Contents
Preface IX
Section 1 Quality Management 1
Chapter 1 Artificial Intelligence Tools and Case Base Reasoning
Approach for Improvement Business Process Performance 3
Aleksandar Vujovic, Zdravko Krivokapic and Jelena Jovanovic
Chapter 2 Improving ‘Improvement’ by Refocusing Learning:
Experiences from an –Initially- Unsuccessful
Six Sigma Project in Healthcare 23
Svante Lifvergren and Bo Bergman
Chapter 3 Project Costs and Risks Estimation Regarding
Quality Management System Implementation 41
Adela-Eliza Dumitrascu and Anisor Nedelcu
Chapter 4 What Quality Management Allied to Information
Can Do for Occupational Safety and Health 69
Erika Alves dos Santos
Chapter 5 Reducing Mirror Slippage of Nightstand with
Plackett-Burman DOE and ANN Techniques 101
Mithat Zeydan and Gülhan Toğa
Chapter 6 Redesigning the Service Process for Total Quality in
Government Hospitals: Evidence from Kwara State 117
Johnson Olabode Adeoti
Chapter 7 Some Applicable Methods to Analyze and
Optimize System Processes in Quality Management 127
Andrey Kostogryzov, George Nistratov and Andrey Nistratov
Chapter 8 Competence Education and Training for Quality 197
Vidoje Moracanin
Section 2 Six Sigma 217
Chapter 9 The Integration of TQM and Six-Sigma 219
Ching-Chow Yang
Chapter 10 Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis
of Six Sigma in Service Organizations 247
Ayon Chakraborty and Kay Chuan Tan
Chapter 11 Lean Six Sigma – Making It ‘Business as Usual’ 287
Graham Cartwright and John Oakland
Preface
Total quality management, now a well known idea, is a philosophy of management for continuously improving the quality of products and processes. The idea is that the quality of products and processes is the responsibility of everyone who is involved with the development and/or use of the products or services. TQM involves management, workforce, suppliers, and even customers, in order to meet or exceed customer expectations. The common TQM practices are cross-functional product design, process management, supplier quality management, customer involvement, information and feedback, committed leadership, strategic planning, cross-functional training, and employee involvement. Six Sigma is a business management strategy which seeks to improve the quality of process outputs by identifying and removing the causes of defects and minimizing variability in manufacturing and business processes. A six sigma process is one in which 99.99966% of the products manufactured are statistically expected to be free of defects. TQM’s focus is general improvement by approaching the problem collaboratively and culturally whereas Six Sigma utilizes the efforts of many departments, generally with a statistical approach. It makes use of measuring and analyzing data to determine how defects and differences could be minimized to the level where there are 3.4 defects per million cycles/products.
Six Sigma can easily be integrated into quality management efforts. Integrating Six Sigma into the TQM program facilitates process improvement through detailed data analysis. Using the Six Sigma metrics, internal project comparisons facilitate resource allocation while external project comparisons allow for benchmarking. Thus, the application of Six Sigma makes TQM efforts more successful. In today’s highly competitive environment, organizations tend to integrate TQM and six sigma to gain maximum benefits. This volume is an effort to gain insights into new developments in the fields of quality management and six sigma and is comprising of articles authored by renowned professionals and academics working in the field. Both beginners and veterans in the field can learn useful techniques and ideas from this volume.
Tauseef Aized
Artificial Intelligence Tools and Case Base Reasoning Approach for Improvement Business Process Performance
Aleksandar Vujovic, Zdravko Krivokapic and Jelena Jovanovic
1. Introduction
Contemporary and every day more perfect information achievement, becomes available for everybody, and simply, very quickly become a necessity. It is necessary that organizations use information technology as a tool for developing a sense of learning, acquire and use knowledge. Information tools should not be use like tools for automation of existing processes. There should be another aspect or already obsolete category. With this aspects, thinking and attitudes, it can be said that we living in the century of knowledge and that we have already overcome period of information technology which should be, simply, implemented like support in the way for achieving knowledge.
This informational environment has been recognized in the world and because of there are significant rising in the use of artificial intelligence tools. There is evidence that is a great number of eligible to use and easily available software for needs of the development of such as systems in the field of artificial intelligence. Also, in [1] states that investment and implementation of artificial intelligence show significant results, particularly in attempt of to get higher profit. The artificial intelligence, like the word itself says is the area that deals with the development of systems that mimic human intelligence and a man with tend to replace him in some activities based on knowledge. That is way for over viewing problem of human absence, cost of services, disinclination of people to provide knowledge and similar. Specified conditions, particularly from the standpoint of the necessities of knowledge, and also the fact that in area of research topic for the purposes of quality management systems, there are evident gap [2, 3-10, 11]. That facts justifying the author’s striving to be in this research and accept to use artificial intelligence tools for developing systems oriented to knowledge. These views and attitudes were in agreement: that there is no correct programming software that has a strong base of knowledge that could assist in identification of a problem, that has not developed a single expert system that deals with the measurement, evaluation, corrective and preventive action to improve organizational performance and the like [12, 13-16, 10]. It is also an incentive to be based on such analogies create a foundation set up and entered the field of artificial intelligence in order to obtain knowledge as one of the most important factors for creating competitiveness in the market [17-19, 20].
Everything above can be understand like introduction for developing an research whit main aim for developing a system in the field of artificial intelligence that would be based on the analysis in the quality management system and that has given recommendations for achieving business excellence and improve the financial performance of the organization. The main parts and activities of that research stay in the basis of this chapter.