Quality

There are several definitions of quality, or quality dimensions. One of the most respected collections of quality dimensions was compiled by David Garvin 1 of the Harvard Business School. Garvin found that most definitions of quality were eithertranscendent, product-based, user-based, manufacturing-based, or value-based. What does each of these terms mean?

1Garvin, D., “What Does ‘Product Quality’ Really Mean?” Sloan Management Review (Fall 1984):25–43.

Transcendent: Quality is something that is intuitively understood but nearly impossible to communicate, such as beauty or love.

Product-based: Quality is found in the components and attributes of a product.

User-based: If the customer is satisfied, the product has good quality.

Manufacturing-based: If the product conforms to design specifications, it has good quality.

Value-based: If the product is perceived as providing good value for the price, it has good quality.

Using these five definitions of quality, Garvin developed a list of eight quality dimensions (see Table 1-1). These dimensions describe product quality specifically in the following paragraphs.

Performance refers to the efficiency with which a product achieves its intended purpose. This might be the return on a mutual fund investment, the fuel efficiency of an automobile, or the acoustic range of a pair of stereo speakers. Generally, better performance is synonymous with better quality.

Features are attributes of a product that supplement the product’s basic performance. These include many of the “bells and whistles” contained in products. A visit to any television or computer retail store will reveal that features, such as surround sound, HDTV capability, plasma, and size, are powerful marketing tools for which customers will pay a premium. A full-line television retail store may carry televisions priced from $200 to $12,000. This range represents a 6,000% price premium for additional features!

Reliability refers to the propensity for a product to perform consistently over its useful design life. A subfield in quality management has emerged, called reliability management, based on the application of probability theory to quality. A product is considered reliable if the chance that it will fail during its designed life is very low. If a refrigerator has a 2% chance of failure in a useful life of 10 years, we say that it is 98% reliable.

Conformance is perhaps the most traditional definition of quality. When a product is designed, certain numeric dimensions for the product’s performance will be established, such as capacity, speed, size, durability, or the like. These numeric product dimensions are referred to as specifications. The number of ounces of pulp allowed in a half-gallon container of “pulp-free” orange juice is one example. Specifications typically are allowed to vary a small amount called a tolerance. If a particular dimension of a product is within the allowable range of tolerance of the specification, it conforms.

The advantage of the conformance definition of quality for products is that it is easily quantified. However, it is often difficult for a service to conform to numeric specifications. For example, imagine trying to measure the quality of a counselor’s work versus that of a carmaker. Because counseling is intangible, it is almost impossible to measure.

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Durability is the degree to which a product tolerates stress or trauma without failing. An example of a product that is not very durable is a light bulb. Light bulbs are damaged easily and cannot be repaired. In contrast, a trash can is a very durable product that can be subjected to much wear and tear.

Serviceability is the ease of repair for a product. A product is very serviceable if it can be repaired easily and cheaply. Many products require service by a technician, such as the technician who repairs your personal computer. If this service is rapid, courteous, easy to acquire, and competent, then the product generally is considered to have good serviceability. Note that different dimensions of quality are not mutually exclusive.

Aesthetics are subjective sensory characteristics such as taste, feel, sound, look, and smell. Although vinyl interiors in automobiles require less maintenance, are less expensive, and are more durable, leather interiors generally are considered more aesthetically pleasing. In terms of aesthetics, we measure quality as the degree to which product attributes are matched to consumer preferences.

Perceived quality is based on customer opinion. As we said in the beginning of this chapter, quality is as the customer perceives it. Customers imbue products and services with their understanding of their goodness. This is perceived quality. We can witness an example of the effect of perceived quality every year in college football polls that rank teams. In many cases, the rankings are based on past records, team recognition, tradition of the university, and other factors that are generally poor indicators of team quality on a given Saturday. In the same way that these factors affect sportswriters’ perceptions, factors such as brand image, brand recognition, amount of advertising, and word of mouth can affect consumers’ perceptions of quality.

The Garvin list of quality dimensions, although it is the most widely cited and used, is not exhaustive. Other authors have proposed lists of additional quality measures, such as safety. Carol King 2 identified dimensions of service quality such asresponsiveness, competence, access, courtesy, communication, credibility, security, and understanding. Allowed time, you probably could think of additional dimensions as well.

2King, C., “A Framework for a Service Quality Assurance System,” Quality Progress 20, 9 (1987):27–32.

Service quality is even more difficult to define than product quality. Although services and production share many attributes, services have more diverse quality attributes than products. This often results from wide variation created by high customer involvement. For example, the consumer of a fountain pen probably will not care that the factory worker producing the pen was in a foul mood (as long as the quality of the pen is good). However, excellent food served in a restaurant generally will not suffice if the server is in a foul mood. In addition, a consumer probably will not consider a pen poor quality if he or she is in a bad mood when using the pen. However, food and service in a restaurant could be excellent and still be perceived poorly if the patron is feeling badly.

Parasuraman, Zeithamel, and Berry, three marketing professors from Texas A&M University, published a widely recognized set of service quality dimensions. These dimensions have been used in many service firms to measure quality performance. The Parasuraman, Zeithamel, and Berry dimensions are defined here (see Table 1-2).

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Tangibles include the physical appearance of the service facility, the equipment, the personnel, and the communication materials. For example, a hotel with yellowed linens will be rated low for quality. Hair salons catering to an elite clientele might invest in ambient lighting and employ only well-dressed hairstylists. That the hairstylist is dressed well does not affect the service being provided; however, clients believe that their hair will be better styled by someone who is dressed stylishly.

Service reliability differs from product reliability in that it relates to the ability of the service provider to perform the promised service dependably and accurately. For example, a firm might hire a consultant based on reputation alone. If the consultant delivers what the customer wants, then the customer will be satisfied and pay the consultancy fee. If the consultant delivers something other than what the customer expects, the customer will not pay the consultancy fee.

Responsiveness is the willingness of the service provider to be helpful and prompt in providing service. When you last called your bank for service, how long did it take for a response? Were your problems taken care of quickly, or did you have to pay for a toll call while you listened to “elevator music” for an hour? Does your service provider always respond to you within three rings of the phone—without forwarding your call to another location?

Assurance refers to the knowledge and courtesy of employees and their ability to inspire trust and confidence. If you needed heart surgery, you probably would not opt for a doctor who appeared forgetful and disorganized during an office consultation. Rather, you would want assurance that the doctor is competent.

Finally, consumers of services desire empathy from the service provider. In other words, the customer desires caring, individualized attention from the service firm. A maxim in the restaurant industry is that “if you are in it for the money, you probably won’t survive.” A restaurant where the employees are constantly focused on efficiency will not give the customers the feeling that their needs are important. Therefore, no empathy will be shared, and restaurant employees will not adequately provide service that will make customers want to return again and again.

Just as there are many quality dimensions relating to production, there are several other dimensions of service quality, such asavailability, professionalism, timeliness, completeness, and pleasantness. It should be noted that service design strives to address these different service dimensions simultaneously. It is not sufficient for a services firm to provide only empathy if responsiveness and service reliability are inadequate.

One problem with having multiple dimensions of quality is communication. It is difficult to devise a coherent strategic plan relating to quality when communication is imprecise. One important attribute of a strategic plan is functional alignment or consistency. If different departments in a company understand quality differently, then the strategic plan will not be in alignment. Understanding that different definitions and dimensions of quality exist allows measures to be taken to provide a good basis for communication and planning. By sharing a common definition of quality, each department within a company can work toward a common goal. In addition, understanding the multiple dimensions of quality desired by consumers can lead to improved product and service design. Hewlett-Packard Corporation, a producer of laser printers for computers, understands this concept very well. Early in their quality journey, Hewlett-Packard developed products that consistently conformed to specifications. This involved years of product design, process control, and process improvement. Once the printers conformed to specifications, the company emphasized reliability. After the printers were found to be reliable, the company was able to improve the aesthetics of their printers. After years of working on these different quality dimensions, Hewlett-Packard embarked on a “customer one-on-one” program that emphasized customer interaction with production workers. In this program, Hewlett-Packard production workers take time to call customers on the phone to assess and improve the “relationship” that the customer has with a printer.

One of the important determinants of how we perceive quality is the functional role we fulfill organizationally. Just as artists and scientists process information differently, so do employees who perform different functions in an organization.

For example, information systems analysts often find it difficult to communicate with information systems users and internal managers for several reasons. Why? A primary reason is that the basic nature of the two jobs is different. Users might deal with the consumer of the product or service as the final customer. Analysts almost never interact with the external customer. To the analyst, the user is the customer. Training received by analysts and users is very different. Analysts usually have a computer science background that stressed logic, systems languages, and hardware architectures. Management training more often stresses decision making, human resource management, and strategic planning. Analysts are more detail oriented. Users often are more focused on “big picture issues” such as productivity improvement and cost containment. User system requirements differ from analyst system requirements. For example, users often are concerned with work flows and quality, whereas analysts are concerned with the efficiency and function of the machine. This difference in the nature of the work performed by users and analysts causes them to see quality issues differently. To an analyst, machine performance may be an important definition of quality. However, to the user, the manner in which the system improves responsiveness to customer inquiries may be more important.

Differences between users and analysts are only one instance of different perspectives created by functional differences. Accountants are interested in information for accounting and tax purposes; operations people want information for process control and scheduling; finance people need information to manage cash; and marketing needs information to see if sales quotas are being met.

The organic view of the organization sees the whole as the sum of different parts uniting to achieve an end. The heart and the liver do not perform the same function in a body, but they each perform processes that are necessary for survival of the whole. Just as the body is subject to breakdown when different parts do not perform properly, so are organizations. Unfortunately, firms do not have the magnificent communication network (i.e., the central nervous system) to coordinate activities that human bodies have. For this reason, firms must constantly improve their communication. Recognizing fundamental differences between how different functions view quality is an important first step in understanding and resolving problems associated with mismatches of quality perceptions within organizations.

As organizational processes become more cross-functional, many of these communications issues will find resolution. However, experience with cross-functional teams has been difficult for many firms because of poor communication skills among team members. Therefore, it is expected that cognitive differences between different functions will continue to be a major problem that firms must overcome.

This section of the chapter views quality management from the perspectives of several different functions. Many of the topics discussed in this chapter are presented in concept only. More in-depth discussions of these topics appear in later chapters. This chapter is designed to lay out the field of quality management from an interdisciplinary, integrative perspective. The functions that are discussed here include supply chain management, engineering, operations, strategic management, marketing, finance/accounting, human resources, and management information systems.

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