See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/265793992
A CASE STUDY OF QUALITY MANAGEMENT ON ROLLS-ROYCE Article · May 2013 DOI: 10.13140/2.1.2172.5442 10.13140/2.1.2172.5442
READS
2,375
3 authors,
including:
Hafez Shurrab IMI Hydronic Engineering 35 PUBLICATIONS 0 CITATIONS
SEE PROFILE
All in-text references underlined in blue are blue are linked to publications on ResearchGate, letting you access and read them immediately.
Available from: Hafez Shurrab Retrieved on: 18 August 2016
A CASE STUDY OF QUALITY
MANAGEMENT ON ROLLS-ROYCE
A CASE STUDY OF QUALITY
MANAGEMENT ON ROLLS-ROYCE
Karlstad Business School Handelshögskolan vid Karlstads Universitet
TITLE OF THE WORK:
Karlstad Business School Handelshögskolan vid Karlstads Universitet
TITLE OF THE WORK: A Case Study of Quality Management on Rolls Royce
Prepared by Hafez Shurrab Farhana Akter Mohammed El Bouassami
TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES & FIGURES ............................................................................................... II 1.
INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... - 1 -
2.
METHODOLOGY ......................................................................................................... - 2 -
3.
BACKGROUND ............................................................................................................ - 2 -
4.
3.1.
Rolls Royce Group PLC ..................................................................................... - 2 -
3.2.
Rolls-Royce practice of Lean, Six Sigma and Robust Design ........................... - 3 -
3.3.
Rolls-Royce and Benchmarking......................................................................... - 4 -
3.4.
Rolls-Royce and Quality Management Systems ................................................ - 5 -
3.5.
Rolls-Royce and Process Improvement ............................................................. - 7 -
THEORY ........................................................................................................................ - 7 4.1.
Quality ................................................................................................................ - 7 -
4.2. Total Quality Management (TQM) ........................................................................ - 7 4.3. Benchmarking and ISO Standards ......................................................................... - 8 4.4. Lean Production Method/Philosophy..................................................................... - 9 4.5. Six Sigma Method .................................................................................................. - 9 4.6. Robust Design and the Design Process ................................................................ - 10 5.
ANALYSIS .................................................................................................................. - 11 -
6.
DISCUSSION ............................................................................................................... - 14 -
7.
CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................ - 15 -
8.
REFERENCES ............................................................................................................. - 16 -
I
LIST OF TABLES & FIGURES Figure 1: Timing integration for recommended technology management tool suites ...... - 5 Figure 2: The framework of the process structure across Rolls-Royce Group ................. - 6 Figure 3: Path of Continuous Improvement at Rolls -Royce in Recent History ............... - 7 Figure 4: Robust Design and optimization ..................................................................... - 11 -
II
1. INTRODUCTION The aim of this paper is to understand the values, tools and methodologies of quality. The paper will integrate the theories with a real context. Rolls Royce Group PLC (RollsRoyce) is in our focus to understand the theories related to quality. Rolls Royce as one of the most powerful brands in the world has always been associated with high quality products. The company symbolizes a promise to deliver reliability, integrity and innovation to its customers. Rolls Royce manufacture engine for global civil aerospace, defense aerospace, marine and energy industries (Rolls Royce, 2013). Quality is the most important and complex component of business strategy (Golder et al. 2012). Quality is seen as key factors to an organization’s Success and survival in today’s competitive environment. Bergman and Klefsjö (2003) stated, “The quality of a product/service is its ability to satisfy, or preferably exceed, the needs and expectations of the customers.” TQM is a continuously evolving management system consisting of values, methodologies and tools, the aim of which is to increase external and internal customers satisfaction with a reduced amount of resources (Hellsten & Klefsjö 2000). The Total Quality Management (TQM) principles are adopted in the organization and incorporate into all their organizational process. Lean is used as a systematic approach to identifying and eliminating waste through continuous improvement, flowing the product at the pull of the customer in pursuit of perfection (NIST 2000). Quality improvement is in the top priority in Six Sigma, which is done by reducing defects (Hong & Goh, 2004). Along with other advantages this method is used on reducing lead times. Customer focused product development help the organization to be competitive and sustainable in the market. Robust design methodology help the company better understand its customer (Karl et al., 2011). ISO 9000 and ISO 14001 standards are used to ensure that the organization meets the needs for its customer’s and it’s other stakeholder. Benchmarking give the organizations the opportunity to improve over all organizational levels.
-1-
In the following, firstly, the theory of quality management values, tools and methodologies will be discussed. Subsequently, preview of Rolls Royse and its quality management practice will be presented. Finally, in analysis, the paper will give a link between the theory and the company practice to strengthen the understanding of the topic.
2. METHODOLOGY The information
related the theories and case study used in this report was collected
from books, scientific articles, the official website of Rolls-Royce, and the course literature “Quality from Customer Needs to Customer Satisfaction”. The scientific articles were found in the databases Emerald and Science Direct. The books, course literature, and scientific articles are used to build up the core theory of the models of QMS, while the empirical data gathered about Rolls-Royce from their website and other relevant case studies is used to analyse how the efforts dedicated for quality in Rolls-Royce relate to the tools and models of QMS.
3. BACKGROUND 3.1.
Rolls Royce Group PLC Charles Rolls and Steward Royce founded Rolls Royce in 1906. In the beginning, the
company focused on manufacturing cars, but it saw a new era, due to the design of the first jet engine in 1914. Rolls- Royce is a global company, headquartered in the city of Westminster London, United Kingdom. The company provides integrated power solutions for customers on land, at sea and in the air. Nowadays, Rolls Royce is considered to be as one of the market leader of jets engines manufacturer worldwide alongside with General Electric and Pratt and Whitney (Lazonick 2002). Rolls Royce has manufacturing facilities in 20 countries, and by 2013, RR employs over 40000 people in fifty different countries worldwide, where three quarters of the manufactured goods are sold outside England to customers in 150 countries (Jefferys 2011). RR is a highly profitable multinational, where in 2012 the company turnover attained over 60 billion GBP, with a record profit of 1, 317 billion GBP compared to 2011 net profit of 223 million GBP (RR AR 2012). The company is a major player in the aeronautic industry and it supplies more than 600 airlines, and also armies in five continents with both products and services. Rolls Royce has businesses in marine propulsion and energy sector and is the world’s third -largest maker of aircraft engine. It supports its customers through worldwide networks of offices, manufacturing
-2-
and service facilities. The company places the customer at the heart of the organization and always understands and shapes their requirements according to their need. The company is very responsive to its customers. Innovation and development of new technology help the company to offer more to its customers. The company has created high value to its customers by producing high performance products, delivering high value service, and investing in high-tech research and development. A global supply network has also added high value to its customers (Rolls Royce, 2013).
3.2.
Rolls-Royce practice of Lean, Six Sigma and Robust Design The company believes that it is not only the engineering excellence but also the
integrated standard of quality in all their activities and their promise to their customers that made their brand strong. Continuous improvement is the key to drive and build a sustainable business by the company’s quality team. Delivering on time and understand the customers expected standard is seen as a quality ingredient. The continuous improvement of management system, gathering information about customers, managing suppliers and invests in new technology help the company to better its qualit y in a regular basis. Lean manufacturing techniques and Rolls Royce Production System principles has used to design the new civil nuclear manufacturing facility to minimize lead- time (Rolls Royce, 2013). Six sigma principles are used to design the factory to get the benefit of utilizing world leading manufacturing process and technology (Rolls Royce, 2013). Rolls Royce has the capability to provide complete product life-cycle solutions from initial conceptual design through to full requirements, design, development, manufacture/ production, testing and provision of through life technical support of their product. The company has designed Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR) power plants the Royal Navy nuclear submarine and continue to provide technology and safety support. The company has the design capability to meet the standard of American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), British Standers and other Europeans cods for nuclear and non – nuclear applications (Rolls Royce, 2013). Rolls Royce use robust design to understand their customer need. Parameter and tolerance design are the basic part of robust design. The process also includes assessing the design robustness and selecting a nominal design. In first step the company collect manufacturing data and map onto the response model outputs. In step two it ensure the -3-
robustness of the whole range in the feasible area. And in the final step it select the nominal design to sit in the middle of the manufacturing variation range (Karl et al. 2011).
3.3.
Rolls-Royce and Benchmarking Rolls-Royce is highly considered around the globe for benchmarking. According to
BitC Index (Business in the Community Corporate Responsibility Index), which assesses how corporate strategy is integrated into business practice throughout an organization, Rolls-Royce scored 91% on Gold Status, and 94.8% in the Environmental Index in 2010. Furthermore, Rolls-Royce scored 79% on DJSI (Dow Jones Sustainability World and European Indexes) for the ninth consecutive year, and 100% for environmental reporting, operational eco-efficiency and product impact, and safety and occupational health. Moreover, and according to CDP’s FTSE 350 Carbon Disclosure Leadership Index, which assesses the professional approach to corporate governance in respect of climate change disclosure practices, Rolls-Royce scored 79% in 2010 (Rolls-Royce, 2010). On the other hand, the global inventory manager at Rolls-Royce, Rob Brown, mentioned that the company has much to benefit and learn from the experience of others. He also mentioned that the company pays high attention to avoid the big company syndrome, whereby nothing is good as long as it is not invented internally. Rolls-Royce highly stress on benchmarking to get their experts engaged with others’ experts in two-way communication and learning cycles (Measure for measure, 2012). Operationally, and for more effective technology management, Rolls-Royce conduct technology
benchmarking
altogether
with
technology
maturity
assessments
as
supplementary practices of technology identification that facilitates more robust decision making. Technology benchmarking in Rolls-Royce is a combination of benchmarking against competitors and internal benchmarking of technology alternatives within the organization. The technology owners in Rolls-Royce, who are also the capability acquisition engineers, are the main responsible for conducting and technology maturity assessments and benchmarking (Foden & Berends, 2010). Figure 1 shows how technology benchmarking is used in the technology management process in Rolls-Royce.
-4-
Figure 1: Timing integration for recommended technology management tool suites (source: (Foden & Berends, 2010))
3.4.
Rolls-Royce and Quality Management Systems
Quality Management Systems integrated in Rolls-Royce incorporate a robust suite of processes that cover local controls and all business operations. The process controls are conducted in the domain of internal operations and supply chain. For both quality and business management, the systems integrate robust controls that are applied to supply chain, business, service, and manufacturing and design activities across Rolls-Royce. The embracing world-class process-based system is tagged as the RRQMS (Rolls-Royce Quality Management System). Figure 2 shows the Business Process Model whereby RollsRoyce make sure the delivery of best practice across (Rolls-Royce, 2013). For supply chain and external relationships, supplier quality assurance is mainly supported with SABRe (Supplier Advanced Business Relationships) and the GSP (Global Supplier Portal). SABRe is a standard set of processes and requirements and framework whereby Rolls-Royce together with their suppliers are agreed on, while the GSP is to be accessed by suppliers and employees anytime, which enhance the automation and acceleration of the purchasing business functions.
-5-
Figure 2: The framework of the process structure across Rolls-Royce Group
There are several key functions whereby Roll-Royce develops the quality of suppliers including, supplier approval and maintenance, supplier development, supplier quality, and ME-P (Manufacturing Engineering Purchasing). In supplier approval and maintenance, the AVL (approved vendor list) is created and maintained by dedicating STEP (Supplier Total Evaluation Process), which involves lots of assessments that primarily measure the capability and performance of suppliers, and quality suppliers to supply materials according to ASME code requirements. For supplier development, the issues of the delivery performance into the supply chain are driven through root cause analysis by green or black belt accredited members. The required improvement actions are highlighted on the required areas of the supply chain. For supplier quality, the verification of deliverables in the supply chain is achieved by many activities including physical testing, process observing, and documentation reviewing. Finally, and to enhance the manufacturing capability of suppliers, Rolls-Royce assign a team of manufacturing engineers. They constantly support suppliers with advices and insights regarding process related issues. The Civil Nuclear business unit in Rolls-Royce is certified to ISO9001: 2008, ISO14001: 2004 and the TickIT guide Issue 5.5. The instrumentation and controls business of RollsRoyce is certified separately to ISO9001: 2000 and the TickIT guide Issue 5.5. RollsRoyce is accredited for MO N, NS, NPT, and ASME activities appropriate to the design, procurement, manufacture, inspection, test and certification of nuclear vessels and components (Rolls-Royce, 2013).
-6-
3.5.
Rolls-Royce and Process Improvement The process improvement methodology has experienced many milestones at Rolls-
Royce since after 2000. Figure 3 shows the path of continuous improvement methodologies that are titled by several tags.
Figure 3: Path of Continuous Improvement at Rolls-Royce in Recent History (source: (Hindle, 2013))
4. THEORY 4.1.
Quality There are two major quality dimensions: quality dimensions of goods, and quality
dimensions of services (Bergman & Klefsjö, 2010). Some of the quality concepts for goods include: Reliability, performance, maintainability, which shows the effectiveness of detecting problems. Environmental impact, appearance, flawlessness, safety, and durability are also other dimensions of a product quality concept. Nowadays, service quality is as important as the product quality, but there are prevalent differences between goods and services (Bergman & Klefsjö, 2010). Dimensions of service quality are sets of criteria used by customers for evaluating service quality and it´s consisted of ten dimensions. These dimensions include reliability, credibility, communication, access, responsiveness, courtesy, empathy and tangibles (Zeithaml et al. 1990).
4.2. Total Quality Management (TQM) The term Total quality management (TQM) has no standard definition, instead many uses different definitions, which have both similarities and differences. “TQM is a
-7-
continues process whereby top management takes whatever steps necessary to enable everyone in the organization in the course of performing all duties to establish and archive standards witch meet or exceed the needs and expectations of their costumers, both external and internal “Miller (1996). TQM is not a specific work method instead it is a group name for management systems that has as their main objective to achieve higher customer satisfaction. For Powell (1995) a TQM system should work with continues improvement, reducing reworks, work in groups and meet customer requirements.
4.3. Benchmarking and ISO Standards Camp (1989) has referred benchmarking as seeking superior performance by searching for best practice in any measurable dimension. There are four main types of benchmarking, including internal, competitor, functional and generic benchmarking. Internal benchmarking is used to compare the operations or processes within an organization, while competitor benchmarking is dedicated to operations or processes against competitors that lead this kind of industry. Functional benchmarking is adopted to go further in more detailed comparison of operations or processes against similar operations or processes that have the same functions in similar. For generic benchmarking, operations or processes are compared across non-related industries (ASQ, 2011). A QMS, or quality management system, is framework whereby organizational structure, resources and processes, procedures are designed and contextualized so that they goodly facilitate implementing quality management. Among many QMS regimes, ISO 9000 and 14000 families of standards are probably the most widely implemented worldwide (Pyzdek & Keller, 2003). The family of standards ISO 9000 is used for helping organizations to ensure that they meet the customers’ needs and other stakeholders’ needs (Poksinska et. al., 2002). ISO 9000 addresses the basics of quality management systems that include the eight management principles: Customer Focus, Leadership, Involvement of People, Process Approach, System Approach to Management, Continual Improvement, Factual Approach to Decision Making, and Mutually Beneficial Supplier Relationships (Beattie, 1999), while ISO 9001 is about the requirements that organizations interested in meeting the standard need to fulfil (ISO, 2012). Similarly ISO 14000 is as same as ISO 9000, except the fact the ISO 14000 family is essentially associated with the environment and how the negative effects of organizational operations are minimized. ISO 14001
-8-
frames a managerial context whereby an organization can initialize an effective environmental system of management (ISO, 2013). Process management is the set of planning and performance monitoring activities for a process, whether it is a business or manufacturing process. Continuous improvement is commonly indispensable effort comes together with processes in today’s business. Companies conduct continuous improvement to keep abreast of the overall global development, competitors’ performance levels, and take the lead in their industries. Improvements are built into process radically, by applying BPR’s (Business Process Reengineering) projects, or incrementally, by TQM’s (Total Quality Management) projects (Bergman & Klefsjö, 2003).
4.4. Lean Production Method/Philosophy Japanese companies first introduced lean production system in 1970. John Krafcik a MIT student worked as a quality engineer for Toyota has introduced lean as it is today in 1988. Lean is a production practice that meets the demand of the customer with perfect quality. Its focus is on reducing waste by minimizing non-value added activities. Continuous improvement (Kaizen in Japanese) is the key part of lean philosophy. The benefits of Lean are well documented. Melton (2005), mentioned that lean decreases lead times for customers, reduces inventories for manufacturers. It also improves knowledge managements and emphasis on robust process (as measured by less errors and less rework). This method helps companies to reduce the inventory levels by providing Just in Time JIT) product or service (Slack et al., 2010). This is a pull production or service system, which is made or serve when the order is made (Peter & Donnelly, 2002). The elimination of waste improves the quality by reducing cost and production time. There are eight waste that is stated under lean principle: defects, overproduction, Waiting, non value added processing, transportation, inventory, motion and unused employee creativity. (Bicheno & Holweg, 2009).
4.5. Six Sigma Method Six Sigma is a strategic initiative to reduce costs of poor quality and customer dissatisfaction. This method emphasize on quality improvement and variation reduction. This is a business management strategy and applied by hundreds of companies worldwide to classify and eliminate causes of defects and reducing variability in processes (Slack et
-9-
al., 2010). “Six Sigma is a business improvement approach that seeks to find and eliminate causes of mistakes or defects in business processes by focusing on process outputs that are of critical importance to customers” (Snee, 2004). Motorola introduced Six Sigma in the 1980’s. Robert Galvin (CEO at Motorola at that time) together with Bill Smith, Mikel Harry and Richard Schroeder created an improvement program, which is Six Sigma. This method is the most acceptable methods in quality improvement. Sigma (σ) is used to denote the spread value of one standers deviation. In order to reach Six Sigma quality companies are allowed to occur only 3.4 defects per million opportunities. Six Sigma qualities expect 99.99966% perfection. Six Sigma methodologies are realized as a never-ending process. The DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control) cycle is the most important part of this methodology (Slack et al., 2010).
Define: the cycle starts with defining the problem/ problems. It identifies the amount of work and change necessary to improvement.
Measure: in this step data is used to refine the problems. Measurements are made to know exactly what is happening.
Analyze: cause of the problem is analyzed in the third step. This step contributes to make it easier to make a successful improvement.
Improve: the improvement process starts, when the root cause is identified. Different solution is implemented to solve the problem.
Control: the new improvement is monitor, control and ensure in this stage. It is to ensure the made change are to stay. DMAIC is a cyclic process; there is no last part of the cycle. After the control step
the process seek new possibilities of improvement.
4.6. Robust Design and the Design Process Robust Design method is pioneered by Dr. Genichi Taguchi is also called Taguchi Method. This is the most powerful method available to reduce product cost, improve quality, and simultaneously reduce development interval (Phadke, 1995). Robust design works in four different stages, which are called as define (D), characterize (C), optimize (O) and verify (V). In define stage it is important to understand the customer and translate it into engineering language and select design concepts with variation in mind. Then the
- 10 -
design is generated to measure the Critical-to-Quality (CTQ’s) criteria for each level in this characterizes stage. It helps to understand and measure the source and effects of variation. In optimize stage a strategy is chosen and implemented to reduce the effects of variation for each CTQ. In construction and design verification plan the knowledge of variation and its effects is used (Sung, 1996). The figure shows the stages of robust design.
Figure 4: Robust Design and optimization (Source: Karl et al. 2011)
Robust design gives the opportunity to achieving better design by optimization and automation. A thorough design assessment is possible in simulation driven design at early stage in a development. It is possible to consideration the variation in the design process in robust design.
5. ANALYSIS The successful use of quality improvement should include providing customers with high value products or services that exceed their requirements. Increasing productivity by reducing wastes and costs, will improve the competitiveness and margins, the thing, which pleased shareholders. Most organizations financial performance depends on three key elements. The first element is strategy development including efficient business decisions, market performance, and finally internal performance (George &Weimerskirch 1998). To achieve the current success Rolls Royce depends on working closely with their suppliers and partners providing them with experiences training and development
- 11 -
programmes in order to develop their productivity, also to create a strong supply chain as the market will continue to grow. Permanent communication with customers talking to them, listening to them, and understandings their needs is also one of the key factors of the Rolls Royce success (Zeithaml et al. 1990). Sustainability continues to make RR a better company by reducing waste, lowering costs, driving innovation, increasing productivity which helped them to fulfill both their short and long term target goals. (George & Weimerskirch 1998; Powell 1995). According to Camp (1989), benchmarking seeking superior performance by searching for best practice in any measurable dimension. Rolls-Royce conduct numerous assessments and measures for their almost all processes and practices (Foden & Berends, 2010). There are four main types of benchmarking, including internal, competitor, functional and generic benchmarking (ASQ, 2011). Similarly, the main purpose of assessments and measures conducted in Rolls-Royce is to control the quality of outcomes and to compare the performance of their processes within the company, with competitors, with others’ similar processes, and across organizations. In other words, the four types of benchmarking is practiced in Rolls-Royce. That is clearly found in the high attention RollsRoyce give in terms of global indices for environment, efficiencies and other indicators. Furthermore, their scores are consecutively improved over period, which reflects how significant tools benchmarking is for Rolls-Royce (Rolls-Royce, 2010). Additionally, and according to Rob Brown, Rolls-Royce do not save any effort to learn from others, referring to thier emphasis on avoiding big companies syndrome of nothing is good as long as not invented in-house (Measure for measure, 2012). QMS is framework whereby organizational structure, resources and processes, procedures are designed and contextualized so that they goodly facilitate implementing quality management (Pyzdek & Keller, 2003). Similarly, Rolls-Royce dedicate RRQMS as embracing world-class process-based framework system whereby the overall activities in the company are monitored and managed. Moreover, Rolls-Royce support their supply chain quality through SABRe and GSP as standards and quality assurance practices and facilitators. Moreover, Rolls-Royce is certified to different versions of ISO9001, ISO14001 and TickIT for difference processes and practices (Rolls-Royce, 2013). Rolls-Royce adopted many of process improvement methodologies have been either developed by internally such as Rolls-Royce Production System and Process Excellence,
- 12 -
or combined with other approaches such as Process Basics, Process Flow and Process Capabilities. The historical review of process improvement integrated in Rolls-Royce shows their tendency to incremental continuous improvements (Hindle, 2013). This is the most common form of how companies rely on to evolve and flourish nowadays. BPR is however implemented in forms of projects to push the business process so that to keep abreast of competitors (Bergman & Klefsjö, 2003). Lean production is seen as a multi-dimensional approach that encompasses a wide variety of management practices. It includes Just-in Time (JIT), quality system, work teams, cellular manufacturing and supplier management, etc. as an integrated system (Shah & Ward, 2003). Rolls Royce used this method in civil nuclear manufacturing facility to get all the benefits of lean production specially for minimizing lead-time (Rolls-Royce, 2013). Lean minimizes the lead-time for the customer. (Melton, 2005) Six Sigma approach is aimed to reduce cost of poor quality and customer dissatisfaction. Six Sigma is defined as a business strategy used to improve business profitability, to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of all operations to meet or to exceed customer’s needs and expectations (Antony & Banuelas, 2001). By adopting this method many companies have had great impact on cost structure and reached the maximum potential of the approach in last decade. Adaptation of Six Sigma leads the company to have a continuous product improvement. Rolls Royce put its customer at the heart of its organization and always tries to improve its product to meet their customer needs. The company used Six Sigma principle in their factory design to get all the benefit from this method. Robust Design method is central to improve quality and continuous engineering productivity (Karl et al., 2011). This method has helped reduce the development time and cost. Robust Design generates new design information for improving product quality/ reliability, performance, and cost (Pahadke, 1995). Adaptation of Robust Design helped Rolls Royce to improve its product quality and continuous productivity. It also helps the company to be competitive in the market it serves. Lean’s cost effective process, and investing modernizing the IT systems within the company, these measures helped the company to keep their prices reasonable compared to other strong competitors operating in the market. For user based approach Rolls Royce offers a variety of products that could satisfy the customer needs. As an example Dynamic
- 13 -
positioning solutions, giving users a new experience of easy to use graphical interface and cost effective operations. Meanwhile, manufacturing approach relates to product conformance to specification, in that matter Rolls Royce works in close partnership with their suppliers in order to meet or even exceed their quality requirement applies to technology solutions as well as services.
6. DISCUSSION TQM can be used as a tool for an organization to achieve higher quality throughout the whole organization. In order to achieve the best quality results, it is important for organizations to invest on resources that make it different. Communication with customers and continuous improvement are also important strategies for the efforts to provide high quality value added technological and services solutions. The competition of today’s business became more complicated than ever. Meeting standards such as ISO 9000 and ISO 14000 series is not necessarily a guarantee for larger market share. There is more to do beyond efficiency and benchmarking is more likel y to be the guidance to where to improve and how to improve it. Learning from others might be the best strategy to accelerate shifting to excellence over all organizational levels. Prioritizing the decision of process improvement is mainly dependent on the state of technological advisement and the amount of change needed. Recognizing unspoken customers’ needs together with meeting the spoken once efficiently is the key success to win larger market share and lead your industry. The main trust of lean production it that it can work collectively to create a smooth high quality system. The system that can produce finished products when the customer demands for it with little or no waste. So, Lean is serving the customer according to their need and also giving opportunity to the company of lowering cost by eliminating waste. The company adopts Six Sigma methods to lower cost, to minimize defects and to reduce customer dissatisfaction. To meet the continuous improvement demand for product and quality from the customer’s need always keeps the company in a competitive position. Robust Design help the organization to reduce the development time and cost. This method creates new design information to improve product quality.
- 14 -
7. CONCLUSION The values, tools and methodologies of quality have discussed in the theory part. It is now clearer how the stated theories work in real life by focusing on the Rolls Royce management practice. The company uses the mentioned tools, values and methodologies, which is to provide a quality product according to their customer needs. Rolls Royce is working with quality and quality management from a sustainable perspective, and they are continuously trying to improve their products, services quality, and also their processes with sustainability in mind. Many of their achieved goals can be connected with the large network and the close collaboration with the suppliers. Rolls Royce has also invested in energy saving technologies and managed to come up with revolutionary solutions especially in the aviation industry, the thing that is an indication of their quality efforts. These innovations and creative ideas have contributed to the market leading position in retail industry, and thereby created a competitive advantage thanks to its quality products and services that fulfil customers needs before and after sales. Rolls-Royce pays high attention to all kinds of benchmarking to keep their overall performance in the lead. They set their quality management system that is known as RRQMS to embrace in one framework all specific sets of standards such as SABRe and GSP for supply chain management, and ASME for manufacturing operations and processes. Additionally, RollsRoyce also focus on ISO certification including ISO 9001 and ISO 14001. The main theme of process improvement in Rolls-Royce is continuous improvement, whereby changes are added incrementally. The use of Lean along with Six Sigma has opened many opportunities to best serve their customer. Robust design method helped the company improve product quality and continuous productivity.
- 15 -
8. REFERENCES Antony, J. & Banuelas, R. (2001). A strategy for Survival. Manufacturing Engineer. 80 (3), 119-121. ASQ (2011). Benchmarking
-
Quality
Management | ASQ.
[online]
Available:
http://asq.org/service/body-of-knowledge/tools-benchmarking [2013-05-25]. Bicheno, John; Holweg, Matthias (2009). The Lean Toolbox. PICSIE. Bergman, B. and Klefsjö, B. (2010). Quality from Customer Needs to Customer Satisfaction. 3rd edition. Lund: University Press. Beattie, K. R. (1999). "Implementing ISO 9000: A study of its benefits among Australian organizations". Total Quality Management. Camp, R. (1989). Benchmarking . Milwaukee, Wis.: Quality Press Foden, J. and Berends, H. (2010). 'TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT AT ROLLSROYCE', Research Technology Management. Hindle, B. (2013). Developing Lean Capabilities at Rolls-Royce. [online] Available: http://www.leanuk.org/downloads/LS_2012/day2_hindle.pdf [2013-05-26]. ISO
(2012) ISO
9000
quality
management-ISO.[online]Available:
http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_9000 [2013-05-25]. ISO (2013). ISO 14000 - Environmental management - ISO. [online] Available: http://www.iso.org/iso/iso14000 [2013-05-23]. Klefsjö, B., Wiklund, H., & Edgeman, R. L. (2001). Six Sigma Seen as a Methodology for Total Quality Management. Measuring Business Excellence, 5(1), 31-35. George, S. & Weimerskirch, A. ( 1998).” Total Quality Management”, John Wiley & Sons, Inc, USA Jefferys, S. (2011).” Offloading, outsourcing, sub-contracting and social dialogue at the high end of UK manufacturing: a case study of rising order books and restructuring under pressure at Rolls Royce, Sunderland”. London Metropolitan University. Karl, A., Farris B., Brown L., & Metzger N. (2011) “Robust design and optimization: Key methods and applications” Rolls-Royce plc. - 16 -
Lazonick, W. (2002). “ Sustaining the Innovation Process: The Case of Rolls- Royce plc”. The European Institute of Business Administration. University of Massachusetts Lowell Melton, T. (2005). The benefits of lean manufacturing: What Lean Thinking has to offer the Process Industries. Institution of Chemical Engineers. Miller, W. J. (1996). “ A Working Definition for total quality management (TQM) researchers”. Journal of Quality Management , 1(2), pp.149-159. NIST (2000). Principles of lean manufacturing with live simulation. Gaithersburg, Manufacturing Extension Partnership, National Institute of Standards and Technology. Pahadke, S. M. , 1995. Quality Engineering Using Robust Design, Printice Hall, NJ, USA. Powell, T. C. (1995). “Total Quality Management as competitive advantage: A review and empirical study”. Strategic Management Journal , 16(1), pp.15-37 Paul P. J. & Donnelly, H. J. (2002). A Preface to Marketing Management. McGraw-Hill Professional. p.132. Poksinska, B., Dahlgaard, J. J., and Antoni, M. (2002). "The state of ISO 9000 certification: A study of Swedish organizations". The TQM Magazine. Pyzdek, T. and Keller, P. (2003). Quality engineering handbook . New York: Marcel Dekker. Sung H. P. (1996) . Quality control; Experimental design; Taguchi methods (Quality control); Robust statistics; Statistical methods. Chapman & Hall (London and New York). Slack, N., Chambers, S., & Johnston, R. (2010). Operations management . England; Pearson Education limited. Shah, R., & Ward, T. P. (2003). Lean manufacturing: context, practice bundles, and performance. Journal of Operations Management , 21(2), 129 – 149. Rolls Royce (2013). [online] Available: http://www.rolls-royce.com [2013-05-23]. Rolls-Royce (2010). Rolls-Royce annual report 2010 - Sustainability. [online] Available at: http://www.rolls-royce.com/reports/2010/businessreview/sustainability. Html [2013-0525].
- 17 -
Rolls-Royce (2013). Mechanical systems and component engineering services - Rolls Royce.
[online]
Available:
http://www.rolls-
royce.com/energy/nuclear/services/mech_systems_component_engineering.jsp. [2013-0525]. Womack, J.P., Jones, D.T. & Roos, D. (1990). The Machine that Changed the World: The Story of Lean Production. Harper Collins Publishers, New York, USA. Zeithaml, V.A., Parasuraman, A., and Berry, L.L. “ Delivering quality service – balancing customer perceptions and expectations”. New York: The Free Press, 1990
- 18 -
