Share | 98% of quality incidents stem from these 8 common mistakes – stay away from them!

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The most common problems are also the hardest to correct, and they serve as reasons for making mistakes. Quality accidents are problems that every quality professional wishes to avoid, but no matter how much effort is put into prevention, they are sometimes inevitable; it’s just a matter of the severity of the accident. The following 8 questions represent issues we often encounter in quality management, and most quality accidents stem from these common mistakes. 1 Classification of quality accidents When it comes to quality accidents, what comes to mind first is the classification of such accidents. After reviewing some information, Certified Expert found that there are two classification methods: one is to divide them into three categories – minor quality incidents, serious quality incidents, and major quality incidents. 1) Minor quality incidents: Those that meet one of the following conditions are considered minor quality incidents: a) The direct economic loss is 5,000 yuan or more, but less than 50,000 yuan ； b. Those that affect the functional performance and structural safety of the project, resulting in permanent quality defects. 2) Serious quality accidents: An accident is considered serious if it meets one of the following conditions: a) The direct economic loss is 50,000 yuan or more, but less than 100,000 yuan ； b. Seriously affecting the use of the project or its safety, with significant quality risks ； c. The nature of the accident is severe, or it results in serious injuries to 2 people or fewer. 3) Major quality accidents: An accident is considered major if it meets one of the following conditions, and falls under the category of major accidents in construction projects. a. Collapse or scrapping of the project ； b. Death, injury, or serious injuries to 3 or more persons due to a quality accident ； c. Direct economic losses of over 100,000 yuan. These are classified into four categories: minor accidents, relatively serious accidents, serious accidents, and extremely serious accidents. 1) An extremely serious accident refers to one that results in 30 or more deaths, or 100 or more people suffering serious injuries (including acute industrial poisoning; the same applies hereafter), or direct economic losses of over 100 million yuan; 2) A serious accident refers to one that results in 10 to 30 deaths, or 50 to 100 people suffering serious injuries, or direct economic losses of between 50 million yuan and 100 million yuan; 3) A relatively serious accident refers to one that results in 3 to 10 deaths, or 10 to 50 people suffering serious injuries, or direct economic losses of between 10 million yuan and 50 million yuan; 4) A minor accident refers to one that results in 3 or fewer deaths, or 10 or fewer people suffering serious injuries, or direct economic losses of less than 10 million yuan. 28 common mistakes. Of course, the way in which they are classified is merely a means of assessing the losses caused by the accidents. As a quality professional, the primary responsibility is to avoid or minimize the occurrence of quality incidents. The following 8 common mistakes should be avoided by all quality professionals. Mistake 1: Let’s forget about it this time; it’s better to avoid trouble. Most inspectors don’t like to issue defect reports, and of course suppliers prefer that as well, because after issuing such a report, they have to take the defective products to various supervisors for their signatures, and they also need to inform the purchasing department ； When the supplier comes to the factory for rework, it is necessary to confirm the method of reprocessing; after the reprocessing is completed, further inspections must be carried out in accordance with the standards. Rejecting one batch takes more time than conducting inspections on three batches as part of the normal process. Therefore, in many cases, when inspectors encounter a small number of defective items, but that number still meets the AQL rejection standard, it is incorrect to label them as qualified and allow them to proceed to the next stage. With the inspectors I used to work with, basically every new inspector had to go through this experience: during inspections only a few defective items were detected, but during production, a large number of defective items appeared, leading to production shutdowns and other problems. Therefore, when the sample inspection reaches the AQL rejection level, it is necessary to issue a rejection order. Some inspectors are afraid of the hassle involved in issuing reports. When they detect defects, the purchasing department says that it’s sufficient to have the supplier come and redo the work, so there’s no need to issue a report – after all, it’s troublesome to do that. When such situations occur, inspectors usually are willing to help and work with the purchasing department to suppress the issue; as a result, the supplier fails to handle things in a timely manner, which leads to production lines coming to a halt due to a lack of materials. In some cases, materials have been delivered for three days yet no order has still been placed, and so on. If the superior is unaware of it, it will be considered that the inspector failed to conduct the inspection, and issues related to the inspector’s timeliness will be raised. Therefore, after detecting defects, the inspector should issue a report promptly. Error 2: The procurement, business, technical, and production departments said it was okay to include it, so I did. You should know that the basis for inspectors to conduct inspections is the inspection standards, which include drawings, approval documents, inspection standard sheets, samples, and so on ； If you find anything that does not meet the standards, you should confirm it with your supervisor. It’s not the case that anything is okay just because other departments say so. The management and performance evaluation of inspectors are all handled by the Quality Department; since you listen to other departments, then just transfer you to those departments. I’ve encountered such a case before: the inspector found that the material was substandard, but the purchaser said it wasn’t a problem, adding that they had informed the production line and that they were willing to proceed with production without filing any complaints against you. As a result, the inspector didn’t report the issue to his superiors and simply applied a \"qualified\" label to the material, allowing it to go into production. This leads to complaints on the production line and line shutdowns, and purchasing will not take responsibility for this. When materials cause production problems, other departments will only ask how the inspectors conducted the inspections, without blaming people from those other departments. The consequences of failing the inspection fall solely on the inspector. Therefore, when an inspector detects defects, the decision must be followed based on the instructions of the direct supervisor; and if the supervisor decides to approve the item despite the defects, the reason for this change must also be noted in the defect report. Error three: I thought that when an inspector fails to fulfill his duty of oversight and is asked why things got out of control, he would always start by saying “I thought...”. Inspectors should not say “I thought”. When you say “I thought,” you start looking for reasons and excuses for your mistakes; after finding those excuses, you commit the same errors again. Furthermore, if a problem cannot be confirmed, one should first consult and get confirmation from a superior. Therefore, I ask my employees that after making a mistake, they should not say “I thought.” All I want to know is the reason why it wasn’t detected this time, and what they will do in the next inspection to ensure it is caught. For example: This time my sampling method was incorrect. A total of 6,000 units arrived, distributed across 5 pallets and 200 boxes. According to the requirements, 32 boxes should have been sampled, with an average of 6 boxes sampled from each pallet ； 6 samples per box ； And I only inspected one pallet, a total of three boxes in all. The defective items were not concentrated on this pallet, which is why I didn’t pick them up. Going forward, I will conduct random inspections using standard inspection methods. Error four: Relying on experience and using connections to assume that this material won’t have any problems and thus doesn’t need inspection. This is a common mistake made by experienced inspectors. It’s fortunate that inspectors know how to carry out their work and what the key points of inspection are, but they use the wrong methods. There have been no problems until now; inspections can be reduced, but they cannot be eliminated. At the very least, the labels on the outer boxes should be checked, and one product should be taken for a thorough inspection. Generally, for products that are free of defects, the first box and the last box must be inspected. In this way, at least it can be ensured that there will be no batch-related issues with the materials. This manufacturer (the team leader) gets along well with me; he even bought me water to drink and cigarettes yesterday. Let’s ignore this defect this time and mark it as PASS. This is a major no-no for inspectors, and it happens in most companies. Just to save face for a friend, I ended up getting myself into trouble. When these defective items are released, causing customers to return the products during inspection and creating problems for the production line, the first question that upper management will ask is how you carried out the inspection and why you failed to detect such issues It is not advisable to allow a matter of face to result in losses for the company. Error 5: This issue was revised and approved in previous orders; therefore, no order will be created this time, and a PASS label will be applied directly. Sometimes, due to the urgency to get the materials onto the market, many revisions occur, leading inspectors to mistakenly think that such conditions are acceptable. During the second inspection, the same issue was found, so no order was issued; this led to production complaints after the product went into use. The supervisor will make a revised decision regarding this batch, taking into account various factors based on the actual situation; some involve communicating with clients, others with the production team, as well as selection processes – all of these apply to this specific batch. Therefore, after discovering non-conformities, although the previous batch was reclassified, an order should still be issued to reject it. Error 6: Missing inspection items. Since the materials were needed urgently and both the procurement and production departments were pressing for delivery, several necessary inspection items were not carried out. Assuming there would be no problems, a PASS label was applied and the materials were sent into use. Every company, due to factors such as procurement lead times, faces issues with materials that need to be delivered urgently. For such materials, there is pressure to speed up the inspection process by the procurement inspectors; production and warehouse staff wait beside the inspectors until they finish inspecting the materials before releasing them, which puts significant psychological stress on inspectors who lack extensive work experience. Due to palpitations, some tests were not conducted, and the product was directly labeled as pass and sent out for production. As there were defects in the items that were not inspected, production was halted, resulting in a penalty. For items that are in urgent need, purchases usually involve making phone calls to suppliers to urge them to speed up production. As long as the goods can be delivered within the specified time frame, no attention is paid to other quality issues. In order to deliver the goods on time, suppliers work tirelessly to rush production; so how good can the quality of the materials produced be? The more urgent the situation, the more carefully it needs to be checked. Generally, urgent orders are more prone to quality issues. When personnel from procurement or other related departments urge the inspector to conduct the inspection quickly, they should be asked to wait in the designated area. The inspector must complete all required inspection steps and confirm that there are no defects before allowing the product to proceed to the production line. If defects are detected during the inspection process, the relevant personnel should be notified promptly to handle them. Error 7: Failing to follow the procedures after identifying a problem. During the inspection process, defect A was detected; after an order was placed and the issue was addressed through actions such as rework or special processing, defect B appeared again once production resumed. Inspectors conduct inspections in accordance with the inspection procedures; the general order of inspection is packaging, appearance, mechanical dimensions, and performance testing. Many times, when an inspector discovers a defect, they are pleased, stop the inspection, and immediately issue a non-conformity report. In previous quality management efforts, many problems arose as a result of this approach. When inspectors detected visual defects such as scratches, and in order to keep production moving forward, special approvals were given to proceed with manufacturing; yet another issue emerged later: dimension problems that made it impossible to assemble the products. Therefore, when inspecting products, if any defects are found, all of them should be checked thoroughly, and the inspection results should be recorded before an order is placed. Error 8: Products are not re-inspected after rework. If defects are detected during inspection, and the supplier or production team carries out rework, there should be no issues left; in such cases, minimal inspection should be conducted or the products can be approved directly. Many times, the heavy-duty workers sent by the suppliers do not work diligently; they want to go back early or go out to have fun after completing their tasks. As a result, they don’t even take a look at many of the materials, and some boxes remain unopened. When the inspector went to conduct the inspection, assuming that the supplier had completed all the rework, they carried out a symbolic sample check and then gave a PASS rating, allowing the supplier’s staff to leave. However, after the products were put into use, production complaints arose: the incoming materials were of poor quality. Therefore, for products that have undergone rework by the supplier, the inspector should also recheck the materials in accordance with the inspection requirements; if defects are found, the supplier should be required to carry out further rework until the products meet the specified standards. With all these problems arising, how should we address them? How can we be good managers, and what should we do to achieve that? That is why we, as managers, should focus on employee development and on the cultivation of their habits. - End -