Abstract:
A TQM based approach has been developed to improve the quality of products of MDF
boards manufacturing industry .The methodology developed has been implemented in a
selected local company and a considerable improvement in the quality of boards have been
observed. As the MDF boards manufacturing process is almost the same everywhere, the
methodology implemented for quality improvements can be used for the entire MDF
industry.
As an initial step, a customer survey was carried out on the external customers. This survey
covered the customer perception about quality of purchased boards and the product variety
needed by the customers. For this survey, it used five MDF board manufactures both locally
and in abroad. A questioner survey method was used for this purpose. Outcomes of this are
poor quality boards, poor response for the customer complains and unavailability of customer
preferred boards.
Depending on the external survey outcomes, another survey was carried out on internal
customers to reveal the exact reasons for poor quality. Main outcomes of this are, poor
quality control method implemented, poor customer orientation, inadequate quality
parameters and lack of quality related parameters exist within the industry.
As a solution for these problems, a new TQM based quality control methodology has been
developed and implemented for the entire production process. Further a quality council
system and work team involvement method has been introduced to address the issues from
both internal and external customers.
Then process improvement technique was implemented in order to further improve quality
and minimize waste. Here the Kaizen theory has been used as the main tool for process
improvement. A performance measure was introduced to measure the success of the newly
implemented system.
