Page 122 - The Handbook for Quality Management a Complete Guide to Operational Excellence

108 I n t e g r a t e d P l a n n i n g U n d e r s t a n d i n g C u s t o m e r E x p e c t a t i o n s a n d N e e d s 109

decision maker, source of payment, people who evaluate the
product’s capabilities, people involved in transporting the product
from the manufacturer, people who install the equipment, and any
other person involved in the process of acquiring the product and
preparing it for use by the end user. As a general rule, transfer
agents perform functions that are transparent to the end user; for
instance, the user of an automobile doesn’t really know or care
how the vehicle was transported from the manufacturer to the
dealer. This presents opportunities to reduce costs without affecting
perceived quality. Yet transfer agents often play a major role in end
user satisfaction. A rude, obnoxious, or ill-informed salesperson
can create customer dissatisfaction that no amount of product
quality will ever overcome. Because of their closer contact with
producers and greater buying power, transfer agents often have
greater voice than end users, and can act as an information filter
between producers and end users. The transfer agents’ interests
may be different from the interests of the end user. The combination
of these factors can create a disconnect between end user and
producer that leads to a failure to meet the needs of the end user. If
the gap becomes wide enough, it can create an opening that an
alert competitor can use to gain market share at the expense of the
often perplexed producer.
• Maintenance customers. These are people who repair or replace
products that have defects or other problems that make them
unsuitable for service, as well as those who perform routine
preventive maintenance on products. This category of customer
often plays a major role in end user satisfaction, for better or for
worse. Maintenance customers are a potential goldmine of product
improvement ideas. They are often more familiar with the actual
performance of the product than the original designers, and may
also have intimate knowledge of competitive products. Especially in
larger companies, designers may be relatively isolated from other
designers, with little understanding of how their design piece would
fit with the rest of the design. Maintenance customers work with
complete products under actual field conditions. This, combined
with intimate end user contact, makes their input invaluable for
design improvement. Adding maintenance customers to the product
design team can produce big payoffs.
In practice, these categories may become somewhat ambiguous, as
people fill different role at different times. The key to keeping the correct
perspective is to understand that the unifying criterion is the satisfaction
of the end user. All activities in the process are being performed to achieve
this final result.

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