Scenario:
You are a project manager of two projects for a facial care product development firm, ZJZ Cosmetics. ZJZ Cosmetics creates products for other firms to brand and market; they do not sell the products they create to the final customer, only business-to-business. You are in the research and development department and your research specialty is on improving the manufacturing process by investigating new product components. One of the projects you are managing is a "pure" research project. You are looking at five different compounds trying to determine which will be the most reliable and cost-effective base for a new make-up base.
Your other project is for one of your new clients, a pharmaceuticals firm. Your client will be using one of your existing products as the base for some medications that will be used to treat skin problems. This is an existing product for your client and one of the major revenue generators. The client moved to you as a supplier because of quality control problems with one of the former suppliers. The former supplier would deliver wrong product, expired product, product close to expiration, mislabeled product. It got to the point with the former supplier that the returns and waste were greater than the volume of proper, usable product.
You have been identified as the project manager for the project to implement quality control processes that will be used for the manufacture, monitoring, and distribution of this product. You are not sure if the research processes are considered part of the scope. Your new client will be auditing your quality processes and controls in 4 months, so everything must be ready by then.
This is a significant project for your company. This new client is the largest client for ZJZ Cosmetics, and if successful, this provides an entrance into a whole new market. Quality has always been addressed for existing products, but never at the level of rigor and discipline required for a pharmaceutical product regulated by multiple governments. Historically, ZJZ has been a flat organization, and all the department managers have been responsible for quality; there has been no quality department. It is not clear if a quality department will be created or not; that is part of the project's scope. This quality initiative dubbed Growth Through Quality (with the tagline of Excellent Product + Quality Processes = Future Growth) has been communicated to the entire company by the CEO. You know you have senior management's support.
You just met with your boss, Sharon, the vice president of research and development. Sharon emphasized that your project will be responsibility for
- Defining the goals and scope of the quality initiative.
- Defining organizational structure, roles, and responsibilities relative to quality controls.
- Developing the quality policies, processes, procedures, and the associated controls.
- Communicating, training, and implementing the new procedures.
- Defining and implementing the quality measurement program.
Question 1:
You just met with Sharon to discuss the next communication about the "Growth through Quality" initiative that is going out to the new company. You have just learned that there will be several phases to the initiative based on requirements from the new customer. The initiative should first focus on the contributors to product quality in the labeling, storage, and shipping businessprocesses. Apparently, the prior supplier had constant problems with product being shipped that was too old. Future phases will focus on the manufacturing and research business processes and other processes that contribute to product quality. She asked you to prepare the first draft of the e-mail that will be sent out by the CEO. It should cover the following:
- concept/definition of quality
- importance of quality to ZJZ Cosmetics
- objectives of the quality initiative
- overview of the quality program that will be implemented
- scope of business processes that will be included in the quality program
- definition of the quality standards that will be expected by the customer
- overview of the quality controls that will be implemented
Question 2:
You have a meeting with the customer next week to gain a better understanding of his definition of quality and the things he considers important. Using the information, you will then be able to work with your team to begin defining the quality controls. In preparation for the meeting, create a meeting pre-work document for the customer. In it, describe the purpose of the meeting, the length of the meeting, the agenda, and the questions that the customer should be prepared to discuss during the meeting.