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How to Ensure Quality

© Bert Markgraf

One of the keys to small business success is making sure that the customer gets the quality which he expected when he purchased the product or service and which he paid for. Ensuring that he gets this level of quality, quality assurance, has three different parts to it.

To start with, it has to be clear what level of quality the customer expects. He may want something inexpensive which just barely does the job or he may be looking for top of the line with superior performance. The best way to address this is to present the customer with clear options so that he can make an informed decision. If you're clear on what you're offering and about what he can expect from your product or service, then he will decide accordingly and the sale is made on a proper basis as far as quality is concerned.

The second part of ensuring quality is an internal matter - you have to make sure that the product or service you are selling is living up to what you told your customer. This part starts with your suppliers, goes right through your whole company and involves checking everything against target characteristics, quality and performance.

Are your suppliers sending you products which satisfy your requirements? Are they living up to their contracts? When the suppliers' material is received, is it checked and stored properly. Is it identified so you know what you have?

When you produce your product or carry out your service activity, do you know exactly what the customer required? Do you check what you're doing against what he ordered? Do you make sure that he is getting what he ordered when he wanted it. Do you check that the price you're charging him is what he agreed to?

During this second part all these things have to be checked and verified. Ideally, you have a check list which someone in authority signs off - that's the assurance part, that the contracted quality has been achieved internally.

Finally, the last part of the quality assurance process is external again - you have to check whether your products or services are in fact doing what you expect and said they would. You have to contact some of your customers and ask them. You have to keep track of complaints. Then you have to take what is called "corrective action".

This means that if several of your customers are complaining about the same thing, then they're not getting what they expected - you have to correct the source of the complaints to make sure the proper quality is there.

The copyright of the article How to Ensure Quality in Small Business is owned by Bert Markgraf. Permission to republish How to Ensure Quality in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.