I. A little trick for model selection: Assessing the project manager of the second - partythe second - party second - party the other party
In the project selection process, the assessment of the project manager from the second - party is a crucial step. As the core person in charge of the project, the professional qualities and abilities of the project manager are directly related to whether the project can be successfully delivered.
We can evaluate the Project Manager of Party B from multiple professional fields. For example, in terms of system and compliance requirements, systems such as ISO9001, IATF16949, ISO13485, and ISO14001 play important regulatory roles in different industries respectively. ISO9001 is a general standard for quality management systems, ensuring that an enterprise's products and services meet customer needs and relevant regulations. IATF16949 focuses on quality management in the automotive industry and sets strict requirements for quality control in the automotive supply chain. ISO13485 is for the medical device industry, guaranteeing the safety and effectiveness of medical devices. ISO14001 is a standard for environmental management systems, prompting enterprises to pay attention to environmental protection in their operations. If the project manager has only a superficial understanding of these system requirements, it will be very difficult to ensure that the project complies with industry norms and regulatory requirements during the project execution process.
Commonly used structured problem - solving methods, such as PDCA, 8D, A3, and DMAIC, are also tools that project managers must master. The PDCA cycle (Plan, Do, Check, Act) is a classic method in quality management, which can continuously improve the quality and efficiency of projects. The 8D method is used to solve repetitive problems. It conducts in - depth analysis of the root causes of problems and formulates solutions through eight steps. The A3 report is a concise and effective problem - solving and communication tool that can clearly present problems, analyze causes, and propose countermeasures. DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) is the core method in Six Sigma management, used to optimize business processes and improve product quality. If project managers are not familiar with these methods, they may not be able to efficiently find solutions when facing problems in projects, which will lead to delays in project progress.
The GB 2828 sampling plan is an important means in quality control, which is used to determine the quantity and method of product sampling to ensure the stability and reliability of product quality. If project managers are not familiar with this sampling plan, it will be difficult for them to effectively monitor and evaluate product quality.
The five major tools such as APQP and FMEA play a crucial role in product development and quality management. APQP (Advanced Product Quality Planning) can ensure the effective management of the entire process from product design to production. FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis), on the other hand, can identify potential failure modes in products or processes in advance and take corresponding preventive measures. Process audits, product audits, and layered audits are important means to ensure that product quality and production processes meet the requirements. If project managers are not familiar with these audit methods, they will not be able to promptly detect quality problems and process loopholes in the project.
In addition, it is also a basic requirement for the project manager to understand the manufacturing process of Party A. Different manufacturing processes have different characteristics and requirements. Only by being familiar with Party A's manufacturing process can the project manager reasonably arrange the project schedule, allocate resources, and ensure that the project results meet Party A's actual needs. If the project manager has knowledge gaps in these key areas, the project delivery will inevitably face many difficulties and may even fail to achieve the expected goals.
II. Several aspects to focus on during the model selection
1. Company focus
When selecting a company for QMS system development, the company's focus is an important consideration. Some companies in the market claim to be all - round players, capable of developing systems such as ERP, MES, PLM, APS, QMS, WMS, and SRM. However, this seemingly comprehensive ability often means a lack of in - depth research and professional accumulation in a specific field.Companies that specialize in the development of QMS systems for the manufacturing industry will invest more energy and resources in this area. They can gain a deeper understanding of the characteristics and requirements of quality management in the manufacturing industry, and thus develop QMS systems that better meet the actual needs. In contrast, companies that try to be involved in multiple fields may not be able to achieve excellence in QMS system development. Their products may have problems such as incomplete functions and poor adaptability.
2. Product professionalism
3. Project cases
Project cases are an important basis for evaluating the strength of a QMS system development company. Whether a company can provide at least 20 signed QMS contracts reflects its market recognition and business scale. A large number of signed contracts indicate that the company has rich experience and successful practices in QMS system development.Meanwhile, the availability of visitable successful cases is also crucial. Visiting successful cases on - site allows enterprises to intuitively understand the actual application effects of the QMS system developed by the company, including the system's stability, the practicality of its functions, and its role in improving enterprise quality management. By communicating with enterprises using the system, one can also obtain first - hand usage feedback and experiences, which can serve as a reference for their own system selection decisions.
4. Product maturity
Providing trial accounts for software demos is an effective way to test the maturity of a product. By trying out the demo, enterprises can personally experience the functions and operation processes of the QMS system and evaluate whether it meets their own needs. During the trial period, enterprises can check aspects such as the system's stability, ease - of - use, and functional integrity. For example, they can assess whether the system is easy to master, whether the functions can meet the requirements of daily quality management, and whether data processing is accurate and efficient. If a company can offer trial accounts for the demo, it indicates that it has confidence in its own product and is willing to let customers test it in actual use.
5. Product universality
Whether standard products can be applied to different manufacturing enterprises or multiple business formats of a single enterprise is an important indicator for measuring the practicality of a QMS system. Different manufacturing enterprises have different production processes and quality management requirements, and a single enterprise may also have multiple different business formats, such as injection molding, metal processing, motor manufacturing, SMT, assembly and other processes. A universal QMS system should be able to adapt to these different needs and meet the quality management requirements in various manufacturing scenarios through flexible configuration and customization. In this way, when an enterprise selects a QMS system, it does not need to choose different systems for different business segments, which reduces the enterprise's informatization costs and management difficulties.
6. Product perfection levelProduct completeness 、Product maturity
Providing a software feature list allows enterprises to comprehensively understand the functional scope and characteristics of the QMS system. The feature list should detail all the functional modules of the system, as well as the specific functions and roles of each module. By reviewing the feature list, enterprises can compare their quality management requirements and evaluate whether the system can meet their needs. Meanwhile, the feature list can also serve as an important basis for the two parties to sign a contract, ensuring that the system purchased by the enterprise has the required functions.
7. Quality report
The display of various quality analysis charts is one of the important functions of the QMS system. Quality reports can intuitively reflect the enterprise's quality management status and provide data support for the enterprise's decision - making. Through quality reports, enterprises can promptly identify problems and potential hazards in quality management and take corresponding measures for improvement.For example, by analyzing the quality pass - rate report, enterprises can understand the fluctuations in product quality and identify the key factors affecting quality. By analyzing the quality cost report, they can evaluate the effectiveness of quality management and optimize the allocation of quality management resources.Therefore, a good QMS system should be able to provide a rich variety of intuitive and easy - to - understand quality analysis charts.
8. Implementation professionalism
- **Experience of implementation personnel**: Whether the implementation personnel have rich experience in factory quality management is directly related to the implementation effect of the QMS system. Implementation personnel with experience in factory quality management can better understand the actual needs of the enterprise and effectively connect the QMS system with the enterprise's quality management process. They can formulate reasonable implementation plans and schemes based on the actual situation of the enterprise to ensure that the system can be launched smoothly and function effectively.
- **Value-added service capabilities**: Whether the implementation personnel can assist enterprises in optimizing quality management processes and providing additional value-added services, such as quality consulting and technological improvement suggestions, is also an important aspect in measuring the professionalism of implementation. In addition to completing the system implementation work, the implementation personnel should also be able to leverage their professional knowledge and experience to provide more value to the enterprise. For example, through the analysis and evaluation of the enterprise's quality management processes, they can put forward optimization suggestions to help the enterprise improve the efficiency and level of quality management; based on the enterprise's production processes and quality requirements, they can offer suggestions for technological transformation to enhance the enterprise's product quality and competitiveness.
- **Business input capabilities**: Whether the implementation personnel possess the ability to input quality - related business knowledge is crucial for the successful implementation of the QMS system, rather than simply carrying out outsourced development in a "do as I say" manner. Implementation personnel with quality business input capabilities can actively participate in the enterprise's quality management process, put forward their own insights and suggestions, and provide innovative ideas for the enterprise's quality management. They can offer forward - looking planning and design for the enterprise's QMS system based on the best practices in quality management and industry development trends, ensuring that the system can meet the enterprise's future development needs.
III. Comparison of the advantages and disadvantages between product - based QMS and project - based QMS
Product-based software
Product - based QMS software has many advantages. Firstly, it can provide consulting services other than the software itself for enterprises, helping them better implement the software. These consulting services may cover aspects such as the construction of quality management systems and the optimization of business processes, enabling enterprises to fully utilize the software's functions and improve their quality management levels.Secondly, the performance of product - based software is relatively stable. This is because it has been used and verified by a large number of customers, and the development team is relatively stable, capable of continuously maintaining and optimizing the software. Meanwhile, product - based software offers high cost - effectiveness. Enterprises can obtain a relatively well - functioning QMS system without investing a large amount of funds in customized development.Another significant advantage is that the software interfaces are mature, facilitating integration with other existing systems in the enterprise and realizing data sharing and circulation. In addition, the product - based software has a clear iteration roadmap. The development team will continuously upgrade the software according to market demands and technological developments to ensure that its functions and performance always remain at the leading level. The software implementation time is short, which can quickly bring benefits to the enterprise.Moreover, product - based software has solidified many business logics of quality management. These logics are summarized from a large amount of practical experience and can provide standardized quality management solutions for enterprises.
However, product-based software also has some drawbacks. There may be redundant functions on some customers' pages. This is because product-based software is designed to meet the needs of most customers and cannot be fully customized for each customer's specific requirements. The software's architecture, functions, pages, etc. are relatively fixed, making it difficult to make significant changes according to customers' requests. If an enterprise has some special business processes or management requirements, they may not be well implemented in product-based software.
Overall, product - type software undergoes complex logical abstraction to transform rich quality management knowledge into software. In essence, it is another manifestation of quality business knowledge. It combines its own quality business knowledge with the successful practices of a large number of customers. It has a clear iteration path, undergoes continuous upgrades, has few bugs, and can provide enterprises with stable and efficient quality management solutions.
Project-based software
The main advantage of project - based QMS software is that it can be custom - developed entirely according to the current needs of customers, without redundant functions. Enterprises can carry out personalized design and development of the software based on their own special business processes and management requirements, enabling the software to perfectly meet the actual needs of the enterprise.
However, project-based software also has many drawbacks. First of all, the client must have personnel familiar with quality business and IT technology to sort out detailed requirements, which places relatively high demands on the client's professional skills. If the client lacks such professional personnel, they may not be able to accurately express their needs, resulting in the developed software failing to meet the actual needs of the enterprise.Secondly, if insufficient consideration is given in the early stage, it will lead to continuous changes in requirements during the development process, posing a high risk of project out - of - control. Frequent requirement changes will disrupt the development plan, increase development costs and time, and may even result in the project being unable to be delivered on time.High communication costs are also an issue with project - based software. It is difficult for suppliers to fully understand the requirements expressed by the client, and information transmission is severely distorted. This may lead to a gap between the developed software and the client's expectations.In addition, project - based software has poor flexibility. Only immediate needs are considered during the development process, making it difficult to make changes later. There are also prominent problems such as a large number of bugs, difficulty in ensuring software stability, rapid turnover of developers, difficulties in later - stage upgrades, and relatively high costs.
In essence, project - based software is a form of labor outsourcing. The core business logic is all completed by the client. Due to the tight schedule, if the client fails to consider comprehensively, the future scalability of the software will inevitably be restricted. The suppliers aim to meet the client's current needs, so it's difficult for them to make relevant contingency plans for future business development. According to statistics, the failure rate of project - based QMS systems exceeds 70%.
4. It is recommended to choose product-based companies
When selecting a QMS system, it is recommended to choose a product - based company rather than a project - based one. Currently, there are some QMS manufacturers in the market. More than half of the customer cases they display on their official websites have already been abandoned. However, new customers have no way of knowing about these failed cases during the selection process, and naturally, the manufacturers won't mention them actively. This indicates that there are significant risks associated with project - based QMS systems, and many projects ultimately fail to achieve the expected results.
A senior figure in the industry mentioned that many automobile original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) have been advocating digitalization of quality management, but there isn't a suitable Quality Management System (QMS) vendor. There are many suppliers involved, but most of them end up as failures. This reflects that large manufacturing enterprises face great difficulties when selecting a QMS. Large manufacturing enterprises have many unique and proprietary management methods and business processes, and their requirements involve a large amount of secondary development. However, only a very small number of these customized projects can be successfully delivered.
In contrast, the digital transformation of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is more likely to succeed. This is because the business processes of SMEs are relatively simple and their demand for customization is relatively low. Product-based Quality Management System (QMS) software can better meet their needs. Product-based software has advantages such as high stability, low cost, and short implementation cycles, which can help SMEs quickly achieve digital quality management and enhance their competitiveness. Therefore, when selecting a QMS system, enterprises should weigh the advantages and disadvantages of product-based and project-based software according to their actual situations and give priority to product-based companies.