Parts Deployment

Phase III - Process Planning

Phase IV - Production Controls

Business Planning

Also known as Hoshin Kanri or Policy Deployment. Templates can be based on data files included.

Executive Strategies

Managing Executive Strategies

Mgt. Factors to Operations

Hoshin Audit - Policy Deployment


Shows an example comparing a benchmark concept to alternatives. Includes embedded bitmap graphics showing concepts visually.

Pugh Concept Selection Example.BIP

Six Sigma Quality Improvement - Defect Prevention Strategies

Best Practices Matrix

Quality Matrix

Application Description Template/Example Included

60 Chapter 2 • • • •••


• • • •••

61

Chapter 3 Software Basics

InstallationInstall the software like any other Microsoft Windows application.After you Insert your CD-ROM, it should automatically run the installprocedure. If it does not, just navigate to it using your WindowsExplorer and execute the SETUP.EXE program. Make sure you haveyour serial number handy and just follow the prompts to complete theinstallation.

Beginning a ProjectWhen you first start the software, you are prompted with the dialogbox below. You may start a new blank project or open an existing one.

If you want to view one of the sample projects that come with thesoftware, choose “Open an Existing Project” and press .

62 Chapter 3 • • • •••

To create your own new project, choose “Blank Project” then

At the prompt, enter a filename for the new BIP (BusinessImprovement Project) file then

The new blank project opens. No charts are contained in the projectyet so, the software prompts you to choose a template on which tobase your first chart. This is done via the dialog box shown below.

Continue to next section for details on adding a chart to the project.

Adding A Chart To The ProjectYou add new charts through the template dialog box (as shownabove). It allows you to choose from available templates to specifythe desired chart layout.

If the template dialog box is not visible, just press the button orchoose the menu item below:

Note, there are several tabs with different template styles to choosefrom. Later, you will learn how to create your own tab groups andtemplates.

From Toolbar From Menu

File > New Chart

(your dialog box may vary)

Software Basics 63 • • • •••

Click through the tab groups and note the available templates. Whenyou find one you like, click it and press to open it as a new chart.

You are first prompted to enter the name of the new chart. Then, theblank chart appears in a new window.

Now that the chart is open on screen, you can begin entering data.You may wish to start by adding or altering the existing chart title.

Entering a Chart TitleThe title region for a chart is the rectangular region in the upper leftcorner of the chart just above the WHATs room.

To enter or edit the title for the chart, just click in this region once thentype the new title text. You may enter multiple lines in the title and youcan format the title text using the font settings on the toolbar.

Each chart’s thumbnail image is titled according to the chart title region text. To differentiate between different chart thumbnails on the project view, just make sure each chart has different title block text.

You may wish to change to format of the title text. It is easy to do, justfollow the directions below.

Formatting TextFormatting chart text is easy. There are several methods you canuse. The fastest way is with the formatting toolbar.Text Formatting Tools

Bold, Italic, Underline

Font ColorFont Size

Rotate Text Orientation

Left, Center, Right

*Bullets

64 Chapter 3 • • • •••

You can change the following text settings using the tools above

• Font• Font Size• Bold, Italic, Underline• Font Color• Text Orientation (toggles horizontal or vertical)• Text alignment (left, center, right)• *Bullets - can only be added when actually editing text (i.e.

after single-clicking text twice)

Just click any text item then press the desired formatting button.

You may also choose FORMAT>FONT from the menu to changemany of the same attributes.

Changing the Format For Multiple ItemsAny font settings you make are applied to the currently selecteditem(s). Sometimes, you may want to format several entries all at onetime.

To do this, you need to select the entries first. Do this by any methodbelow.

To Select These Items . . . Use This Technique . . .

To select a continuous group of WHATs/HOWs.

Click the first item. Then, hold down the key and click the last item to select the list.

To select a discontinuous group of WHATs/HOWs or custom room data.

Click the first item then hold down the key while you click the other items individually. Release key when done.

B

CC


Setting the FontWhen you are entering text, you may want to change the font of yourentries. You can do this easily with the setting choices on the toolbarfor Font, Size, Bold, Italic etc.

�You can set the default font attributes for new items from any existing text. If there is one text entry in the chart that has the desired format, you can use it to set the default attributes. Follow the directions below.

Just click on any text item that has the formatting you like and choose

The format of the currently selected item is transferred automaticallyto the default settings. Now, any new text assumes the formatting ofthe selected item.

To select all data cells in a room.

Right-click the room’s title and choose

Select All Data

from the popup menu.

A dotted line appears around all the data cells to denote that they are selected. There is a menu choice that does the same thing;

Edit > Select All Room Data



Format>Set Default Font from Selected

66 Chapter 3 • • • •••

Setting Text AlignmentTo format text justification either left, center or right, use the toolbarbuttons below.

To format text alignment to the cell top, middle or bottom, use thebuttons below.

There are corresponding menu choices under

Format>Text Alignment> . . . to do the same things.

Entering WHATs and HOWsMost users start with the row entries along the left edge, usuallyknown as the Customer’s Needs or WHATs area of the chart.

Left Justify Center

Justify

Right Justify

Align Top Align

Middle

Align Bottom


The region is shown below:

You may continue entering text into the WHATs region. �You may quickly insert and/or delete items using the Insert and Delete

keys on your keyboard.

�Two single-clicks (pause between clicks) on an item with text will allow you to edit it.

Sizing Chart RegionsYou can size almost any chart region in two dimensions. To size achart region, first, turn on the sizing tool using either method below:

When you turn on the sizing tool, your cursor changes to the following

The region to the far left (or topfor HOWs) is the title.

There is a default title alreadyentered.

To change it, click in theregion, type the new text thenpress <Enter>.

�You can also use your right mouse button to edit text.


Options>Size Regions

68 Chapter 3 • • • •••

Then, as you move the cursor over a region which is sizeable, it willchange again to show you in which dimension you can size theregion. An example is shown below:

This region is sizeable horizontally.

This region is sizeable vertically.

To size the region, just click its border line and keep your mousebutton down while you drag the border to its new position.

�You can even size individual rows and columns of WHATs and HOWs.

Sizing WHATs and HOWs consistently with Match SizeSometimes, you may want to format all WHATs and HOWs with thesame dimension to achieve a consistent look on your chart.


For example if you have sized an individual WHAT or HOW to fit in some text or a symbol, it will obviously not match the size of the other WHATs and/or HOWs. In order to make them all the same size, there is a simple feature which allows you to match them all to any one item.

Auto-fitting Text in WHATs/HOWsSometimes there is text in the lowest level of the WHATs or HOWsthat is too long for the current region’s size. You can always manuallysize the region using the Sizing tool. However, a faster way is to fitthe region to the text.

Inserting LevelsMost templates charts have two levels of hierarchy available withinthe WHATs and the HOWs.

Using Match Size

Click on the WHAT or HOW item that has the desired size.

Choose Options>Match Size.

Auto-fitting WHAT/HOW Text

Click any WHAT or HOW item in the lowest (most detailed level)

Choose Options>Auto-Fit Text

70 Chapter 3 • • • •••

The region title is at the extreme left or top for the WHATs and HOWsrespectively.

Organization of Title and Levels in the WHATs region

Should you desire more detail at any time, you can add more levelsanywhere within the WHATs or HOWs.

Title

Primary Level Secondary Level

Insert a New WHAT/HOW Level

Action Comment

1. Click an item in either the WHATs or HOWs.

Your new level will be inserted next to the cur-rently selected item.


Deleting LevelsYou may delete a “level” within the WHAT or HOW room by clickingany item in the desired level then choosing:

EDIT>LEVEL>DELETE

from the menu. Deleting a level removes all WHAT or HOW items inthat level.

� Instead of deleting levels, you can size the region down to hide it from view using OPTIONS>SIZE REGIONS from the menu. This does not remove any data from the chart, only from view. To bring back a hidden level, choose OPTIONS>UNHIDE>LEVEL OR ITEM> (WHAT or HOW).

“Zooming” to Scale The Chart ViewThe software allows you to continuously zoom the chart image onscreen and still work on the chart. The default zoom factor is 100%but you can adjust it to any value you want. When you press the dropdown list box on the toolbar, you will see some preset values.

2. Choose:

EDIT>LEVEL>INSERT>

(above or below) for WHATs

or

(left or right) for HOWs

The new level will now appear in the chart. You may wish to reorganize the items in either the WHATs or HOWs now to take advantage of the new level.

The easiest way to do that is to use Drag & Drop to quickly reposition items in the WHATs or HOWs.

Insert a New WHAT/HOW Level

Action Comment

Use care when deleting levels. If you delete the lowest (most detailed) level, not only the items but all related data including symbols and room data will be removed. To reverse a level deletion, immediately choose EDIT>UNDO.

72 Chapter 3 • • • •••

You can use one of them or, just click in the edit box and enter yourown zoom factor.

�Adjusting this setting actually affects the scale factor used in Print Preview. If you need to adjust how the chart is printing on your printer’s page, simply adjust the zoom factor setting the print-preview till you get the desired result.

Inserting a List of Text or NumbersYou can easily enter a list of text entries or numbers from anotherapplication like a word processor or spreadsheet.

Text or numbers can be pasted into either WHATs or HOWs. Inaddition, you may paste a list of text into any Text room or a list ofnumbers into any Numeric room.

To insert a list, follow instructions below.

Chart Zoom Factor Setting

Inserting a List (Text or Numbers)

Action Comment

1. Copy the text or number list onto your clipboard

Open the application where the text or numeric list appears then select and copy the list using Edit>Copy from that application (i.e. word pro-cessor or spreadsheet).


Entering NotesYou can enter notes or annotations to any chart data. To enter a notebehind existing chart data, just select the data with a single click thenpress the note button on the floating symbol bar.

Splitting the ChartHave you ever wanted to split the chart on screen to make it easierto enter data?

2. Click an insertion point on the chart.

You can click any WHAT or HOW. You can also click a cell in a Text room if pasting a text list or a Numeric room if pasting a numeric list.

The list will be inserted either to the right of or below the insertion point.

3. Choose Edit>Paste...

>Items In One Cell

(or)

>Multi-Cell Across

>Multi-Cell Down

The entire list can be pasted in one cell or in multiple cells going across or down. The menu choice enabled depends on the orientation of the room into which you are inserting the text.

Inserting a List (Text or Numbers)

Action Comment

74 Chapter 3 • • • •••

It’s easy. Just choose

WINDOW>SPLIT AT CURSOR

or,

WINDOW>SPLIT WHATs and HOWs

The first choice will split your chart at the position of the currentlyselected item. The second choice will split the chart so that the entirewidth of the WHATs region is visible and the entire height of theHOWs is visible. This makes it easy to enter symbol data and seewhere you are in the Relations matrix.

If you want to remove the split, either double-click the split bar(s) orjust reselect the menu choice to toggle the split off.

Setting Chart PositionThe entire chart can be repositioned or shifted on the screen andprinted page. To shift the chart, click inside the chart title region andhold your mouse button down while you drag the chart to a newposition.

Split Bars

Split Bars


You may shift the chart position in order to make room for the chartlegend or, to allow various chart regions to be resized moreeffectively.

If you have shifted the chart but want to reset its position into theupper left corner of the view, choose

Options > Reset Chart Position

This feature simply resets the chart position to the upper left cornerof the screen.

Organizing and Grouping EntriesNow that you know how to enter data into the chart, let us spendsome time on techniques which you can use to arrange your data intomeaningful groups. Let us begin with “Drag and Drop.”

“Drag and Drop” to Quickly Move ItemsIf you want to move a WHATs or HOWs item in the region toreposition or regroup it, use the simple Drag & Drop technique.

Just click the item you want to move and keep your mouse buttondown while you move it to the new position then release the mousebutton.

Any data related to the WHAT/HOW item (e.g. matrix or roof symbols) will reposition automatically.

The dark bar signalswhere the item beingdragged will be placedupon release of themouse button

(e.g. above “Item 22” inthis example).

76 Chapter 3 • • • •••

�Use this simple drag & drop technique to rearrange items easily into their logical groupings. This organizing and grouping of like items is often referred to as the Affinity Process.

You may also use the standard Cut or Copy and Paste to move itemsor rooms.

Cut, Copy & PasteSteps to Cut, Copy & Paste are described below.

You may have a list of WHATs, HOWs or other text or numbers inanother program. Quickly inserting the list into your chart is describedbelow.

Entering SymbolsTo enter symbols into your chart, you will be using the floating,dockable Symbol Bar.

Cut, Copy & Paste

Action Comment

1. Click the item you wish to Copy or Cut Valid selections are WHATs, HOWs or rooms.

2.Edit>Copy or

Edit>Cut

Copy leaves original, Cut does not.

Both place item on the Windows clipboard.

3. Click where you want to reposition the item.

Paste location is always next to some selected item.

4. Choose Edit>Paste or press button below

Paste

The data is repositioned.


The Symbol BarSymbols are “dropped” into the chart from the Symbol bar. Forexample, try this. Bring up the Symbol Bar for the Relations Matrix byclicking anywhere in the matrix then choosing either option below:

The Symbol Bar appears (sample shown below).

Symbol Bar Diagram

To View The Symbol Bar


View > Toolbars >

Symbol Bar

Symbol Bar Button Descriptions

Button Description

Add or edit text Allows entry or edit of cell text

Add note Enter note (annotations) into cell

Add note Add weblink

Add multimedia event

User-definedsymbols forthis region

Intersect items

Erase dataAdd or

edit text

78 Chapter 3 • • • •••

The first five buttons on the symbol bar are always present. Afterthose, any user-defined symbols assigned to the region areshown.

In this example, three classic QFD symbols have been added todenote Strong, Medium and Weak relationships.

On most charts, these symbols are pre-defined and appear bydefault on the Symbol bar for the Relations Matrix. You can addor delete assigned symbols easily by configuring any chartregion.

To enter a symbol, just press it. It “drops” into the chart at yourcursor’s current location.

�You can drag the symbol bar to a new position to simplify data entry

�Entering a symbol will automatically advance your cursor to the next cell either across or down the matrix. Advance across, down or toggle off using the menu choice OPTIONS>AUTO MATRIX ADVANCE.

Add multimedia event Play audio or video from cell

Add weblink Launch web browser and connect to a URL (web address)

User-defined symbols Lists all symbols currently defined for this chart region.

user-defined buttons correspond to those symbols configured for region.

Intersect items Lists the row & column items at the selected intersection. Parent items are shown via drop-down list.

Symbol Bar Button Descriptions

Button Description


Entering Symbols in RoomsJust like the Relation matrix room described above, most other roomsare also preconfigured with basic settings and symbols to help youenter data quickly.

For example, if you create a new chart from a basic template, bringup the symbol bar then click around in different regions which canhold symbols, you will notice that the symbol bar button choicesautomatically adjust to reflect the symbols defined in that region.

EXAMPLE:

With a Relation matrix cell selected on a basic template chart, youshould see the symbol bar with the following choices.

Then, select a roof cell and note that the symbol choices change tothose shown below.

Click another region and the symbol bar updates again with theapplicable symbol choices.

If you only see the first five system buttons on the symbol bar, thatsimply means no user-defined symbols have been assigned to thatregion.

The first five system buttons are always present.

You can modify those symbol options easily by “configuring.” See“Configuring Chart Regions” on page 91

80 Chapter 3 • • • •••

Assessment Rooms, used to express marketplace (external) or technical(internal) performance datum, have no default symbols assigned. You willneed to assign symbols for your company, your competitors and your targetthe first time you use those rooms.

Deleting SymbolsIt is easy to delete a symbol from the chart. Use any method below.

Entering Matrix SymbolsOnce you have WHATs and HOWs entered, you may wish to entermatrix symbols. The chart region between the WHATs and HOWs isknown as the Relations Matrix. It is shown graphically below.

You can place a symbol at any intersection between a WHAT andHOW by dropping it from the Symbol Bar.

Deleting Symbols

Click it then press <Delete>.

Click it then press “Erase data” button on Symbol bar

Right-click it and choose Symbol>Delete from the popup menu

RelationsMatrix region


Marking and Displaying Reviewed ItemsSometimes, you will analyze a relationship or data value in your chartand decide that NO relationship exists, that no data entry isapplicable.

When this happens, it makes it hard to keep your place in theanalysis, you can get lost confusing items you haven’t considered yetwith those you have and that are intentionally blank.

To avoid this problem, there is a built-in facility to handle just such anoccurrence. Once you select a cell in a room or in the Relationsmatrix, if you then press without placing data in the cell, thesoftware notes this and tags it internally as a “Reviewed Item.”However, if you use the arrow key to navigate to another cell, the itemwill not be tagged as reviewed.

So, to summarize:

Pressing will mark the item as “Reviewed.”

Pressing will simply navigate past the cell without markingit in any way.

Then, whenever you want to see the cells which you have alreadyreviewed, just choose OPTIONS>SHOW REVIEWED ITEMS fromthe menu.

Entering Data in Custom Rooms

Entering Symbol Room DataEntering data into an existing symbol room on the chart is done viathe symbol bar.

Just click any data cell in a chart symbol room (e.g. Direction ofImprovement) and access the symbol bar (chooseView>Toolbars>Symbol Bar). Another way to bring up the symbol baris to double-click on the data region of any numeric room. That willcause the symbol bar to appear.

E

E

ZYQ R

82 Chapter 3 • • • •••

On the symbol bar, you will see the choices of all valid symbols forthe room. To enter data, simply press the button corresponding to thesymbol you want to enter.

Entering Numeric Room DataEntering data in a Numeric room on the chart is done by just typingin the value from the keyboard. Just click any data cell in a chartNumeric room (e.g. Customer Importance) and type in the desiredvalue then press <enter>.

If a numeric room is calculated, you will not be able to enter values, the software will beep and any typing is disregarded. If this happens, you can configure the room to see how it is calculated. See “Numeric Rooms” on page 93.

To insure that calculated values in your chart are accurate, you can either enable Options>Auto Recalc (default is enabled) or disable auto-recalc and choose Options>Recalc Now to manually refresh calculated values.

Refreshing Chart Numbers with RecalcWhen you modify values in a Numeric room or Relations matrix, anycalculated numeric rooms which are affected “recalc” automatically(assuming “Auto-Recalc” is on). This insures that they are reset andupdated with new values.

For example, let’s say you enter new values in the CustomerImportance room and it is an argument used in the WeightedImportance function from another room. As soon as you enter thenew values, a recalc occurs automatically so that the WeightedImportance room values update.

On really large charts, this can take enough time that data entry andedits slow a bit. If this happens, you can eliminate any recalc delaysby turning off the auto-recalc function.

The Auto-Recalc menu choice appears on the menu as shown below

Options>Auto-Recalc


It toggles on and off. When it’s on, it is displayed with a checkmark.Just choose it again to toggle it off.

If you turn off Auto-Recalc, you will need to perform a recalculationusing

Options>Recalc Now� If Auto-Recalc is off, before you consider chart data, make sure you

perform a “Recalc Now” to insure that values are correct.

Changing values on an upstream linked chart will not automatically cause a recalc in downstream linked charts. In order to refresh data linked between charts, the target chart (usually downstream) needs to be closed and re-opened in order to refresh it from the project database.

Entering Assessment Room DataTo enter data in an assessment type room, you must first configuringit. That establishes the valid symbols which can be expressed in it.

For example, each assessment room symbol will need to beassociated with a competitor before you can “drop” that competitor’sdata values (represented by symbols) into the chart.

Please see “Configuring Assessment Rooms” on page 102.

Once you have configured the valid symbols for the room, you candrop the data into the chart via the symbol bar for the room. Launchthe room’s symbol bar by double clicking in any data cell for a chartassessment type room (e.g. Customer Rating). Or, choosing eithermethod below will also launch the symbol bar:

To Launch The Symbol Bar


View > Toolbars >

Symbol Bar

84 Chapter 3 • • • •••

Entering Text Room DataEntering text room data is easy, just click the any data cell in a charttext room (e.g. How Much) and type in the text.

PrintingGetting a printed hardcopy of your charts is simple, just follow thedirections in this section.

Printer SetupBefore printing, you may want to make printer settings (i.e. portrait vs.landscape, paper size, printer etc) To do so, just choose

File>Print Setup

The Print Setup dialog box below appears.

In the dialog box, you can make settings for the printer like papersize, paper tray, orientation, properties etc.

Once you have setup your printer, you can print your charts.

Printers can also be setup via the Windows Control Panel.


Printing with “Fit to Page”Printing is fast and easy if you elect to fit to page. You don’t even needto preview, you can let the software automatically scale the chart tofit entirely on the printer’s page. Just choose

File>Print>Fit to Page

The chart is scaled up or down accordingly so that it covers themaxiumum page area on your printer.

The page size is determined by the default printer and its page size setting. Tochange this, you can use the Windows Control Panel.

If you would rather preview before printing, keep reading.

Print PreviewPreviewing your chart before printing is easy. Start the preview witheither method below.

The preview window allows you to see how your chart will fit on paperwhen printed. If the chart doesn’t appear as you want, close preview,modify the chart and preview again. Repeat till you get the results youwant.

You can scale the chart’s dimensions on the paper using the screenzoom setting.

�The previewed and printed image actually adjusts based upon the screen zoom factor setting. Thus, if you want the chart to appear smaller on the page, you can just set the zoom factor down from say 100% to 90%. Then preview again to verify. Repeat till you like the results.

Print Preview


File > Print Preview

86 Chapter 3 • • • •••

To fit different page sizes, enlarge or shrink the image accordingly. Asyou change the screen zoom setting, the previewed image adjusts toshow you how the new image will print.

�The page size used in preview mode depends on the current “default” printer and its settings (i.e. page size, orientation etc.). Change defaults with the Windows Control Panel or with File > Print Setup.

Printing “As Displayed”The amount of print scaling applied is controllable by your screenzoom factor. If you choose

your chart is sent to the printer scaled exactly as shown on screen(i.e. using the current screen zoom factor like 100%, 125%, 50% etc.)

This can be useful. This connection means that if you change thescreen zoom setting and preview, you will see a correspondingadjustment of the previewed image.

� If you Print Preview and the chart is not scaled as desired, adjust the zoom setting for the screen display and preview again. Repeat until the preview is acceptable then print.

Printing “As Displayed”


Print > As Displayed


Printing NotesPrinting chart notes is described below.

�Once the notes are in Wordpad, you can then copy them into another word processor if you choose by just selecting them and using the copy and paste functions.

Exporting the Chart ImageOnce you have created a chart, you may want to export it into anothersoftware program for reporting or distribution to others. Doing this iseasy, you can just use a simple Copy & Paste technique.

Just follow the steps below:

How to Print Chart Notes

1 Choose File>Notes>Send to Wordpad

The “Save As” dialog box appears. The notes will be saved into astandard text file (default extension *.not) for which you provide thename.

2 The file created above is opened in the Wordpad application, the simple word processor that comes pre-installed with Microsoft Windows. Once in Wordpad, you may choose to format the notes (e.g. you may want to add a custom title or change the font used for note text etc.).

3 To print the hardcopy, just issue the Print command in Wordpad.

To Export the Chart Image

Action Comment

1. Open the desired chart

2. Choose Edit>Copy Chart This places the chart on the clipboard

3. Open the other application where you want to paste the chart

88 Chapter 3 • • • •••

Being able to embed chart images into other software is very helpful.Once the chart is visible in another program like Word for Windows,you can save the Word (.doc) file and share it with others.

However, they will not be able to edit the chart, they may only viewthe image.

You can embed the chart into other software to

4. Choose Edit>Paste Special and choose the “Picture” format.

The chart image will paste best as a “picture.”

It is important that you Paste as a “picture” to insure that the chart is rendered correctly in the other program.

To Export the Chart Image

Action Comment

If you want to send the file you create to someone else, be sure to make the required setting in the other program to embed fonts. This insures that the chart displays properly when viewed on another computer that doesn’t have the software installed. *It is especially important if you e-mail the file to someone.

WORD FOR WINDOWS

Choose Format>Options then access the Save tab and select “Embed TrueType Fonts.”

MICROSOFT POWERPOINT

In the File Save dialog box, make sure you select “Embed TrueType.”

NOTE: If you find that this doesn’t work on your system, you may have to type in any character from the Dingur font directly in your target document (if desired, you may then hide the character). This insures that the font is actually embedded in the document and may prove a more reliable method of insuring the next user can see all the symbols properly. For example, paste the chart into Word then click somewhere in the Word document and type a character from the Dingur font.


• Create a presentation which shows the chart (e.g. PowerPoint)

• Increase clarity in a management report (e.g. Word for Windows document).

• Post the chart on internet/intranet web pages for team members.

90 Chapter 3 • • • •••


• • • •••

91

Chapter 4 Customizing Charts

Configuring Chart Regions Knowing how to Configure regions is integral to customizing thesoftware.

Each chart room can be configured to establish its settings.Depending on the room’s type, different options will appear when youconfigure it. Use configure to

• Make General settings Valid data symbolsCalculationsScale rangesBar chartingOther display options

• Define AppLinksSymbols that launch other programs

If you want to modify a region’s symbols, Just configure it.

To configure any region, you must select it first. Select a room byclicking its title. Select a Roof or the Relations Matrix by clicking anycell in it.

92 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Then, choose either

The configuration dialog box for the selected region appears. Somespecific examples are described below.

Configure Selected Region


Options > Configure Selected Regionor, Right-Click and “Configure”

Customizing Charts 93 • • • •••

Numeric RoomsNumeric rooms are among the most powerful features of thesoftware. You can directly enter numbers or have the softwarecalculate values for you by defining your own calculation in a Numericroom. When you insert a Numeric Room, the Configure dialog boxappears as shown below.

Configuring a Numeric Room

By default, there is no formula assigned. If you enter a title only andaccept the default settings for the Function (NONE-User Entry) youwill insert a room that allows you to type in numbers directly into cells.

Inserting Rooms That CalculateTo define a room which calculates values, follow the steps below:

94 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Configuring a Calculating Numeric Room

Action Comment

1. Enter the room’s title. Type in any text in the Title region of the dialog box.

2. Press the down arrow in the Functions list box to review the catalog of cal-culations available.

3. Click the desired calcula-tion to select it.

4. In the edit regions that appear on the dialog box, establish the argu-ments which will be used in the calculation.

Different calculations require different argu-ments. For example, if you choose SUM then, you will need to select the rooms which you want to SUM from the argument controls which appear below the Function.

Each time you choose a room to be included in the calculation, its name appears in the Formula box above the Functions list.

A list of Functions available and their arguments are shown below.

5. Choose the number of decimals to display.

6. Choose to display values as numbers or as a bar chart/histogram.

The Bar Chart setting displays a histogram of each cell’s contribution to the total. It is a visual indicator of the relative strength of each total. When you click on this setting, you can establish the bar chart color.

If you want to change the bar chart color after it has been inserted, just toggle this setting off then on again to trigger the color dialog box to appear.


You cannot bracket arguments to affect their order of calculation. In addition, you cannot define more than one function for any room.

� If you need to perform calculations that require several functions, you may configure separate intermediate rooms, used to build more complex compound calculations. If you build such intermediate rooms, you may consider hiding them from view once you have verified that final calcu-lation is working as desired.

Calculation DescriptionsThe table below lists each available function and its description.

7. Select “Percentage” if you want to see the val-ues expressed in per-centage terms.

This is a display formatting options that expresses the value in each cell as a percent-age. For example:

• .04 would appear as 4% etc.• .4 would appear as 40%• 4.0 would appear as 400%

Configuring a Calculating Numeric Room

Action Comment

Function Description Argument Description

AverageAverages all column or row entries in specified Arguments (rooms),

Any Numeric rooms in the chart.

Column SumSums matrix entries down each column in the Relations Matrix.

No Argument.

Difference (Rooms)

Starts with the value in the 1st Arg Room then subtracts all values in subsequent Args.


Difference (Rooms -

Const)

Subtracts the constant entered in 2nd Arg from entries in 1st Arg room.

Any Numeric room and any constant. Type the constant in directly.

96 Chapter 4 • • • •••

DivisionDivides the 1st Arg room values by the 2nd Arg room values.

Any two Numeric rooms in the chart.

Matrix Index

Adds a simple index by numbering each row or column chart entry. Automatically adjusts to insertions and deletions.

No Argument.

Matrix Max in Column

Finds the largest value in the Relations Matrix in each column.

No Argument.

Matrix Max in Row

Finds the largest value in the Relations Matrix in each row. No Argument.

Matrix Min in Col

Finds the smallest value in the Relations Matrix in each column.

No Argument.

Matrix Min in Row

Finds the smallest value in the Relations Matrix in each row.

No Argument.

Maximum

Evaluates all row/column entries in the specified Arg Rooms and enters the MAXIMUM value.


Minimum

Evaluates all row/column entries in the specified Arg Rooms and enters the MINIMUM value.


NONE-User Entry

No calculation. User enters values directly. No Argument.

Percentage

Adds all room entries to get a total, then divides each by that total to arrive at its percentage (%) contribution.

Any Numeric room in the chart.



Product (Rooms)

Multiplies values in the Arg Rooms specified.


Product (Rooms *

Const)

Multiplies entries in the 1st. Arg Room with the constant entered in the 2nd arg


Rank

Ranks all entries in the Arg Room in descending order (highest value is ranked 1st, lowest value ranked last).

Any Numeric room in the chart.

RowSumSums matrix entries across each row in the Relations matrix.

No Argument.

Sum (Rooms) Adds entries from all Arg rooms specified.


Sum (Rooms + Const)

Sums entries in the 1st. Arg with the constant entered in the 2nd arg


Tally

Counts the number of occurrences of the specified symbol in either the Relations Matrix or Roof.

A chart matrix region (either Relations Matrix or one of the Roofs) and any symbol which has been assigned to that region.

Weighted Importance

(Ideal)

Sums “weighted” matrix cells across or down. The Arg is the weight factor. SUM(argWgt. x (cell value/scale max))

Any Numeric room to be the multiplier or weighting value and a number which you must enter directly corresponding to the scale maximum used in the Relations Matrix.

The multiplier (or argument) must have the opposite orientation


98 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Configuring Symbol RegionsIt’s easy to configure regions that hold symbols, just click in theregion’s title (if it’s a room) or in the matrix or roof then press thebutton or use the menu as shown above. An example is shownbelow. If you configure the Relations Matrix, the dialog box below islaunched.

Weighted Importance

(Independent)

Sums "weighted" matrix cells across or down. The Arg is the weight factor. SUM(argWgt. x cell value).

This is a classic QFD function for obtaining the priorities of column entries (HOWs) weighted by customer importance.

Any Numeric room in the chart to be the multiplier(weighting value).

The multiplier (or argument) must have the opposite orientation.

Weighted Importance

(Proportional)

Sums "weighted" matrix cells across or down. The Arg is the weight factor. SUM(argWgt. x (cell value/row or col total))

Any Numeric room in the chart to be the multiplier or weighting value.

The multiplier (or argument) must have the opposite orientation



Configuring the Relations Matrix

Assigning, removing or modifying symbols is easily done from thisdialog box. Click the General tab to access symbols that expressdata. Or, click the AppLink tab (not shown above, only present whenconfiguring custom rooms), to access symbols that launch othersoftware.

If you remove symbols assigned to the region, the symbol barchoices will shrink accordingly. Add them and it expands.

Symbols which may be assigned appear in the “project-wide” SymbolLibrary visible on the left side. You click a symbol on the left side, setits attributes in the center, then add a description and weight value tomake it valid in the selected region.

100 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Step by step instructions are shown below:

Configuring a Region’s Symbols

Action Comment

1. Select the desired room by clicking its title (or a roof or matrix cell) and press to bring up the Configure dialog box.

The configure dialog box is displayed. The options may differ depending on which room is being configured.

2. Symbols must be assigned individually. Click the desired symbol in the Symbol Library list.

These symbols include those that come with the software and any custom ones added by the user (i.e. bitmap graphics).

3. Accept or edit the “Description” field

If you edit the description, it will change in all regions where the symbol is used. This keeps the meaning of each symbol consistent through-out the chart.�Symbols already in use in other regions will

already have descriptions entered.

4. Enter any specific set-tings for the symbol.

You can specify the numeric weight value you want the symbol to have.

You may have to change the “Valid Number Range” if the weight value you want to enter is outside of the current room’s range.

The numeric value you enter may be used in calculations like the Absolute Technical Impor-tance matrix calculation.

Depending on the room, you may have different setting options (i.e. in Assessment regions, you can select symbols to draw with a connecting line).


To remove symbols, just reverse the process described above;

Click the symbol in the assigned list (right side) and press

to de-assign it.

Configuring Custom SymbolsYou can even add custom symbols to the symbol library for display inchart regions. Just create and save a Windows Bitmap file using anyapplication that can export in the bitmap format. Windows Paint(included with Windows) can be used for this purpose.

Setting the bitmap size to 32 pixels wide X 32 pixels tall should provide the most readable results.

5.Press

to add the symbol to the assigned list, making it valid for use in the selected region.

The symbol should now appear in the list box on the right side of the dialog box to denote it is now assigned for use in the current region.

Configuring a Region’s Symbols

Action Comment

102 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Then, in the configuration dialog box, just press the <Add to Library>button under Custom Symbols.

Navigate to the bitmap file which you previously created and insert it.Now, it is in the library and can be assigned like any other symbol.

�The legend shows the definition of all chart symbols. To print it with your chart and/or display it on screen, just choose VIEW>LEGEND>WEIGHT or, VIEW>LEGEND>ASSESSMENT from the menu. The legend appears at the bottom of the chart but can be dragged to another position.

Any symbols you configure will appear on the chart legend.

Configuring Assessment RoomsTo configure an assessment room, just click it’s title area and pressthe configure button or right click the title and choose configure. Thedialog box below will appear:

Use thesebuttons toadd yourown customsymbols


The assessment room is configured by clicking an unused symbol inthe Symbol Library box (left side of dialog box) and then defining thesymbol by entering the following:

• A company name or description• The attribute (Chart owner, competitor or target)*• A line and color if you want data points connected• A valid scale range • The font size to use to display symbol descriptions

The owner, competitor, target settings are only implicated in theassessment consistency check report. See “ComparingAssessments” on page 131.

Once you have configured an assessment room, just double click itsdata area and you can drop a symbol value into the chart.

As soon as you choose a symbol from the symbol bar, the “RapidDrop” dialog box will appear as shown below:

104 Chapter 4 • • • •••

In this dialog box, you can drag the slider bar to set the value or typeit in directly. You should note that after you press enter to drop thevalue into the chart, rapid drop automatically advances to the nextcompetitor defined in the assessment room.

Then, when you have entered data for the last competitor, yourcursor automatically jumps to the next WHAT or HOW item allowingyou to continue rapid data entry.

This feature allows you to very quickly enter data points for yourassessment room.

� If you “code” or order your data values to match that of the defined assessment entries, you can enter this entire rooms data very fast. Just start at the 1st WHAT or HOW and enter the data point for the first company then press enter. Continue with the 2nd and 3rd ...in same sequence till you have sequenced through all data points in all the WHATs or HOWs. Rapid Drop makes it a breeze.

Any symbols you configure will appear on the chart legend.

Configuring the Relations Matrix or Roof(s)Configuring the relationship matrix or the top or side roof establishesthe valid symbols which may be expressed in it and any numericvalues associated with those symbols.


To configure it, just click a cell in it and launch the configuration dialogbox by any method below:

See “Configuring Symbol Regions” on page 98 for furtherinstructions.

Though typically used for symbols, you can also enter text into therelationship matrix.

Configuring the WHAT or HOW RoomsTo configure the WHATs or HOWs, like any other room, you will haveto first click in the room title region to select it. The title region for theWHATs is the left most block in the WHATs region. The title region forthe HOWs is the topmost block in the region.

Then, press the configure button.

The configure dialog box will appear.

As you will see, there is only one type of configuration possible for theWHATs or HOWs, that is to configure AppLink symbols. These aresymbols that launch other programs. A few ways to use theseAppLinks are suggested below:

• Run project manager software and load a Gantt chart to show task information.

• Run spreadsheet software and load a financial data for a design.

• Run CAD/CAM software and load a detailed design drawing.• Run a word processor and show more detailed annotations or

supporting data.

Configure Selected Region


Options > Configure Selected Regionor, Right-Click and “Configure”

106 Chapter 4 • • • •••

To get more information about AppLinks, see “Placing An AppLink”on page 110

The Chart LegendEvery symbol that you assign in your chart is automatically added toone of the various chart legends.An example of the Weights legendis shown below.

Replacing SymbolsSuppose you begin working on a chart and add lots of symbols in theRelationship matrix. Then, you decide that you don’t like a symbol asmuch as another one in the symbol library. No problem, just replaceit. To replace a symbol, choose

Tools>Replace Symbol

When you do, the following dialog box appears.

The rest of the chart legends lookthe same but just present symbolsdefined for different regions.

There is a legend for the variouschart Assessment room symbolsand one that is a key to anyAppLinks defined on the chart(symbols that run other software).

�You cannot size the legend but you can drag it to any location on the chart before printing. The legend’s location is not saved, it resets when you reopen the chart.


Leveraging Supporting DataConsider adding the following supporting data links to your charts tomake powerful presentations and richly express your businessproblem.

By placing these links in your charts your problems become moreunderstandable and easier to solve. Applying supporting data in theright context to frame a problem not only helps you create a richknowledgebase, it can even turn your charts into powerful briefingtools.

You can work directly off your charts to provide active demonstrationsof your business problem and solutions! Show the CEO giving thatrousing call to battle or a customer’s expressions and nuances duringa taped focus group session. Or, show a video of a product in use andnote opportunities to improve it right there during your teammeetings.

Leveraging supporting data links makes it much easier to depict the“big picture.”

Click any used symbol and itmoves to the “Replace this”box.

Then, choose any Unusedsymbol and it moves to the“With” box.

Press Accept and you aredone. Each chart symbol isreplaced and all data is intact.

The legend is also updated automatically.

108 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Configuring AppLinksSymbols entered into your charts can also trigger any supportingapplication to run and load an associated data file.

Symbols used in this fashion are known as AppLinks.

You may configure and place AppLinks in any WHAT or HOW item orthe title of any custom rooms (i.e. Numeric, Symbol, Text orAssessment).

To setup an AppLink, you must Configure the room where you intendto place it. In the configure dialog, just click the AppLinks tab.

Link Type BenefitApplink Launch other software and load

related data file.

Weblink Launch web browser and load URL content or launch any application which can be run from your browser.

Videolink Launch your video player and play a .AVI video file (sound capable).

Audiolink Launch your audio player and play a .WAV sound file.


The options that appear under AppLinks are shown below.AppLinks Options

Setup a Symbol as an AppLink

Action Comment

1. Click in the region and press Configure .

2. Click the AppLinks tab if necessary.

3. Click the desired symbol in the Symbol Library

110 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Placing An AppLinkOnce you have configured an AppLink (described above), you canplace it on your chart. This is done like any other symbol. It appearson the symbol bar and when you click it, it “drops” into the chart at theselected location.

Through Configuring, you associate the symbol with the supportingapplication (e.g. Word, Excel etc.). Now, when you “drop” it in place,you simply need to define the data file that you want the supportingapplication to load (i.e. the specific .xls file for Excel or the specific.doc file for Word).

You are prompted for this data file name automatically whenever you“drop” an AppLink symbol.

�AppLinks are powerful as each time you drop one into your chart, you can define a different data file. This allows you to create very comprehensive linkages from your charts to existing supporting data.

4. In “Which Application”, enter the full path and name of the executable file to associate with the symbol.

For example, to run WordPad enter Word-pad.exe. If the path to the application is not defined, you must enter it. For example, C:\Win-dows\Wordpad.exe.

5. In “Enter Application’s Data File Extension”, enter the three letter extension which is asso-ciated with the applica-tion.

For example, Word for Windows uses .doc files so enter DOC for Word. Excel uses .XLS files so enter XLS for Excel. �You will specify the actual data file name later

when you “drop” the symbol. Just enter its extension now.

6.Press .

It should now appear on the right side in the “Assigned” list.

Setup a Symbol as an AppLink

Action Comment


Playing An AppLinkAppLinks are easy to run, simply double-click them. Their supportingapplication will start and the data file you designated will be loaded.

�Just Right-Click an AppLink to modify it or delete it.

WeblinksWeblinks are symbols that can be defined to launch your webbrowser and automatically display the content available at the URLaddress you enter.

Weblinks are actually one of the most versatile data links you can use. They can be used to view most any data type on your system which can be accessed via your web browser. If the other data link types don’t fit your bill, make sure you try a Weblink. For example; if you want to display a .MPG video file you can use a weblink and it will likely launch and run properly.

Suppose you have entered some customer rating data on one of yourcompetitors products. Why not drop a weblink into the assessmentregion of the chart and display the page on your competitors websitethat details the actual product you are analyzing?

Or, there may be detailed specifications relating to your analysisposted on your company intranet. Why not use a Weblink on yourchart? Drop it into a summary WHAT or HOW and show the detailswith the speed of a double-click during a team meeting.

To enter a weblink into the chart, just bring up the symbol bar andpress the weblink button.

Weblink button

Once dropped in the chart, just double-click the weblink to run it.Right-click it to modify or delete it.

Weblink button

112 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Videolinks and AudiolinksEntered and run the same as weblinks. Specify the desired .avi or.wav file when entering a videolink or audiolink respectively.

These are entered via the symbol bar button shown below.

Multimedia button on symbol bar

Inserting Custom Chart RoomsThe ability to customize your charts by inserting rooms is one of themost powerful features of the software.

With experience, you will be able to insert your own custom rooms torecord whatever types of data you deem relevant to yourimprovement studies.

Pick the type of room to insert by the data you wish to record.

Add videolink or audiolink

Room Type Data Description

Numeric

Display user-entered numbers or numbers calcu-lated by the software.


Text

The data region of these rooms just displays any “free-format” text which the user enters.

Symbol

The data region of these rooms must be configured to include symbols which will represent whatever the user desires. Each symbol has a shape, numeric value (optional) and a description. The symbols with numeric values assigned to them can be utilized in calculations with other numeric rooms.


114 Chapter 4 • • • •••

Assessment

The data region of these rooms must be configured to include symbols which typically represent your company, your competitors and your performance targets.


Inserting Custom Rooms

Action Comment

1. Click on any existing room title to select it.

Room insertions are always made relative to an existing room. You must click somewhere to start. �You can click the title region of the WHAT or

HOW to insert relative to either of those rooms.


Deleting RoomsTo delete a room, just click its title and press Delete =or, choose Edit>Delete>Room.

Hiding and UnhidingSuppose you are reviewing an improvement matrix and want yourteam to focus on a few chart regions and exclude others. Or, what ifyou wish to keep some internal proprietary data (e.g. performancetargets, alternative concepts) from view?

You can just Hide those regions you wish to exclude. It makes anytemporarily unneeded regions invisible. You will not lose data, theregions simply disappear from view and from any printouts until youUnhide them to bring them back into view.

You can hide the following regions

• Rooms (including the Entire WHATs or HOWs)• The Top and Side Roof

2. Choose

EDIT>INSERT>ROOM> (position)>(type)

from the menu.

The “position” is either Above, Below, Left or Right of the selected room. The “type” is either

• Numeric• Text• Symbol• Assessment

depending on what type of information you want to add.

3. Fill out the Configure dia-log box which appears

Depending on the room type you are inserting, you will need to “configure” the room settings for the information you want to display (i.e. room’s title, formula if numeric, symbol list if symbol etc.).

Inserting Custom Rooms

Action Comment

116 Chapter 4 • • • •••

• Individual WHATs or HOWs

Hiding and Unhiding Rooms

Action

1. To HIDE

select it by clicking its title region then choose

OPTIONS>HIDE>ROOM

2. To UNHIDE

Choose OPTIONS> SHOW HIDDEN ROOMS (hidden rooms appear in green). Just click any hidden room’s title and choose OPTIONS> UNHIDE ROOM

Hiding and Unhiding Roofs (top or side)

Action

1. To HIDE

Choose OPTIONS>HIDE>(Side Roof or Top Roof)

2. To UNHIDE

Choose OPTIONS>UNHIDE>Side Roof or Top Roof

Hiding and Unhiding Individual WHATs or HOWs

Action

1. To HIDE

Choose OPTIONS>SIZE REGIONS

2. Click on the bottom or right border of the WHAT or HOW respectively then Click-Drag the border all the way to the other side to close the item from view. Then release the mouse button.


Entering Text in the Relations MatrixYou can enter text into matrix cells between the WHATs and HOWs.This capability allows you to create very comprehensive analyses.You can document issues with as much or as little text detail as youdesire.

Just size the chart row and/or column accordingly to hold more textin the matrix region. You can use the match item sizes feature tomake chart row and column sizes consistent after sizing. See “SizingChart Regions” on page 67 for more details.

3. To UNHIDE

Choose OPTIONS>UNHIDE>LEVEL OR ITEM>(WHAT or HOW)

Hiding and Unhiding Individual WHATs or HOWs

Action

118 Chapter 4 • • • •••


• • • •••

119

Chapter 5 Power Tools

TemplatesThe ability to create and organize templates is one of the mostpowerful features in the software. Templates allow you to reuse chartformats that have worked well. They make it easier to create atailored improvement process. You can delineate not only whichtemplates are to be used but when (i.e. what order) in the process toemploy them.

Creating TemplatesIt is easy to create a template from any open chart. Choose

File>Save As

and the following dialog box appears

In this box, click Save as Template. When you do so, the boxchanges as shown below.

120 Chapter 5 • • • •••

Here, you can enter a title for the template and a description. You canalso select to include the WHATs and/or HOWs in the template chart.

When you’re done, press OK and the template will be created.

You’re not completely done yet. The template has now been createdbut it won’t appear as a choice until you assign it into a tabbed group.

Organizing TemplatesIn order to do so, choose

Tools > Template Organizer�You can run the Template Organizer with a chart open or from the project

view.

The following dialog box appears

Power Tools 121 • • • •••

In this dialog box, templates that have not yet been assigned into tabgroups appear on the left side of the dialog box.

On the right, you can manage the tabbed categories. To enter a newcategory, just type its name and press the Add button. You will see anew tab appear. Then, you can click that tab to select it and assigntemplates into it. Just click the template and press the >> button toassign it or press << the remove it from a group and send it back tothe unassigned group.

If you need to delete a tab group, unassign all templates in that groupby clicking each and pressing the << button. When the group isempty, you can press the Delete button to remove it.

Once you have created and assigned templates, they will appear asoptions whenever you create a new chart.

The dialog box below appears allowing you to specify which templateto use when creating a new chart. The description of the template youclick on is shown in the box on the right.

122 Chapter 5 • • • •••

The description you entered during creation of the template appear in this section.

SortingYou can reorder WHATs or HOWs and all their associated data bysorting them. They can be sorted in descending or ascending orderby the values in any Numeric room on the chart.

To Sort WHATs or HOWs

Action Comment

1. Select the Numeric room by which you want to sort the WHATs or HOWs. Do this by clicking its title.

If you want to sort the HOWs, you must click a Numeric room oriented as a row (horizontally).

To sort the WHATs, it is just the converse.

2. Choose

Tools > Sort > Descending

or

Tools > Sort > Ascending

A new chart is created.

The word “(sorted)” is added to its title and it is automatically saved.

In the new chart, you will notice that the hierar-chy of the WHATs or HOWs is gone. This will always occur when you sort as groupings must be removed to reorder the items.


�A Numeric room formatted to display a bar chart provides a helpful visual to show the results of a chart resort. Or, a numeric room which uses the Rank formula may also be helpful.

The High Priorities Report This report provides you with a fast easy way to summarize numericroom entries.

It works similar in principle to Sorting but results in a text report. Thisreport may help foster discussion in a meeting setting with peoplethat aren’t familiar with how to interpret the matrix representation. Or,for those that do understand the matrix, this report can be a usefulcomplement to it.

It allows you to get a quick summary of high priority items. These highpriority items can be either a list of WHATs or HOWs that meet yourreporting criteria. The reporting criteria is a simple percentile rankingof the WHATs or HOWs based upon corresponding values listed forthe WHAT or HOW items in the selected numeric room.

EXAMPLE:

Let’s assume your chart had a numeric room in it called “Number ofComplaints.” In each cell in the room, you entered a numeric valuecorresponding to how many complaints were received for eachWHAT. You could quickly get a high priorities report which woulddesignate the WHATs with the largest number of complaintsaccording to your reporting threshold (e.g. Top 20% of items).

You enter your reporting threshold into the message box whichappears. It is shown below:

124 Chapter 5 • • • •••

To generate a “High Priorities Report”, follow the directions in thetable below:

The text report is generated in .DOC (Microsoft Word) format and itopens up automatically in the Microsoft Windows Wordpad program.There, you can format it further before printing.

To Generate a “High Priorities Report”

Action Comment

1. Single-click the title of any numeric room in the chart.

Select the room with the numeric values by which you want to rank the WHATs or HOWs.

2. Choose

Tools > High Priorities Report

3. Enter the reporting threshold in the message box that appears.

This is essentially a “percentile” calculation. For example, if you enter the top 20%, the software will list in the report, those WHAT or HOW items in the 80th Percentile for the selected room.

4. Enter a file name and location for the report.

After finishing this step, the report will appear in Microsoft Wordpad.


Phase ProgressionWhen you want to refine your analysis or design, you can perform aPhase Progression. This is a simple transfer and link of the columnitems in one chart into the row items of another chart. As notedpreviously, the column items are typically factors and the rows aregoals.

Thus, this progression is used to further analyze the key or highpriority factors evidenced in the original chart. Once they are“progressed” or “cascaded” to a new chart, they appear in the “goals”area. Thus, you can determine the issues that drive the successfulaccomplishment of the key factors. When the factors are transferredto the next phase chart, related data (e.g. targets, weightedimportance, assessment data etc.) can also be transferred.

The phase progression concept is depicted below

To perform a Phase Progression, follow the steps below.

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HO

W 1

HO

W 2

HO

W 3

HO

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WHAT 2

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Phase I Example

Enter NewFactorsBelow

HO

Ws

Phase 2

Hows x-fer to WHATs

Targets etc. X-fer to here

New factors canthen be enteredin the blankHOWs region.

126 Chapter 5 • • • •••

Once you are done with the phase progression, the newly createdchart will be visible on screen in a separate window.

Performing a Phase Progression

Action Comment

1. (OPTIONAL)

Click a Numeric room to sort by and choose

Tools > Sort > Descending

Sorting creates a new chart with reordered entries.

Sorting makes spotting HOWs with high impor-tance easier.

Alternatively, you can use the Rank function in a Numeric room to help you identify the most important factors based on their Rankings.

2. Select the HOW room items that you want to carry to the next phase.

You can Click the first item, then hold down the Shift key and Click the last item to select a con-tinuous group of items.

Or

Click (1st item) then hold down the CTRL key while you Click additional discontinuous items to select discontinuous items.

3. Choose

Tools > Phase Progression

The Build Next Chart dialog box appears.

4. (OPTIONAL)

Select Related Info to carry.

Click on any additional related rooms in the chart that you want to be transferred to the next chart.

5. (OPTIONAL)

Choose a template.

If you don’t choose a template, the HOWs and any related data displays in a new chart with a generic layout.

If you choose a template, the HOWs are entered into that template and related data is added to the right side of the template.

6. Press OK The new “downstream” chart appears.


At this point, the charts are linked. Changes in linked charts are notrepresented immediately. Links update only upon chart opening.

�You must close and reopen linked charts in order to see changes update.

If you close and reopen that chart, you will notice one or more linksymbols (shown below) appearing in the transferred items.

Linked text (HOW items transferred to WHATs and Room titles) canbe modified in either chart. Changes will be visible in either linkedchart upon its re-opening.

Data that is shown in linked rooms is not editable on downstreamcharts. If you try to edit linked data, you will see the following dialogbox appear

You must make your changes on the upstream chart.

The Power of Linked ChartsLinked charts are created automatically whenever you perform aPhase Progression. They provide powerful benefits by keepingsystem level data synchronized with subsystem data.

EXAMPLE

Assume you are developing a product and you create a top levelHouse of Quality chart. You perform a Phase Progression to create adownstream Parts Deployment chart where you analyze the relativeimportance of product parts.

The Linked Data symbol

128 Chapter 5 • • • •••

Together, these charts allow you to use marketplace importanceratings, which were derived from the Voice of the Customer, to helpyou determine which parts are most critical to your design.

Now, assume some time goes by and you are redesigning yourproduct to meet changing market needs. First, you will query themarket to reveal changes in their importance ratings for each WHAT.Then, you can simply plug these new values into the top level(upstream) chart which you previously completed.

Voila’, you can easily view the effects on any downstream charts.

Review any indicated changes in the importance rankings of thedownstream Parts Deployment chart and adjust your designaccordingly.

It’s quite possible that with the newly entered marketplace needs, adifferent array of parts in your design now take on the highestimportance. You have leveraged your existing designknowledgebase.

The same methodology works for Strategic Planning, ProcessDesign and other linked chart groups.

Viewing LinksSometimes, you may want to know the other charts where linkedHOWs appear. To find this out, just choose

View > Linked HOW Details...

The dialog box below appears


Here, you can click any HOW item that shows the link symbol to getthe link details. The grid below the HOWs region shows you on whichother charts the linked items appear. The chart name is shown aswell as the room name and item text.

� If the item is linked to several charts, each link will be listed on a separate line in the grid.

Cascade DeleteIf you attempt to delete a linked item, you will get the followingmessage

130 Chapter 5 • • • •••

Pressing View Links, shows the dialog box described in the ViewingLinks section above.

Pressing Break Link breaks the links and only deletes the items onthe active chart.

Pressing Cascade Delete deletes not only the items on the activechart but those on all linked charts.

Creating Subset Charts

???? Are there times when you would like to extract a smaller version of a chart which only shows interac-tions between a few regions?

**** Subset charts are a great way to divide work in your team. They help you turn a large chart into smaller ones having fewer issues to address. They are very helpful for creating focused management reports.

They are easy to create, just follow the steps below.

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Performance Targets


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N Competitor A

O Competitor B

Q QS/FF Services

0

1

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Subset charts make it easy to go from this...


Comparing AssessmentsOnce you have invested the time necessary to create a matrix, it ishelpful to analyze the data to potential improvement opportunities. Acase where you can apply some analysis towards that end is in thecross-checking of data in Assessment rooms.

The characteristics that are helpful to spot are those situations wherethe data reflects an inconsistency between market perceptions(shown on a column oriented assessment) and internal or measuredperformance benchmarking data (shown on a row orientedassessment).

The software will perform this analysis for you and highlight problemareas visually. To perform an Assessment Check, choose

Tools>Compare Assessments

Creating a Subset Chart

Action Comment

1. Start by clicking a WHAT or HOW item or room on the chart which you want to extract.

You can click a WHAT, HOW or room but not an individual data value or matrix value.

2. Hold down the CTRL key and click any additional items which you wish to extract.

When complete, you must have clicked at least one HOW and one WHAT item. You cannot con-tinue unless you have done so.

3. Choose

EDIT>COPY SELECTED ITEMS

The items are now on the clipboard.

4. Choose

EDIT>PASTE>AS NEW CHART

A new chart is created with the items you selected.

132 Chapter 5 • • • •••

When you choose this menu item, the following dialog box appears

In this dialog box, you will first specify which two assessments in thecurrent chart you wish to analyze. You may pick any one market(external assessment) and any one company (internal) assessment.

Then, establish the reporting thresholds. You may check only ratingsof your own company’s performance if you wish. Or, you may elect tocheck the competitor’s ratings in the surveys.

The reporting thresholds are in terms of the maximum scaleINCONSISTENCY. For example, if the scale in the externalassessment is from (1 to 10) and the scale in the internal assessmentis from (1-5) then the maximum inconsistency would occur when datapoints are at opposite ends of the scale in each survey.


This is shown graphically below.

The dialog box below appears to report the assessment analysis.

It reports that the Chart Owner (using the square symbol) had a ratingof 1 in the market data assessment and 5 in the internal dataassessment with a 100% scale variance or inconsistency.

In this example, the market thinks the chart owner performs poor forthe WHAT (effect) in question. But, when considering a HOW (cause)which is related to the WHAT in question, the owner’s performanceranks very well in internal (in-house) tests. This may express one ofseveral problems:

In this example, the market rates the company represented by the square poorly (at 1 point of 10) while the internal survey rates the same company well (at 5 points of 5). There is a 100% inconsistency.

134 Chapter 5 • • • •••

1 You may not fully understand the customer need and competitive assessment.

2 The strong relationship doesn’t really exist between the WHAT and HOW. There may be a factor or HOW that has a stronger bearing on customer satisfaction. Revise your matrix to denote such discoveries if they can be uncovered.

3 The internal assessment is misunderstood. It may not accurately reflect customer’s needs and wants. The customer may use the product differently than expected. If this is true, there may be a need for additional internal requirements and performance measuring tests.The software only reports on pairs of survey data points which have a symbol in the relationship matrix to link them together.

Though the software reports on any inconsistencies that meet your reporting criteria, regardless of the symbol in the intersect, it is recommended that you focus first on problems which are linked by strong symbols in the matrix.

Duplicating/Copying an Entire ChartIt’s easy to duplicate charts or copy them to other projects. Here’show

Duplicating/Copying an Entire Chart

Action Comment

1. Go to the Project View where chart thumbnail images are viewable.

2. Click the thumbnail image of the chart you want to copy or dupli-cate.

Just click once to select the chart. You’ll see it redraw with a border and handles around it to designate that it is selected.

3. Copy it to the clipboard by choosing

EDIT>COPY CHARTYou may also press CTRL-C to copy it.


Showing Blanks and Fill %Once you have entered data into the Relations matrix, you may wantto check a few issues.

Normally, you will want to insure that no empty rows exist. If they do,that could mean you have some goals entered (in a row) for whichthere are no factors defined to help you achieve success.

To Find Empty Rows, choose

Tools>Show Blank Rows

Conversely, a blank column may denote resources which areostensibly being wasted. That is, a factor or HOW (design measure)which you may be tracking, measuring and expending capital on,which has no bearing to your goals (WHATs).

To Find Empty Columns, choose

Tools>Show Blank Columns

Lastly, putting too many symbols in the Relations matrix may signifythat many items are really cost, reliability or safety items. Thoseshould be removed from the House of Quality for placement on aReliability Deployment, Cost Deployment or Safety Deploymentchart.

4. To duplicate it, use

EDIT>PASTE CHART

To copy it to a new project, just paste it in that new project instead of the current project. To do that, open the new project and click inside its Project view before the paste.

You may also press CTRL-V to paste it.

�Thumbnail images may overlap each other. This will could occur when you copy and paste a chart into the same project. After performing the paste, click the thumbnail image to select it and drag it to a new position.

Duplicating/Copying an Entire Chart

Action Comment

136 Chapter 5 • • • •••

One measure may be the Fill % of the matrix. It is just a value thatshows how many matrix cells (out of 100%) have an entry.

To check Fill %, choose

Tools>Show Matrix Fill %

Copying Data to Another ApplicationYou can copy chart data to another application by using the WindowsClipboard. First, you need to select the data to copy.

You can select a list of items or one item.

Once you have selected the items, you can choose


To select a continuous group of WHATs/HOWs.

Click the first item then hold down the B key and click the last item to select the list.

To select a discontinuous group of WHATs/HOWs or custom room data.

Click the first item then hold down the F key and click the other items individually.

To select all data cells in a custom room.

Right-click the room’s title and choose

> Select All Data

from the popup menu. This is especially useful when you want to copy a row or column of numbers present in a chart Numeric room.

A dotted line appears around all the data cells to denote that they are selected. There is a menu choice that does the same thing;

Edit > Select All Room Data


Edit > Copy > Selected Text

You must choose “Selected Text” if you plan to copy the items to another application. This choice insures that the selection is stored on your clipboard in text format which is necessary to paste into most other applications (including spreadsheets). The menu choice

Edit > Copy > Selected Item(s)

is only for copying when you intend to paste within QFD Designer.

Then, you can open the other application (e.g. Microsoft Word,Microsoft Excel etc.) and paste into those applications.

Clearing the Relations Matrix

???? Do you ever want to get another person’s or team’s opinion of the Relation matrix symbol ratings?

Sometimes, you may want to take an existing chart and distribute itto a new team member for his or her review of the Relations matrixeven though the existing chart already has symbols in the matrix.

You may be interested in another person or team’s rating of therelationships to compare to your own. Or, you may want to reuse achart from a previous development effort and enter new ratings for anew analysis.

In this case, you may clear the Relations matrix of the existingsymbols and distribute the chart to someone else so that they mayenter their rankings.

To clear the Relations Matrix, choose

Edit > Delete > All Relation Matrix Data�You may want to duplicate or copy your chart first before clearing existing

symbols to insure you retain your original work. See “Duplicating/Copying an Entire Chart” for details.

138 Chapter 5 • • • •••

139

. . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Templates

With the software, you can create and save your own templates. In addition, you maywish to use one of the many built-in pre-packaged templates. Each is described below.

Templates are accessed through the dialog box that appears when you add a newchart to your projects. If you find a template you like, note the tab group in which itappears. You will need to access that tab group upon opening a new file.

Just press the tab indicated in the description to find the template.

TE M P L A T E S

140

A

House of Quality IIn Tab Group: General

Multi-purpose interaction matrix. Includes both top and side roofs. Includes basicmatrix symbol calculations.

Cus

tom

er Im

port

ance

HOWs (Title) CustomerAssessment


WH

ATs

(Titl

e)

How Much


Tech

nica

lA

sses

smen

t

Weighted Importance

Relative Importance

House of Quality

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

141

House of Quality IIIn Tab Group: General

Multi-purpose interaction matrix. Includes only the top roof, the side roof is hidden.Includes basic matrix symbol calculations.

Cus

tom

er Im

port

ance



WH

ATs

(Titl

e)

How Much


Tech

nica

lA

sses

smen

t

Weighted Importance

Relative Importance

New Chart

TE M P L A T E S

142

A

House of Quality IIIIn Tab Group: Genera

Multi-purpose interacton matrix. No roofs. Both top and side roofs are hidden.Includes basic matrix symbol calculations.

Cus

tom

er Im

port

ance



WH

ATs

(Titl

e)

How Much


Tech

nica

lA

sses

smen

t

Weighted Importance

Relative Importance

New Chart

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

143

Simple MatrixIn Tab Group: General

Simple L-matrix. Only WHATs vs. HOWs and top roof are included. No calculationsincluded.

HOWs (Title)

WH

ATs

(Titl

e)

New Chart

TE M P L A T E S

144

A

Market Segmentation MatrixIn Tab Group: Voice of the Customer

This template simplifies market segment analysis. It includes demographics, wants,current commerce, competition and other segmentation dimensions.

Segment 1 Segment 2 Segment 3 Segment 4

Mar

ket F

acto

rs

Demographics (Age, Sex,Education Level, Marital Status,

Family Composition)

Want are their key wants?

What products or services dothey currently buy?

Which companies compete fortheir business?

If they are current customersalready, what do they like in our

company?

If they are current customersalready, what do they dislike in

our company?

Percent of total customers


Percent of total Sales Volume


Market SegmentationMatrix

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

145

Customer Voice Table IIn Tab Group: Voice of the Customer

Used to analyze and record verbatims, demographics and customer use cases.Includes Why, What, Who, When, Where and How.

Ref

eren

ce #

Inte

rnal

/Ext

erna

l

Soci

o-Ec

onom

icG

roup

WHY?

Why do you need orwant this product?

WHAT?

What will it be usedfor?

WHO?

Who uses it now?Who will use it?

WHEN?

When does thecustomer use it?

When will thecustomer use it?

WHERE?

Where will it beused?

HOW?

How is or will theproduct be used?

Cus

tom

er V

erba

tims

1.00

2.00

3.00

4.00

5.00

6.00

7.00

8.00

9.00

Customer Voice Table

TE M P L A T E S

146

A

Customer Voice Table IIIn Tab Group: Voice of the Customer

Used to analyze and record verbatims, demographics and customer use cases.Includes Functions, Measures, Cost, Reliability, Technologies, Failure Modes, Social&& Organizational issues.

Ref

eren

ce #

Customer'sReworded Data

Customer'sNeed

Customer'sProblem

Addressed

Product/Process

Function or Task

Product/Process

CompanyMeasure

Design

Cost

Design

Reliability

Design

Technologies

Design

Failure Modes Project Social Organizational

Cus

tom

er V

erba

tims

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

Customer Voice Table II

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

147

Phase I - House of QualityIn Tab Group: Product or Service Dev’t

The classic QFD chart. Used broadly for many improvement analyses.

Cus

tom

er Im

port

ance



WH

ATs

(Titl

e)

How Much


Tech

nica

lA

sses

smen

t

Absolute Importance

Relative Importance

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

Phase IHouse of Quality

TE M P L A T E S

148

A

Pugh Concept SelectionIn Tab Group: Product or Service Dev’t

Compares alternative design concepts to a datum/benchmark. Tallies "better" and"worse" entries each alternative rated against design criteria. Enhance by importingconcept "graphics" into Symbol Library.

Impo

rtan

ce

Design Concepts

Concept #

Des

ign

Crit

eria

+ (plus) Pugh Sums

- (minus) Pugh Sums

Concept Rating (+'s and -'s)

Concept Rating (weighted by Importance)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

0 0 0 0 0 0 0

0 0 0 0 0 0 0

0 0 0 0 0 0 0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0


. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

149

Phase II - Parts DeploymentIn Tab Group: Product or Service Dev’t

Classic Parts Deployment chart. Analyzes HOWs from the previous phase againstparts and their characteristics. Used to determine which parts in the product designmost strongly drive prioritized design measures.

Impo

rtan

ce

CustomerSatisfaction

Targets

Part Characteristics (HOWs)

Des

ign

Req

uire

men

ts (W

HA

Ts)

Part Characteristic Values

Part Capability

Absolute Importance

Relative Importance

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

Phase IIParts Deployment

TE M P L A T E S

150

A

Phase III - Process PlanningIn Tab Group: Product or Service Dev’t

Classic Process Planning Chart. Its inputs are the critical parts and theircharacteristics from previous chart. Explores interactions between parts and shopfloor manufacturing processes.

PartCharacteristic

ValuesIm

porta

nce

Process Parameters (HOWs)

Part

Cha

ract

eris

tics

(WH

ATs

)

Process Parameter Values

Process Capability

Absolute Importance

Relative Importance

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

Phase IIIProcess Planning

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

151

Phase IV - Production PlanningIn Tab Group: Product or Service Dev’t

Classic QFD Chart. Inputs are high priority Processes from upstream. It is used tostudy process capability and measures which can be take to insure successfuloutcome of each process. Includes Quality Control, Maintenance, SPC, Checklistsetc.

ProcessParameter

Values

Pro

cess

Cap

abili

ty

Impo

rtan

ce

Diff

icul

ty

Fre

quen

cy

Sev

erity

Abi

lity

To D

etec

t

Tot

al P

oint

s

PlanningRequirements

Proc

ess

Para

met

ers

(WH

ATs

) 0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

Phase IVProduction Planning

TE M P L A T E S

152

A

Hoshin Audit - Policy DeploymentIn Tab Group: Business Planning

Use this chart to enter information about current policy deployment status, intendedaction plans and responsible parties.

Measures ofObjectives

(Targets) Stat

us

Stat

us(s

ymbo

lical

ly)

Cur

rent

Per

form

ance

Perf

orm

ance

Tar

get

Perc

ent C

ompl

ete

Issue orConcern

(Problem)

NextActions

Quarterly,Monthly,Weekly

etc.

Responsibility

Who will takethe actions?

DueDate

Don

e Ye

t?

Actions Taken

Obj

ectiv

es

PrimaryObjective

SecondaryObjective Tertiary Objectives

Reduce Costs

Reduce Sales Cost

Reduce European SG&A

Hoshin Audit(Policy Deployment)

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

153

Executive StrategiesIn Tab Group: Business Planning

Record executive future visions versus high-level strategic factors which will impactachievement. Shows importance of visions, current performance and goals, requiredratio of improvement, market assessment and internal benchmark rooms.

Cor

pora

te Im

port

ance

Our

Cur

rent

Per

form

ance

Perf

orm

ance

Goa

l

Impr

ovem

ent R

atio

Strategy Factors MarketAssessment

N Target

P Competitor A

Q Competitor B

O Our Company

0 1 2 3 4 5


Stra

tegi

c G

oals

BusinessTargets


Inte

rnal

Ben

chm

ark N Target

P Competitor A

Q Competitor B

O Our Company

0

1

2

3

4

5

Weighted Importance

Relative Importance

Strategy Factor Rank

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

0.0

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

ExecutiveStrategies

TE M P L A T E S

154

A

Managing Executive StrategiesIn Tab Group: Business Planning

This chart has as its inputs, the prioritized strategy factors from the executivestrategies matrix. In the HOWs region, Managerial factors are recorded. This is anexcellent chart for establishing managerial steps needed to enact strategic factors.

Abs

olut

e Im

port

ance

Managerial Factors

Bus

ines

s Ta

rget

s

Org

aniz

atio

nal D

iffic

ulty

Stra

teg

Managerial Factor Importance

Relative Managerial ImportanceMgr. Factor Rank

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

Management ofExecutive Strategies

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

155

Management Factors to OperationsIn Tab Group: Business Planning

Inputs are prioritized management factors. Used to establish operations and tacticsnecessary to carry out management objectives. Records the very detailed stepswhich may be taken by functional specialists.

Man

ager

ial F

acto

r Im

port

anceOperational/Tactical Factors

Mgr

. Fac

tor R

ank

Man

ager

ial F

acto

rs

Operational Importance

Relative Operational Importance

1

1

1

1

1

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

OperationalizingManagement Factors

TE M P L A T E S

156

A

Design Failure Mode & Effects Analysis - DFMEAIn Tab Group: Failure Analysis

Design FMEA - For Design Failure Mode and Effects (DFMEA) analyses. Anticipatepotential failures, estimate their criticality then alter designs to prevent them beforeactual development; saving time and money..

Current Design Controls

Seve

rity

Cla

ss

Occ

uren

ce

Det

ectio

n

Ris

k Pr

iorit

y N

umbe

r (R

.P.N

.)

RecommendedAction(s)

Responsibility &Target Completion

DateActions Taken

Seve

rity

- (A

fter A

ctio

n Pl

an)

Occ

uren

ce -

(Afte

r Act

ion

Plan

)

Det

ectio

n - (

Afte

r Act

ion

Plan

)

RiskPriorityNumber(R.P.N.)

(AfterAction)

Failu

re D

ata

Item

FunctionPotential Failure Mode Potential Effect(s) of Failure Potential Cause(s)/Mechanism(s) of Failure 0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA(Replace this title block, enter info similar to below)

Subsystem:Component:Model Year(s):Core Team:Design Responsibility:Key Date:FMEA Number:Prepared By:Creation Date:Revision Date:

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

157

Process Failure Mode & Effects Analysis - PFMEAIn Tab Group: Failure Analysis

Process FMEA - For Process Failure Mode and Effects (PFMEA) analyses. Anticipatepotential failures, estimate their criticality then alter the manufacturing process toprevent them; saving time and money.

Current Process Controls

Seve

rity

Cla

ss

Occ

uren

ce

Det

ectio

n

Ris

k Pr

iorit

y N

umbe

r (R

.P.N

.)

RecommendedAction(s)

Responsibility &Target Completion

DateActions Taken

Seve

rity

- (A

fter A

ctio

n Pl

an)

Occ

uren

ce -

(Afte

r Act

ion

Plan

)

Det

ectio

n - (

Afte

r Act

ion

Plan

)

RiskPriorityNumber(R.P.N.)

(AfterAction)

Failu

re D

ata

Process Function

RequirementsPotential Failure Mode Potential Effect(s) of Failure Potential Cause(s)/Mechanism(s) of Failure 0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

0.00

Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA(Replace this title block, enter info similar to below)

Item:Component:Model Year(s):Core Team:Process Responsibility:Key Date:FMEA Number:Prepared By:

TEM

PL

AT

ES

158

A

Best Practices Matrix

In Tab Group: Six Sigm

a

This Best Practices Matrix can be used to assess areas within your com

pany againstvarious best practice judging criteria.B

est Practice - Judging Criteria

Continuous Flow

Point-of-Use Concepts

Pull Systems

Material Control

Flexible Suppliers

Set-up Time Reduction

Preventive Maintenance

Standardized Product

Late Point Identification

Continuous Improvement Training

Cycle Reduction Teams

Workforce

Kanban with Visual Signals

Schedule Attainment Quality

Area Score (row sum)

Relative Area Performance

Assessment Areas

(substitute your areas for sample text)

Plant A

Plant B

Departm

ent C

Plant D

Section F

Station 23

Plant I

enter your areas...

Criteria Perform

ance Target

Criteria Score

Relative C

riteria Score

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

000000000

Best Practices M

atrix

sample sym

bols

. . .

. .TE M P L A T E S

159

Quality MatrixIn Tab Group: Six Sigma

This Quality Matrix can be used to assess the level of performance of your company'sbusiness units for each of several quality initiaties (e.g. Customer Satisfaction,Commitment, New Technology etc.)

List of Company Business Units

Are

a Sc

ore

(row

sum

)

Rel

ativ

e A

rea

Perf

orm

ance

Qua

lity

Perf

orm

ance

Initi

ativ

es

Quality Leadership

Supplier ManagementProcess Operation Control &

ImprovementQuality Information Management

Problem Solving Techniques

People Commitment

Customer Satisfaction

New Product/Technology/ServiceIntroduction

Chance Capability

Criteria Performance Target

Criteria Score

Relative Criteria Score

0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

Quality Matrix

sample symbols

TE M P L A T E S

160

A

161

. . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .File Conversion

Converting Version 3.15 Files - OverviewIf you have created data in QFD Designer Version 3.15, you may convert those filesindividually for use with the new software.

V3.15 data files were organized such that for each data file, there were four sub-files.These files have the extensions .QF1, .QF2, .QF3 and .QF4.

Though users only see the .QF1 file, all four files must be present to convert the entire data file properly.

In the new software, all the data is combined in one file, a .BIP (Business ImprovementProject) file.

The included conversion routine is designed to convert from the .QF1 through .QF4files into a single .BIP file.

There are a few pointers which you should bear in mind to simplify your fileconversions. If possible, please open the file in V3.15 and take the following stepsbefore running the convert routine:

1 Choose Options>Show Hidden Rooms to make sure there are no hidden rooms. If any rooms are hidden, click to select then choose Options>Unhide Room for each, then save the file.

2 If the chart has no side roof, and you want a side roof available in the new software, you MUST insert one in V3.15 before converting. Choose Options>Add Side Roof to do so. There is no facility in the new software to add a side roof to files converted without one.

3 Copy the data file (all four sub files .QF1 through .QF4) to the directory where the new software is installed before converting.

Running “Convert V3 Data”Follow the directions below to run the convert routine.

Access the new software’s program group off the Start button. Find and choose theicon titled:

F I L E C O N V E R S I O N

162

B

Convert V3 Data

After an informational message, the following dialog box will appear

1 Press the <1. Locate V3 File> to browse to the .QF1 file.2 Press the <2. Set Destination> button to establish where to save the converted file.3 Press the <Convert> button.

After converting, a new .BIP file will be created. You may open that file like any other.BIP file formatted for the new version.

Some formatting may be necessary after converting. For example, symbols may appear small. To fix that, size one row and one column till the intersecting symbol look large enough then, use the Match Size feature to make the chart consistent.

The conversion routine does not convert chart title or WHAT/HOW titles from the V3 file and doesn’t transfer font settings. You may wish to insert a new title in the converted file and format text font settings according to your preference.

2One to two more conversion messages may appear after you open the file in the new version. This is normal. The application performs some final “cleanup” as part of the conversion process before finally opening the file.

163 • • • •••

AAdding A Chart To The Project 62aligning text 66applinks

configuring 108dialog box 109

entering 91expressing real world problems

with 27launching programs with 108placing in WHATs or HOWs 98placing into chart 110playing 111setting up

step by step 109assessment

analysesconsistency checks 131dialog box 131internal vs. external (market)

131interpreting consistency

checks 134report threshholds 132

custom room type 36room

data description 114defining valid symbols in an 80

assessment roomsetting up by configuring 98

assessment roomsentering data 83

Audioexpressing real world problems

with 27Auto-fitting Text in WHATs/HOWs 69Auto-Recalc vs. Recalc Now 82Average 95

BBeginning a Project 61Benchmarking 13Boosting Revenues 7business improvement

applications 10framework 2intra-company projects 15steps 24team oriented 22

Business Improvement StepsBrainstorm HOWs 45Determine relationships (HOWs

vs. WHATs) 48Determine Required Improvement

44Enter Correlations between HOWs

(factors) 50Establish Performance Targets 49Gather Competitive Ratings 43Gather WHATs 39Make Internal Competitive Ratings

49Quantify WHAT Importances 43Refine your designs 51Sort HOWs by Importance 51table of 38

business problems"lip service" 23and financial performance 6company actions misaligned 11competitive struggles 13considering internal processes 16corporate strategy issues 11costs too high

production 14service/support 12warranty 12

customer needs misunderstood 12internal improvement projects 16

• • • • •INDEXINDEXINDEXINDEX

ININININDEDEDEDE

• XXXX

164

• • • •••

INDEXlitigation 12many causes of 20market share low 10misunderstanding customer per-

ceptions 131misunderstanding market percep-

tions 131modeling 27modeling interactions 19new concepts needed 13product development uncoordinat-

ed with manufacturing 13product or process failure 12production yields low 14profits low 10reliability 12resource allocation 19returns too high 12sales revenue low 10satisfaction low 10strategic planning 16taking actions to solve 26task management 14

Ccalculations

compoundintermediate rooms needed 95

performing in Numeric rooms 91setting up 94

Cascade Delete 129Catchball 9cause and effect 17

courtroom example 18importance of quantifying 20visually 19

causes 19Chart Legend 106chart legend

depicts custom symbols 102moving 106

chart regions 30, 31charts

decomposing into subsystems117, 130

clearing the relations matrix 137Column Sum 95communicating

linked matrices help in 28via intranet 28

Comparing Assessments 131competitive analysis 131Competitive Benchmarking 13competitive ratings 24configure

button 92, 105dialog box example 98

configuring 91applinks 108symbol library 99to establish valid symbols 91WHATs or HOWs 98

Configuring Chart Regions 91Configuring Custom Symbols 101configuring regions

how to 91Configuring Symbols 98Configuring the Relationship Matrix 98Configuring the WHAT or HOW Rooms

98copying an entire chart 134Copying Data to Another Application

136Correlations

HOW vs. HOW 25costs

lowering 8planning helps reduce 8

Creating a Subset Chartstep by step 131

custom roomsinserting 112

custom symbolsadding by configuring 99guidelines for creating 101

customeridentifying 15

Customer Assessmentcustom room 37

Customer Importance

165 • • • •••

INDEXnumeric room 37

customersinternal and external 15recording verbatims 42segmenting 41

via "use case" observation 41Cut, Copy & Paste 76

steps 76

DData Collection and Recording 30data types

applinks 56audio 55calculations 54numbers 53symbols 53text 52videos 54weblinks 55

decimals shownchanging setting for in Numeric

rooms 94delayed response

due to auto-recalc 82Deleting Levels 71

recovering using EDIT>UNDO. 71deleting linked data 129Deleting Rooms 115Deleting Symbols 80deployment

manufacturing 13production 14reliability 12task 14Voice of Customer (VOC) 12

designingdrilling down into details 125leveraging previous analyses 28

Difference (Rooms - Const) 95Difference (Rooms) 95Direction of Improvement

Symbol room 37Division 96

Drag & Dropto reposition WHATs or HOWs 75

Duplicating/Copying an Entire Chart134

Ee-mail

sharing the chart image via 87employees

educating new hires 22recording their specialized knowl-

edge 21Enter key

to "mark" a reviewed item 81Entering a Chart Title 63Entering Assessment Room Data 83Entering Data in Custom Rooms 81Entering Matrix Symbols 80Entering Numeric Room Data 82Entering Symbol Room Data 81Entering Symbols in Rooms 79entering text in the Relations Matrix

117Entering Text Room Data 84entering weblinks 111Entering WHATs and HOWs 66Executive Planning 16Exporting 136

chart numerics 136WHATs HOWs 136

Exporting the Chart Image 87

FFailure Mode and Effects Analysis. See

FMEAfighting fires 3FMEA 9, 12focus

short-term vs. long-term 3focus groups 15, 42formatting

multiple items at once 64text in a room’s data region 64

Formatting Text 63

166

• • • •••

INDEX

Ggraphics

windows bitmapsimporting into symbol library

101green shaded rooms

are set to hidden 116

Hhiding and unhiding

levels 71roofs (top or side) 116rooms 116

High Priorities Report 123use of Percentile calculation in 123

HOQ. See House of QualityHoshin 17Hoshin Kanri 9, 11House of Quality 31

basic diagram 31HOW

sorting by importance 25How Much

Text room 37how to

add a chart to the project 62change the number of decimals

displayed 94configure a region’s symbols 100configure regions 91convert V3.15 data files 161create a subset chart 131cut, copy & paste 76delete symbols 80develop resulting design priorities

125duplicate or copy an entire chart

134enter matrix symbols 80export the chart image 87insert custom rooms 114perform a "phase progression" 126print notes 87select multiple WHATs or HOWs

64sort chart data 122

HOWsas causes 20, 24as design measures 20as economic properties 47as human properties 46as market properties 47as mechanical properties 46as physical properties 46as production properties 47as time properties 47brainstorming for 24chart room description 34checklist 46developing

keys to 47sorting 122

IIdentifying The Customer 15importing

bitmapsto use as symbols 101

from other programs 72improvement goals 24Inserting a List of Text or Numbers 72Inserting a New WHAT/HOW Level 70Inserting Custom Chart Rooms 112Inserting Levels 69Inserting Rooms That Calculate 93Installation 61Interviews

to obtain Voice of the Customer 42items

sorting 122

LLeadership and Planning 3Learning The Software 30legend 102

moving to a new position 106levels

hiding with size regions 71inserting in WHATs/HOWs 70

167 • • • •••

INDEXLeveraging Supporting Data 52Linked Charts 127linked charts 83

and viewing downstream effects127

reopening to recalc 83upstream and downstream effects

28linked data 83

breaking links 130deleting 129symbol denoting 127

linking internet sites 111Lowering Costs 8

Mmanagement reports

simplifying with subset charts 130Manufacturing Deployment 13manufacturing yield 14market

understanding 1market needs

unspoken 25Market Research 42Market Segmentation Matrix 40market share

satisfaction and quality effects on 7winning 1

marketingsales points 25surveys 15

Marking and Displaying ReviewedItems 81

match item sizes 117Match Size

to match all item sizes 68matching item sizes 68matrices

holding design knowledge 21in knowledge libraries 22used in employee education 22

Matrix Index 96Matrix Max in Column 96Matrix Max in Row 96

Matrix Min in Col 96Matrix Min in Row 96matrix power

knowledgebase creation 21to model interactions 21

matrix symbolsentering 80

Maximum 96Minimum 96mission statement

examples 4

NNONE-User Entry 96numeric formulas

described 95numeric rooms 36, 93–98

data description 112entering data 82

OOrganizational Difficulty

Numeric room 37organizational intelligence

tapping 23orientation

setting printer 84setting text 64

Ppaper effect

refining designs/planning on paper29

saving tooling/eqp. cost 29paper size 84pasting

a list of text or numbersfrom clipboard 72

chart imagesymbol display issue 88

data from other programs 72multi-cell across 73multi-cell down 73

Percentage 96percentile

168

• • • •••

INDEXused in High Priorities Report 123

performance gaps 25performance targets

establishing 24Performing a Phase Progression 126Phase Progression 125

and linking between charts 127diagram 125into a template 126

planninglack of time for 4profit impact 3

Policy Deployment 9, 11, 17Policy Management 9, 11pre-planning

importance of 45Pre-Planning Matrix

template chart 44Print Preview 85print preview

affected by screen zoom setting 85affected by zoom setting 72and fitting charts to paper 85scaling chart on page 85tip 86zoom setting’s effect on 85

Print Setup dialog box 84Printer Setup 84Printing 84, 86

As Displayed 86Fit to Page 85

Printing Notes 87Priorities

refining designs 25prioritizing

based on cause and effect 20problem definition 6

and project requirements 6problem formulation

data types used in 27problem reoccurence 3process map 16Product (Rooms * Const) 97Product (Rooms) 97Product Clinics 42

product developmentleveraging "lessons learned" 22

Production Deployment 14profit damage 3Profit Potential 1project view

duplicating entire charts 134Pugh Concept Selection 13

QQF1 QF2 QF3 and QF4 files

from Version 3.15 161QFD 8, 10

Relationship symbols 35quality

perceived 15quote

bill gates 1einstein 14jack welch 7phillip II of macedon 4

RRank 97rank reversals

of factors 28Recalc Now 82recalculating linked values 83Refresh calculated values

use of Recalc to 82refreshing linked data 83Relations Matrix 35

picture of 80Relationships

WHATs vs. HOWs 24RelativeTechnical Importance

Numeric room 37Reliability Deployment 12Replacing Symbols 106resource allocation 19reusing design analyses

linked chart implications 127reviewed items

enter key vs. arrow key 81keeping your place on the chart 81

169 • • • •••

INDEXROI 3

boosting 28roofs

hiding 116unhiding 116

roomscustom 36deleting 115entering symbols in 79hiding 116on the House of Quality 31unhiding 116

RowSum 97Running Convert V3 Data 161running weblinks 111

SSelect All Data 65selecting WHATs or HOWs 64services

considering customer deliverablesof 15

Setting Text Alignment 66setting the default font 65Showing Blanks and Fill % 135Side Roof 33size regions

remove levels from view with 71Sizing Chart Regions 67sizing WHATs or HOWs to match one

item 68software

as an improvement analysis frame-work 26

how it can help boost quality 8how it can help prioritize personal

goals 26how it helps prioritize 8learning the 30

Sorting 122complements to

High Priorities Report 123speeding up data entry 82Splitting the Chart 73stakeholders 11

needs of 17strategic planning 9, 16

for shareholders 17strategy

misguided 2subset charts 117, 130Sum (Rooms + Const) 97Sum (Rooms) 97Supporting Data

leveraging 30Symbol Bar

described 77symbol bar

adjusts to show valid symbols 79button descriptions 77diagram 77, 111, 112launching 81

Symbol entrymark reviewed item

to note no relationship exists81

symbol library 99symbol room 36

data description 113symbol rooms

entering data 81symbols

insuring they display correctly 88

TTally 97Task Deployment 14team meetings

display projector facilitates 29keeping your place on the chart

mark reviewed items 81teams

avoiding "not invented here" syn-drome 23

benefits of 22building 22consensus building 23dividing work using subset charts

130enhancing results of 29

170

• • • •••

INDEXestablishing 23importance of "buy-in" 23participation in 23

Technical Assessmentcustom room

Assessment type 37template

open fromdialog box 121

template Organizerdialog box 120

templates 14, 119benefits of custom 30Best Practices Matrix 158catalog of 58Creating 119Customer Voice Table I 145Customer Voice Table II 146Customer VoiceTables 58Design FMEA 156Executive Strategies 153failure analysis (FMEA) 58for quickly starting 30help record "best practices" 30Hoshin Audit - Policy Deployment

152House of Quality I 140House of Quality II 141House of Quality III 142Listed in Appendix 139Management Factors to Opera-

tions 155Managing Executive Strategies

154Market Segmentation Matrix 40,

144opening from

dialog box 57organizing 120

dialog box 62Phase I - House of Quality 147Phase II - Parts Deployment 149Phase III - Process Planning 150Phase IV - Production Planning

151

phase progression into 126Pre-Planning Matrix 44Process FMEA 157Pugh Concept Selection 59, 148QFD 58Quality Matrix 159Simple Matrix 143starting quickly with 56use in standardizing internal meth-

ods 30Voice of Customer 42–43

textaligning 66entering in Relations Matrix 117

Text roomdata description 113

Text rooms 36text rooms

entering data 84thumbnail images

titling 63titling

charts 63thumbnails 63

top roofdescription 34

Total Quality Management (TQM) 11transferring HOWs to WHATs

via Phase Progression 125Two-Dimensional Thinking 27

Uunhiding 116

roofs 116

VVersion 3.15 data files

converting 161Video

expressing real world problemswith 27

viewing data links between charts 128VOC (Voice of Customer) analysis

five Ws and H method 41Voice of Customer

171 • • • •••

INDEXtemplates 42

Voice of the Customer 40

Wwaste

avoiding to reduce cost 29Weblinks

expressing real world problemswith 27

weblinks 111Weighted Importance

custom Numeric type room 37Weighted Importance (Ideal) 97Weighted Importance (Independent)

98Weighted Importance (Proportional) 98WHAT HOW text

auto-fitting 69what-if scenarios 28

exploring 28

WHATsas desired effects 17as goals 17as project inputs 17chart room 33gathering 24Importance Ratings for each of the

24sorting 122

WHATs and HOWsentering 66hiding and unhiding 116inserting/deleting with keyboard 67

Zzoom factor

effect on print preview 72shrink or expand chart image on

screen 72Zooming to Scale The Chart View 71

172

• • • •••

INDEX

qfd basics

Documents