Page 136 - Design for Six Sigma for Service (Six SIGMA Operational Methods)

Quality Function Deployment 111

activities (e.g., surveys) are used to rate the Whats of the various
designs in a particular segment of the market.
2. Technical competitive assessment: Found at the bottom of the rela-
tionships matrix. It rates Hows for the same competitor from a
technical perspective.

The assessments should align; a conflict between them indicates a failure by
the team to understand the VOC. In case of a conflict, the team needs to
revisit the Hows array and check its understanding of the array. The team
should contrast that understanding with VOC data. Further research may be
needed. The team may then add new Hows that reflect customer perceptions.
Any unexpected items that violate conventional wisdom should be noted for
future reference. Situations like this can only be resolved by having the DFSS
team involved in the QFD, instead of having only marketing people
comparing competitive designs. In this way, the team that is responsible for
designing for customer attributes will interpret exactly what those wants are.

6.5 Kano Model of Quality
In QFD, voice of the customer activities such as market research, provide
the array of Whats that represent customer attributes. Such Whats are
“spoken” by the customer and are called performance quality or one-
dimensional. However, more Whats have to be addressed than just those
directly spoken by the customer. As Fig. 6.5 shows, there are also unspoken
Whats. Unspoken Whats are the basic features that customers automatically
assume the design will have. Such Whats are implied in the functional
requirements of the design or assumed from historical experience. For
example, customers automatically expect their lawnmower to cut grass to
the specified level, but they would not discuss it on a survey unless they had
trouble with one in the past. Unspoken wants have a weird property. They
do not increase customer satisfaction. However, if they are not delivered,
they have a strong negative effect on customer satisfaction.

Another group of unspoken Whats can be categorized as innovations or
delighters. These pleasant surprises increase customer satisfaction in a
nonlinear fashion. For example, in the automotive industry, van owners
were delighted by the second van side door and by baby seat anchor bolts.

Design features may change position on the Kano model over time. In the
1990s, the second side door in a caravan was a pleasant surprise for
customers, but now, on most models, the second door is standard and