CustReq

Meeting Customer Requirements >---> CustReq

James A. Ward September 17, 2000

Total quality management is a commitment to the continuous improvement of work processes with the goal of satisfying internal and external customers. It's the customer that matters in TQM; the process is only the means to satisfying the customer.

What about Zero Defects? Has anybody ever succeeded? Twice? In a row? That is very hard and I have never heard of it. This makes me worry that people are signing on to a dream that has no hope of fulfillment and will lead to situations where everybody is fooling themselves and each other. If you acknowledge no tradeoffs, then tradeoffs will be chosen for their hidability instead of their contribution.

To include the requirements of all the users is virtually impossible by definition, isn't it? Wasn't it an airplane designer who told his clients that they could have everything they demanded as long as they didn't need for the airplane to fly. -- Dick Karpinski

Quality is a continuous process, and zero defects is the only acceptable goal. Quality is achieved by continuously improving processes and measuring defects against the standard. If tradeoffs are made regarding quality, and the usual one is quality vs. schedule (ship date), then quality is being approached from the wrong perspective. You cannot achieve quality through cycles of testing and rework. Only by standardizing and continuously improving processes can sustainable quality improvement be achieved. Done in this manner there are no tradeoffs. It is not a dream with no hope of fulfillment but measureable improvement toward a goal. Yes, it has been achieved, where software development organizations have been able to measure defects as MTTF in years.

The point the article is trying to make about inclusion is that requirements will be better and more complete if all customers are included in the requirements definition process. If you don�t identify requirements, it will be impossible to include them. The design decisions about what to include in any product always involve tradeoffs. The objective is to include those features that the customers care about while delivering a usable product within an acceptable time frame and a given budget. Tom Gilb explains this well in "Principles Of Software Engineering Management." James Ward

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Updated: Tuesday, January 16, 2001