PM FPX 5333 Assessment 3 Quality Plan Analysis and Quality Assurance Plan

Student Name

Capella University

PM-FPX5333 Project Budgeting, Procurement, and Quality

Prof. Name:

Date

Quality Plan Analysis and Quality Assurance Plan

The Nearlyfree.com New Employee Orientation (NEO) project has surpassed its initial budget and is at risk of failing. The current quality plan of the company did not identify all necessary resources nor define the project’s quality adequately. This document will evaluate the existing quality plan and pinpoint the project’s failure areas.

Quality Standards

Quality management standards outline the requirements, specifications, guidelines, and characteristics that products, services, and processes must consistently meet to ensure they:

Meet expectations for quality,
Are fit for their intended purpose, and
Satisfy user needs.

Standards are a critical component of quality management systems (Quality Management Standards, n.d., para. 3). ISO, as part of the ISO 9000 family of standards, has developed ISO 10006, which offers ‘Guidelines for quality management in projects’ (Harding, 2004). These quality standards align with the PMBOK (Project Management Body of Knowledge) Project Quality Management Standards and can also be seen as “the extent to which a set of characteristics meet the required needs” (ISO, 2020).

Analyzing Product Quality

The quality plan of NearlyFree.com is compared against ISO’s recommended standards. The ISO 9001 certification is based on eight Quality Management Principles established by ISO/TC 176, an international body responsible for maintaining ISO’s quality management standards. These principles guide organizations in improving their performance (British Assessment Service, 2018, para. 1).

The eight ISO 9001 Quality Management principles are:

Customer Focus: Emphasizing quality and customer satisfaction. In this project, the staff members being trained are considered the customers.
Leadership: The Project Manager and Project Sponsor are identified as the project leaders.
People Involvement: The roles and responsibilities within the project have not been clearly defined.
Process Approach: Multiple planned testing cycles should be included in the process.
Systemic Approach to Management: Managing multiple processes as a cohesive system to enhance efficiency.
Continual Improvement: Enhancing organizational flexibility, performance, and ability to embrace new opportunities.
Factual Approach to Decision Making: Utilizing a data-driven, logical approach for decision-making.
Mutually Beneficial Supplier Relations: Strengthening the relationship between the company and its suppliers.

Recommendations

Based on the evaluation of the eight ISO quality standards and the current quality statement of the project, the following recommendations are made:

Define key events, timelines, and milestones with critical suppliers to prevent interruptions during time-sensitive phases, improving supplier relations.
Develop and adhere to a consistent workflow for systems to align with the systemic management approach.
Clearly define all leaders and their roles throughout the project phases, ensuring that more than one individual is responsible for quality sign-off.
Identify key influencers and their roles in the quality process.
Schedule meetings with key leaders to discuss project progress and plans that support effective decision-making.

Implementing these recommendations will help the project meet the ISO quality principles.

Quality Assurance

Quality assurance (QA) involves systematic processes to determine if a product or service meets specified requirements (Gillis, 2019, para. 1). A QA review identified failures needing attention, highlighting that the Cost of Quality (CoQ) is currently double the project budget. A new Quality Assurance Plan should be developed.

Cost of Quality

Cost of Quality (CoQ) refers to a methodology for assessing the extent to which resources are used for preventing poor quality, appraising product or service quality, and addressing internal and external failures. This information helps organizations identify potential savings from process improvements (Cost of Quality (CoQ), n.d., para. 1).

CoQ includes costs related to:

Prevention
Appraisal
Internal Failure
External Failure

The Cost of Good Quality (CoGQ) plus the Cost of Poor Quality (CoPQ) equals CoQ. The calculated overall CoQ for this project is: CoQ = $11,958 + $60,760 CoQ = $72,718

Prevention Costs

Prevention costs are incurred to avoid product defects and are part of the cost of quality. These costs typically include employee training and supplier certification, and the greatest improvements in product quality come from defect prevention (Crosby, n.d., para. 1). For this project, prevention costs are estimated at $7,980.

Appraisal Costs

Appraisal costs are associated with the quality control process to ensure products and services meet customer expectations and regulatory requirements. These costs can include field tests and inspections (Twinn, 2020, para. 1). For this project, appraisal costs are estimated at $3,978, bringing the total for prevention and appraisal to $11,958.

Internal Failure

Internal failure costs arise from product defects discovered before the product leaves the factory. These costs include failure analysis, rework, and throughput lost (Internal Failure Costs Definition, 2022, para. 1). If the project fails, internal failure costs are estimated at $30,380.

External Failures

External failure costs occur when product defects are discovered after the product has been sold. These costs include legal fees, loss of future sales, recalls, returns, and warranty expenses. These costs can be significant, especially if they lead to customer loss (External Failure Costs Definition, 2022, para. 1). For this project, external failure costs are also estimated at $30,380, totaling $60,760 for both internal and external failures.

Quality Assurance Recommendations

The New Employee Orientation (NEO) project could save time and money for Nearlyfree.com in onboarding and orientation by achieving the following objectives:

Providing new employees with access to the company intranet.
Automating presentation version control through the system.
Allowing HR staff to monitor new employees’ access to presentations and verify knowledge assessments.
Ensuring HR staff can track and maintain training completion in a centralized location.

References

British Assessment Service. (2018). The 8 principles of QMS. British Assessment Service. https://www.british-assessment.co.uk/insights/the-8-principles-of-quality-management/

Cost of Quality (CoQ). (n.d.). ASQ. https://asq.org/quality-resources/cost-of-quality

Crosby, P. B. (n.d.). Encyclopedia of production and manufacturing management. Springer Link. https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/1-4020-0612-8_702#:~:text=Prevention%20costs%20are%20incurred%20preventing,are%20associated%20with%20preventing%20defects.

External failure costs definition. (2022, April 22). Accounting Tools. https://www.accountingtools.com/articles/external-failure-costs

Gillis, A. S. (2019, July 1). Definition: Quality assurance (QA). Techtarget. https://www.techtarget.com/searchsoftwarequality/definition/quality-assurance

Internal failure costs definition. (2022, October 12). Accounting Tools. https://www.accountingtools.com/articles/internal-failure-costs#:~:text=Internal%20failure%20costs%20are%20those,the%20firm’s%20internal%20inspection%20processes.