Throw away your zero fault targets - MES004

In this episode I will show you how zero-fault targets jeopardize the goal they try to achieve. I will show you some of their major problems. And I will give you some ways to escape or at least to handle them.

What does it mean?

Zero-faults strategy means that there are no faults accepted in the delivered product. Or at least only a very minimum amount of failures with low priority. Regular for medical devices, avionics, spaceflight. But is it really necessary for other industries? The zero fault phase might start anytime before the near customer delivery.

Why are there zero-fault targets?

Customer only wanted to accept mature products
Too many faults in delivery product
Customer complaints

Symptoms and impacts with zero-fault target approach in use

Wrong priorities due to priority inversion
Artificial delay of deliveries
Congestion of problems and tasks
Complete usage of resources for low priorities
Exhaustion, frustration and finally demotivation

Notes about quality

Quality cannot be tested into the product
It is essential to know what the customer really wants
Clear and precise goals and priorities from management for the different projects and programs.

What can you do if you’re in a zero-fault phase?
Leaders & Managers

You can take the following actions in a short-run:

Decide with customer what are the relevant features. Distinguish between: Must-Do, Should-do, and Can-Do. Concentrate on the Must-Do factors.
Take care of mutual exclusive resources
Renegotiate the deadline / renegotiate the system requirements or both
Run the Triage! Details see Wikipedia

And these are my proposed actions for the long-run:

Understand the intention of the innovators of 0-fault target. What’s behind of it?
Educate your engineers. Quality comes from know-how and this can be trained and learned.
Read the book “Death March” by Edward Yourdon
Get familiar with the big-tanker captain’s view

Software-/Hardware engineers

To mitigate or handle the effects of zero-fault targets you may take the following actions:

Show and highlight your outstanding tasks and priorities
Move the decision for priority and order of tasks to the managers
Inform your managers in time about priority clashes and overload situations
Read the book “Death March” by Edward Yourdon

 

Thank You For Listening
Out of all the podcasts available in the Internet you tuned into mine, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed the episode, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the bottom of this note.

Also, I would be very happy if you would consider taking the minute it takes to leave an honest review or rating for the podcast on iTunes or Stitcher. They’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the podcast. For sure I read every single one of them personally!

Or, if you prefer a more direct contact, don't hesitate and drop me a note at [email protected]

The post Throw away your zero fault targets – MES004 appeared first on Embedded Success.