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What is Quality Assurance?
Quality assurance (QA) is a process-centered approach to ensuring that a company or organization is providing the best possible products or services. It is related to quality control, which focuses on the end result, such as testing a sample of items from a batch after production. Although these terms are sometimes used interchangeably, quality assurance focuses on enhancing and improving the process that is used to create the end result, rather than focusing on the result itself. Among the parts of the process that are considered in QA are planning, design, development, production and service.
The Shewhart Cycle
There are many QA tools that organizations can use and that will help guide them through the steps that are needed to ensure that their processes are as efficient and productive as possible. One of the most popular tools is called the Shewhart cycle, which was developed by Dr. W. Edwards Deming, a 20th-century American management consultant who named the tool after his associate, Walter A. Shewhart. This cycle for quality assurance consists of four steps: Plan, Do, Check and Act (PDCA). At the end of Shewhart cycle, which also is called the Deming cycle or PDCA cycle, the steps are repeated to ensure that the process is being evaluated and improved on a constant basis.
Four Steps
During the first step of the PDCA cycle, Plan, the organization should establish its objectives and determine the processes or changes in the processes that are required to deliver the desired results. The second step, Do, is when the processes or changes are developed and tested. In the third step, Check, the processes or changes are monitored and evaluated to determine whether the results are meeting the predetermined objectives. The final step, Act, is when actions that are necessary to achieve the desired improvements are fully implemented into the process. The cycle can then be repeated, beginning with new objectives being planned.
Excellence in Every Component
The Shewhart cycle can be an effective method for achieving quality assurance because it analyzes the existing conditions and methods that are used to provide the product or service to customers. The goal is to ensure that excellence is inherent in every component of the process. Quality assurance also helps determine whether the steps that are used to provide the product or service are appropriate for the time and conditions. In addition, if the cycle is repeated throughout the lifetime of the product or service, it helps improve the company's efficiency by ensuring that the process is always being refined and improved.
Attention to Detail
Quality assurance demands a degree of detail in order to be fully implemented at every step. Planning, for example, could include determining specific levels of quality or measurable results that the organization wants to achieve. Checking could involve testing and other objective measurements to determine whether the goals were met, rather than mere subjective evaluation of quality. Acting could mean a total revision in the manufacturing process to correct a technical or cosmetic flaw or very small changes to improve efficiency or accuracy.
Competition to provide specialized products and services often results in breakthroughs as well as long-term growth and change. Quality assurance verifies that any customer offering, regardless whether it is new or evolved, is produced and offered with the best possible materials, in the most comprehensive way and with the highest standards. The goal to exceed customer expectations in a measurable and accountable process is provided by quality assurance.
Discussion Comments
Which software is best for QA?
Quality Assurance is a continuous process for every service related organization. Software related services especially, require a smooth quality assurance process for the betterment of the software service.
Is quality control considered within the SheWhart cycle?
It is indeed very informative. There is so much knowledge on Quality Assurance, which is a significant part of every production related industry.
QA is important, but usually I hear that it's not a bug, it’s a feature.
QA is the lifeline of every organization.
I am a student taking mls and presenting a seminar on quality control and QA in clinical laboratory.
Qa has amazed me in the company i started working for. they did not have a quality assessor and that has helped them so much. the company has growth and customers are smiling every day with our service delivered.
This is a beautiful piece of information with a long lasting positive and professional impact on QA/QC career.
I want to know more about quality assurance in the manufacturing industry.
i need detail information about QA because i want join it after my B.pharm.
Did a great deal for me as regards my assignments. Thanks a million.
The topic described above is pretty relevant according to the industry, organization.
Its all about customer satisfaction.
it is absolutely helpful and significant in any field. this information is very effective for me to ultimately attain my goal.
Thanks so much for a brief but effective way of defining QA. I am applying for a QA position and I didn't have a good grasp of it until i found this great paragraph.
Quality is method of product testing, i.e., aesthetic, visual, measurement, noise fully analyzed for that product. We can say something bad or good for each and everything.
excellent and to the point.
quality assurance involves manufacturing testing and records of product. pooja s.
good and informative. more matter required to understand better.
Thanks, this was very helpful to me.
i find this post article very informative. Now i can explore my knowledge and be fearless to face the challenge what is QA all about. I'm confident to accept the QA position in my next job. -dabu357
This is an excellent page. Really helped me understand a few things very clearly.
without top management support there is no improvement.
Really great work and explanation.
Thanks. Awesome work!
do you know what is the meaning of 3s development team in sqa?
quality assurance includes sdca also -- is that correct?
now I can differentiate between QC and QA.
I believe that quality assurance is key in ensuring your customers are happy and it provides long term relationships. I like the above article and I have benefited from it and other websites that incorporate quality assurance.
Thanks, helpful article, but next time mention quality standards such as ISO 9000 as it is a part of quality assurance. These standards will also satisfy (meet) or exceed customers prospect and expectations.
The article is about QA that is based on standards, whereas in the article your illustrations talk about PDSA that is part of the Model for Improvement, Quality Improvement -- an entirely different methodology.
great help, thanks very much .. :)
Thank you. very helpful to me.
Good QA requires good social skills, communication skills, and unilateral thinking and acting on the QA person's part; it also requires a company willing to embrace people with such an approach. Good QA requires gathering and implementing semantics from the customer, not just heartless specifications. This requires a company that employs or is willing to support an iterative R&D process. Unless your company is "just pretending" and really doesn't care that much (although it may think it does with respect to its bottom line) about customers, it will allow its QA personnel a wide range. Good QA requires the understanding that American consumers generally have low-standard expectations and QA needs to speak to something somewhat alien in our society in order to approach the aura of quality. If you believe in quality and have high standards, diligently question employers who claim to have a "quality assurance" department! Find the right one - it's worth it!
This is just what i need to have for an interview.
This article provides basic information about quality assurance very clearly and in lucid language.
This is a good overall intro to QA and a useful starting point. The challenge is to apply it in the relevant field and to make all participants to the process aware of the QA requirements involved. - VoxAppeal
I found this article very good and useful for my report on "Quality Assurance" thanks --Andreas
i like the whole article.it is a pretty good article and effective for learning.i m looking for the job of QC/QA this will help me a lot. Thanking you.
thanks..useful for my research, easy to understand! --yeye ;)
great information, it helped me a lot
I'm very excited to gather this information. I'm trying to be a quality assurance manager myself.
I find the article very informative, easy to read and understand.
Quality assurance hits pretty much every industry, company, organization from academic settings, to companies that manufacture or sell goods, to service companies including health care providers.
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