Some further studies on improving QFD methodology and analysis

Abstract

Quality Function Deployment (QFD) starts and ends with the customer. In other words, how it ends may depend largely on how it starts. Any QFD practitioners will start with collecting the voice of the customer that reflects customer¿s needs as to make sure that the products will eventually sell or the service may satisfy the customer. On the basis of those needs, a product or service creation process is initiated. It always takes a certain period of time for the product or service to be ready for the customer. The question here is whether those customer-needs may remain exactly the same during the product or service creation process. The answer would be very likely to be a `no¿, especially in today¿s rapidly changing environment due to increased competition and globalization.

The focus of this thesis is placed on dealing with the change of relative importance of the customer¿s needs during product or service creation process. In other words, the assumption is that there is no new need discovered along the time or an old one becomes outdated; only the relative importance change of the existing needs is dealt with. Considering the latest development of QFD research, especially the increasingly extensive use of Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) in QFD, this thesis aims to enhance the current QFD methodology and analysis, with respect to the change during product or service creation process, as to continually meet or exceed the needs of the customer.

The entire research works are divided into three main parts, namely, the further use of AHP in QFD, the incorporation of AHP-based priorities¿ dynamics in QFD, and decision making analysis with respect to the dynamics. In brief, the main contribution of this thesis is in providing some novel methods and/or approaches to enhance the QFD¿s use with respect to the change during product or service creation process. It is hoped that the research work may provide a first step into a better customer-driven product or service design process, and eventually increase the possibility to create more innovative and competitive products or services over time.