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A CASE STUDY OF QUALITY MANAGEMENT ON ROLLS-ROYCE

Article May 2013
DOI: 10.13140/2.1.2172.5442

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A CASE STUDY OF QUALITY

MANAGEMENT ON ROLLS-ROYCE

Karlstad Business School

Handelshgskolan vid Karlstads Universitet

TITLE OF THE WORK:

A Case Study of Quality Management on Rolls Royce

Prepared by
Hafez Shurrab
Farhana Akter
Mohammed El Bouassami

TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF TABLES & FIGURES ............................................................................................... II
1.

INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... - 1 -

2.

METHODOLOGY ......................................................................................................... - 2 -

3.

BACKGROUND ............................................................................................................ - 2 -

4.

3.1.

Rolls Royce Group PLC ..................................................................................... - 2 -

3.2.

Rolls-Royce practice of Lean, Six Sigma and Robust Design ........................... - 3 -

3.3.

Rolls-Royce and Benchmarking......................................................................... - 4 -

3.4.

Rolls-Royce and Quality Management Systems ................................................ - 5 -

3.5.

Rolls-Royce and Process Improvement ............................................................. - 7 -

THEORY ........................................................................................................................ - 7 4.1.

Quality ................................................................................................................ - 7 -

4.2. Total Quality Management (TQM) ........................................................................ - 7 4.3. Benchmarking and ISO Standards ......................................................................... - 8 4.4. Lean Production Method/Philosophy ..................................................................... - 9 4.5. Six Sigma Method .................................................................................................. - 9 4.6. Robust Design and the Design Process ................................................................ - 10 5.

ANALYSIS .................................................................................................................. - 11 -

6.

DISCUSSION ............................................................................................................... - 14 -

7.

CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................ - 15 -

8.

REFERENCES ............................................................................................................. - 16 -

LIST OF TABLES & FIGURES

Figure 1: Timing integration for recommended technology management tool suites ...... - 5 Figure 2: The framework of the process structure across Rolls-Royce Group ................. - 6 Figure 3: Path of Continuous Improvement at Rolls-Royce in Recent History ............... - 7 Figure 4: Robust Design and optimization ..................................................................... - 11 -

II

1. INTRODUCTION
The aim of this paper is to understand the values, tools and methodologies of quality.
The paper will integrate the theories with a real context. Rolls Royce Group PLC (RollsRoyce) is in our focus to understand the theories related to quality.
Rolls Royce as one of the most powerful brands in the world has always been
associated with high quality products. The company symbolizes a promise to deliver
reliability, integrity and innovation to its customers. Rolls Royce manufacture engine for
global civil aerospace, defense aerospace, marine and energy industries (Rolls Royce,
2013).
Quality is the most important and complex component of business strategy (Golder
et al. 2012). Quality is seen as key factors to an organizations Success and survival in
todays competitive environment. Bergman and Klefsj (2003) stated, The quality of a
product/service is its ability to satisfy, or preferably exceed, the needs and expectations of
the customers. TQM is a continuously evolving management system consisting of values,
methodologies and tools, the aim of which is to increase external and internal customers
satisfaction with a reduced amount of resources (Hellsten & Klefsj 2000). The Total
Quality Management (TQM) principles are adopted in the organization and incorporate
into all their organizational process.
Lean is used as a systematic approach to identifying and eliminating waste through
continuous improvement, flowing the product at the pull of the customer in pursuit of
perfection (NIST 2000).
Quality improvement is in the top priority in Six Sigma, which is done by reducing
defects (Hong & Goh, 2004). Along with other advantages this method is used on reducing
lead times.
Customer focused product development help the organization to be competitive and
sustainable in the market. Robust design methodology help the company better understand
its customer (Karl et al., 2011).
ISO 9000 and ISO 14001 standards are used to ensure that the organization meets the
needs for its customers and its other stakeholder. Benchmarking give the organizations
the opportunity to improve over all organizational levels.

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In the following, firstly, the theory of quality management values, tools and
methodologies will be discussed. Subsequently, preview of Rolls Royse and its quality
management practice will be presented. Finally, in analysis, the paper will give a link
between the theory and the company practice to strengthen the understanding of the topic.

2. METHODOLOGY
The information related the theories and case study used in this report was collected
from books, scientific articles, the official website of Rolls-Royce, and the course literature
Quality from Customer Needs to Customer Satisfaction. The scientific articles were
found in the databases Emerald and Science Direct. The books, course literature, and
scientific articles are used to build up the core theory of the models of QMS, while the
empirical data gathered about Rolls-Royce from their website and other relevant case
studies is used to analyse how the efforts dedicated for quality in Rolls-Royce relate to the
tools and models of QMS.

3. BACKGROUND
3.1.

Rolls Royce Group PLC

Charles Rolls and Steward Royce founded Rolls Royce in 1906. In the beginning, the

company focused on manufacturing cars, but it saw a new era, due to the design of the first
jet engine in 1914. Rolls- Royce is a global company, headquartered in the city of
Westminster London, United Kingdom. The company provides integrated power solutions
for customers on land, at sea and in the air. Nowadays, Rolls Royce is considered to be as
one of the market leader of jets engines manufacturer worldwide alongside with General
Electric and Pratt and Whitney (Lazonick 2002). Rolls Royce has manufacturing facilities
in 20 countries, and by 2013, RR employs over 40000 people in fifty different countries
worldwide, where three quarters of the manufactured goods are sold outside England to
customers in 150 countries (Jefferys 2011). RR is a highly profitable multinational, where
in 2012 the company turnover attained over 60 billion GBP, with a record profit of 1, 317
billion GBP compared to 2011 net profit of 223 million GBP (RR AR 2012). The company
is a major player in the aeronautic industry and it supplies more than 600 airlines, and also
armies in five continents with both products and services. Rolls Royce has businesses in
marine propulsion and energy sector and is the worlds third-largest maker of aircraft
engine. It supports its customers through worldwide networks of offices, manufacturing
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and service facilities. The company places the customer at the heart of the organization and
always understands and shapes their requirements according to their need. The company is
very responsive to its customers. Innovation and development of new technology help the
company to offer more to its customers. The company has created high value to its
customers by producing high performance products, delivering high value service, and
investing in high-tech research and development. A global supply network has also added
high value to its customers (Rolls Royce, 2013).

3.2.

Rolls-Royce practice of Lean, Six Sigma and Robust Design

The company believes that it is not only the engineering excellence but also the

integrated standard of quality in all their activities and their promise to their customers that
made their brand strong. Continuous improvement is the key to drive and build a
sustainable business by the companys quality team. Delivering on time and understand the
customers expected standard is seen as a quality ingredient. The continuous improvement
of management system, gathering information about customers, managing suppliers and
invests in new technology help the company to better its quality in a regular basis.
Lean manufacturing techniques and Rolls Royce Production System principles has
used to design the new civil nuclear manufacturing facility to minimize lead- time (Rolls
Royce, 2013).
Six sigma principles are used to design the factory to get the benefit of utilizing
world leading manufacturing process and technology (Rolls Royce, 2013).
Rolls Royce has the capability to provide complete product life-cycle solutions from
initial conceptual design through to full requirements, design, development, manufacture/
production, testing and provision of through life technical support of their product. The
company has designed Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR) power plants the Royal Navy
nuclear submarine and continue to provide technology and safety support. The company
has the design capability to meet the standard of American Society of Mechanical
Engineers (ASME), British Standers and other Europeans cods for nuclear and non
nuclear applications (Rolls Royce, 2013).
Rolls Royce use robust design to understand their customer need. Parameter and
tolerance design are the basic part of robust design. The process also includes assessing the
design robustness and selecting a nominal design. In first step the company collect
manufacturing data and map onto the response model outputs. In step two it ensure the
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robustness of the whole range in the feasible area. And in the final step it select the
nominal design to sit in the middle of the manufacturing variation range (Karl et al. 2011).

3.3.

Rolls-Royce and Benchmarking

Rolls-Royce is highly considered around the globe for benchmarking. According to

BitC Index (Business in the Community Corporate Responsibility Index), which assesses
how corporate strategy is integrated into business practice throughout an organization,
Rolls-Royce scored 91% on Gold Status, and 94.8% in the Environmental Index in 2010.
Furthermore, Rolls-Royce scored 79% on DJSI (Dow Jones Sustainability World and
European Indexes) for the ninth consecutive year, and 100% for environmental reporting,
operational eco-efficiency and product impact, and safety and occupational health.
Moreover, and according to CDPs FTSE 350 Carbon Disclosure Leadership Index, which
assesses the professional approach to corporate governance in respect of climate change
disclosure practices, Rolls-Royce scored 79% in 2010 (Rolls-Royce, 2010).
On the other hand, the global inventory manager at Rolls-Royce, Rob Brown,
mentioned that the company has much to benefit and learn from the experience of others.
He also mentioned that the company pays high attention to avoid the big company
syndrome, whereby nothing is good as long as it is not invented internally. Rolls-Royce
highly stress on benchmarking to get their experts engaged with others experts in two-way
communication and learning cycles (Measure for measure, 2012).
Operationally, and for more effective technology management, Rolls-Royce conduct
technology

benchmarking

altogether

with

technology maturity

assessments

as

supplementary practices of technology identification that facilitates more robust decision

making. Technology benchmarking in Rolls-Royce is a combination of benchmarking
against competitors and internal benchmarking of technology alternatives within the
organization. The technology owners in Rolls-Royce, who are also the capability
acquisition engineers, are the main responsible for conducting and technology maturity
assessments and benchmarking (Foden & Berends, 2010). Figure 1 shows how technology
benchmarking is used in the technology management process in Rolls-Royce.

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Figure 1: Timing integration for recommended technology management tool suites (source: (Foden &
Berends, 2010))

3.4.

Rolls-Royce and Quality Management Systems

Quality Management Systems integrated in Rolls-Royce incorporate a robust suite of

processes that cover local controls and all business operations. The process controls are
conducted in the domain of internal operations and supply chain. For both quality and
business management, the systems integrate robust controls that are applied to supply
chain, business, service, and manufacturing and design activities across Rolls-Royce. The
embracing world-class process-based system is tagged as the RRQMS (Rolls-Royce
Quality Management System). Figure 2 shows the Business Process Model whereby RollsRoyce make sure the delivery of best practice across (Rolls-Royce, 2013).
For supply chain and external relationships, supplier quality assurance is mainly
supported with SABRe (Supplier Advanced Business Relationships) and the GSP (Global
Supplier Portal). SABRe is a standard set of processes and requirements and framework
whereby Rolls-Royce together with their suppliers are agreed on, while the GSP is to be
accessed by suppliers and employees anytime, which enhance the automation and
acceleration of the purchasing business functions.

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Figure 2: The framework of the process structure across Rolls-Royce Group

There are several key functions whereby Roll-Royce develops the quality of
suppliers including, supplier approval and maintenance, supplier development, supplier
quality, and ME-P (Manufacturing Engineering Purchasing). In supplier approval and
maintenance, the AVL (approved vendor list) is created and maintained by dedicating
STEP (Supplier Total Evaluation Process), which involves lots of assessments that
primarily measure the capability and performance of suppliers, and quality suppliers to
supply materials according to ASME code requirements. For supplier development, the
issues of the delivery performance into the supply chain are driven through root cause
analysis by green or black belt accredited members. The required improvement actions are
highlighted on the required areas of the supply chain. For supplier quality, the verification
of deliverables in the supply chain is achieved by many activities including physical
testing, process observing, and documentation reviewing. Finally, and to enhance the
manufacturing capability of suppliers, Rolls-Royce assign a team of manufacturing
engineers. They constantly support suppliers with advices and insights regarding process
related issues.
The Civil Nuclear business unit in Rolls-Royce is certified to ISO9001: 2008, ISO14001:
2004 and the TickIT guide Issue 5.5. The instrumentation and controls business of RollsRoyce is certified separately to ISO9001: 2000 and the TickIT guide Issue 5.5. RollsRoyce is accredited for MO N, NS, NPT, and ASME activities appropriate to the design,
procurement, manufacture, inspection, test and certification of nuclear vessels and
components (Rolls-Royce, 2013).

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3.5.

Rolls-Royce and Process Improvement

The process improvement methodology has experienced many milestones at Rolls-

Royce since after 2000. Figure 3 shows the path of continuous improvement
methodologies that are titled by several tags.

Figure 3: Path of Continuous Improvement at Rolls-Royce in Recent History (source: (Hindle, 2013))

4. THEORY
4.1.

Quality
There are two major quality dimensions: quality dimensions of goods, and quality

dimensions of services (Bergman & Klefsj, 2010). Some of the quality concepts for goods
include: Reliability, performance, maintainability, which shows the effectiveness of
detecting problems. Environmental impact, appearance, flawlessness, safety, and durability
are also other dimensions of a product quality concept. Nowadays, service quality is as
important as the product quality, but there are prevalent differences between goods and
services (Bergman & Klefsj, 2010). Dimensions of service quality are sets of criteria used
by customers for evaluating service quality and its consisted of ten dimensions. These
dimensions include reliability, credibility, communication, access, responsiveness,
courtesy, empathy and tangibles (Zeithaml et al. 1990).

4.2. Total Quality Management (TQM)

The term Total quality management (TQM) has no standard definition, instead many
uses different definitions, which have both similarities and differences. TQM is a
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continues process whereby top management takes whatever steps necessary to enable
everyone in the organization in the course of performing all duties to establish and archive
standards witch meet or exceed the needs and expectations of their costumers, both
external and internal Miller (1996). TQM is not a specific work method instead it is a
group name for management systems that has as their main objective to achieve higher
customer satisfaction. For Powell (1995) a TQM system should work with continues
improvement, reducing reworks, work in groups and meet customer requirements.

4.3. Benchmarking and ISO Standards

Camp (1989) has referred benchmarking as seeking superior performance by
searching for best practice in any measurable dimension. There are four main types of
benchmarking, including internal, competitor, functional and generic benchmarking.
Internal benchmarking is used to compare the operations or processes within an
organization, while competitor benchmarking is dedicated to operations or processes
against competitors that lead this kind of industry. Functional benchmarking is adopted to
go further in more detailed comparison of operations or processes against similar
operations or processes that have the same functions in similar. For generic benchmarking,
operations or processes are compared across non-related industries (ASQ, 2011).
A QMS, or quality management system, is framework whereby organizational
structure, resources and processes, procedures are designed and contextualized so that they
goodly facilitate implementing quality management. Among many QMS regimes, ISO
9000 and 14000 families of standards are probably the most widely implemented
worldwide (Pyzdek & Keller, 2003). The family of standards ISO 9000 is used for helping
organizations to ensure that they meet the customers needs and other stakeholders needs
(Poksinska et. al., 2002). ISO 9000 addresses the basics of quality management systems
that include the eight management principles: Customer Focus, Leadership, Involvement of
People, Process Approach, System Approach to Management, Continual Improvement,
Factual Approach to Decision Making, and Mutually Beneficial Supplier Relationships
(Beattie, 1999), while ISO 9001 is about the requirements that organizations interested in
meeting the standard need to fulfil (ISO, 2012). Similarly ISO 14000 is as same as ISO
9000, except the fact the ISO 14000 family is essentially associated with the environment
and how the negative effects of organizational operations are minimized. ISO 14001

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frames a managerial context whereby an organization can initialize an effective

environmental system of management (ISO, 2013).
Process management is the set of planning and performance monitoring activities for
a process, whether it is a business or manufacturing process. Continuous improvement is
commonly indispensable effort comes together with processes in todays business.
Companies conduct continuous improvement to keep abreast of the overall global
development, competitors performance levels, and take the lead in their industries.
Improvements are built into process radically, by applying BPRs (Business Process
Reengineering) projects, or incrementally, by TQMs (Total Quality Management) projects
(Bergman & Klefsj, 2003).

4.4. Lean Production Method/Philosophy

Japanese companies first introduced lean production system in 1970. John Krafcik a
MIT student worked as a quality engineer for Toyota has introduced lean as it is today in
1988. Lean is a production practice that meets the demand of the customer with perfect
quality. Its focus is on reducing waste by minimizing non-value added activities.
Continuous improvement (Kaizen in Japanese) is the key part of lean philosophy. The
benefits of Lean are well documented. Melton (2005), mentioned that lean decreases lead
times for customers, reduces inventories for manufacturers. It also improves knowledge
managements and emphasis on robust process (as measured by less errors and less rework).
This method helps companies to reduce the inventory levels by providing Just in
Time JIT) product or service (Slack et al., 2010). This is a pull production or service
system, which is made or serve when the order is made (Peter & Donnelly, 2002). The
elimination of waste improves the quality by reducing cost and production time. There are
eight waste that is stated under lean principle: defects, overproduction, Waiting, non value
added processing, transportation, inventory, motion and unused employee creativity.
(Bicheno & Holweg, 2009).

4.5. Six Sigma Method

Six Sigma is a strategic initiative to reduce costs of poor quality and customer
dissatisfaction. This method emphasize on quality improvement and variation reduction.
This is a business management strategy and applied by hundreds of companies worldwide
to classify and eliminate causes of defects and reducing variability in processes (Slack et

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al., 2010). Six Sigma is a business improvement approach that seeks to find and eliminate
causes of mistakes or defects in business processes by focusing on process outputs that are
of critical importance to customers (Snee, 2004).
Motorola introduced Six Sigma in the 1980s. Robert Galvin (CEO at Motorola at
that time) together with Bill Smith, Mikel Harry and Richard Schroeder created an
improvement program, which is Six Sigma. This method is the most acceptable methods in
quality improvement. Sigma () is used to denote the spread value of one standers
deviation. In order to reach Six Sigma quality companies are allowed to occur only 3.4
defects per million opportunities. Six Sigma qualities expect 99.99966% perfection. Six
Sigma methodologies are realized as a never-ending process. The DMAIC (Define,
Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control) cycle is the most important part of this
methodology (Slack et al., 2010).

Define: the cycle starts with defining the problem/ problems. It identifies the amount
of work and change necessary to improvement.

Measure: in this step data is used to refine the problems. Measurements are made to
know exactly what is happening.

Analyze: cause of the problem is analyzed in the third step. This step contributes to
make it easier to make a successful improvement.

Improve: the improvement process starts, when the root cause is identified. Different
solution is implemented to solve the problem.

Control: the new improvement is monitor, control and ensure in this stage. It is to
ensure the made change are to stay.
DMAIC is a cyclic process; there is no last part of the cycle. After the control step

the process seek new possibilities of improvement.

4.6. Robust Design and the Design Process

Robust Design method is pioneered by Dr. Genichi Taguchi is also called Taguchi
Method. This is the most powerful method available to reduce product cost, improve
quality, and simultaneously reduce development interval (Phadke, 1995). Robust design
works in four different stages, which are called as define (D), characterize (C), optimize
(O) and verify (V). In define stage it is important to understand the customer and translate
it into engineering language and select design concepts with variation in mind. Then the

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design is generated to measure the Critical-to-Quality (CTQs) criteria for each level in this
characterizes stage. It helps to understand and measure the source and effects of variation.
In optimize stage a strategy is chosen and implemented to reduce the effects of variation
for each CTQ. In construction and design verification plan the knowledge of variation and
its effects is used (Sung, 1996). The figure shows the stages of robust design.

Figure 4: Robust Design and optimization (Source: Karl et al. 2011)

Robust design gives the opportunity to achieving better design by optimization and
automation. A thorough design assessment is possible in simulation driven design at early
stage in a development. It is possible to consideration the variation in the design process in
robust design.

5. ANALYSIS
The successful use of quality improvement should include providing customers with
high value products or services that exceed their requirements. Increasing productivity by
reducing wastes and costs, will improve the competitiveness and margins, the thing, which
pleased shareholders. Most organizations financial performance depends on three key
elements. The first element is strategy development including efficient business decisions,
market performance, and finally internal performance (George &Weimerskirch 1998).
To achieve the current success Rolls Royce depends on working closely with their
suppliers and partners providing them with experiences training and development

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programmes in order to develop their productivity, also to create a strong supply chain as
the market will continue to grow. Permanent communication with customers talking to
them, listening to them, and understandings their needs is also one of the key factors of the
Rolls Royce success (Zeithaml et al. 1990). Sustainability continues to make RR a better
company by reducing waste, lowering costs, driving innovation, increasing productivity
which helped them to fulfill both their short and long term target goals. (George &
Weimerskirch 1998; Powell 1995).
According to Camp (1989), benchmarking seeking superior performance by
searching for best practice in any measurable dimension. Rolls-Royce conduct numerous
assessments and measures for their almost all processes and practices (Foden & Berends,
2010). There are four main types of benchmarking, including internal, competitor,
functional and generic benchmarking (ASQ, 2011). Similarly, the main purpose of
assessments and measures conducted in Rolls-Royce is to control the quality of outcomes
and to compare the performance of their processes within the company, with competitors,
with others similar processes, and across organizations. In other words, the four types of
benchmarking is practiced in Rolls-Royce. That is clearly found in the high attention RollsRoyce give in terms of global indices for environment, efficiencies and other indicators.
Furthermore, their scores are consecutively improved over period, which reflects how
significant tools benchmarking is for Rolls-Royce (Rolls-Royce, 2010). Additionally, and
according to Rob Brown, Rolls-Royce do not save any effort to learn from others, referring
to thier emphasis on avoiding big companies syndrome of nothing is good as long as not
invented in-house (Measure for measure, 2012).
QMS is framework whereby organizational structure, resources and processes,
procedures are designed and contextualized so that they goodly facilitate implementing
quality management (Pyzdek & Keller, 2003). Similarly, Rolls-Royce dedicate RRQMS
as embracing world-class process-based framework system whereby the overall activities
in the company are monitored and managed. Moreover, Rolls-Royce support their supply
chain quality through SABRe and GSP as standards and quality assurance practices and
facilitators. Moreover, Rolls-Royce is certified to different versions of ISO9001, ISO14001
and TickIT for difference processes and practices (Rolls-Royce, 2013).
Rolls-Royce adopted many of process improvement methodologies have been either
developed by internally such as Rolls-Royce Production System and Process Excellence,

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or combined with other approaches such as Process Basics, Process Flow and Process
Capabilities. The historical review of process improvement integrated in Rolls-Royce
shows their tendency to incremental continuous improvements (Hindle, 2013). This is the
most common form of how companies rely on to evolve and flourish nowadays. BPR is
however implemented in forms of projects to push the business process so that to keep
abreast of competitors (Bergman & Klefsj, 2003).
Lean production is seen as a multi-dimensional approach that encompasses a wide
variety of management practices. It includes Just-in Time (JIT), quality system, work
teams, cellular manufacturing and supplier management, etc. as an integrated system (Shah
& Ward, 2003). Rolls Royce used this method in civil nuclear manufacturing facility to get
all the benefits of lean production specially for minimizing lead-time (Rolls-Royce, 2013).
Lean minimizes the lead-time for the customer. (Melton, 2005)
Six Sigma approach is aimed to reduce cost of poor quality and customer
dissatisfaction. Six Sigma is defined as a business strategy used to improve business
profitability, to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of all operations to meet or to
exceed customers needs and expectations (Antony & Banuelas, 2001). By adopting this
method many companies have had great impact on cost structure and reached the
maximum potential of the approach in last decade. Adaptation of Six Sigma leads the
company to have a continuous product improvement. Rolls Royce put its customer at the
heart of its organization and always tries to improve its product to meet their customer
needs. The company used Six Sigma principle in their factory design to get all the benefit
from this method.
Robust Design method is central to improve quality and continuous engineering
productivity (Karl et al., 2011). This method has helped reduce the development time and
cost. Robust Design generates new design information for improving product quality/
reliability, performance, and cost (Pahadke, 1995). Adaptation of Robust Design helped
Rolls Royce to improve its product quality and continuous productivity. It also helps the
company to be competitive in the market it serves.
Leans cost effective process, and investing modernizing the IT systems within the
company, these measures helped the company to keep their prices reasonable compared to
other strong competitors operating in the market. For user based approach Rolls Royce
offers a variety of products that could satisfy the customer needs. As an example Dynamic
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positioning solutions, giving users a new experience of easy to use graphical interface and
cost effective operations. Meanwhile, manufacturing approach relates to product
conformance to specification, in that matter Rolls Royce works in close partnership with
their suppliers in order to meet or even exceed their quality requirement applies to
technology solutions as well as services.

6. DISCUSSION
TQM can be used as a tool for an organization to achieve higher quality throughout
the whole organization. In order to achieve the best quality results, it is important for
organizations to invest on resources that make it different. Communication with customers
and continuous improvement are also important strategies for the efforts to provide high
quality value added technological and services solutions.
The competition of todays business became more complicated than ever. Meeting
standards such as ISO 9000 and ISO 14000 series is not necessarily a guarantee for larger
market share. There is more to do beyond efficiency and benchmarking is more likely to be
the guidance to where to improve and how to improve it. Learning from others might be
the best strategy to accelerate shifting to excellence over all organizational levels.
Prioritizing the decision of process improvement is mainly dependent on the state of
technological advisement and the amount of change needed. Recognizing unspoken
customers needs together with meeting the spoken once efficiently is the key success to
win larger market share and lead your industry.
The main trust of lean production it that it can work collectively to create a smooth
high quality system. The system that can produce finished products when the customer
demands for it with little or no waste. So, Lean is serving the customer according to their
need and also giving opportunity to the company of lowering cost by eliminating waste.
The company adopts Six Sigma methods to lower cost, to minimize defects and to reduce
customer dissatisfaction. To meet the continuous improvement demand for product and
quality from the customers need always keeps the company in a competitive position.
Robust Design help the organization to reduce the development time and cost. This method
creates new design information to improve product quality.

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7. CONCLUSION
The values, tools and methodologies of quality have discussed in the theory part. It is
now clearer how the stated theories work in real life by focusing on the Rolls Royce
management practice. The company uses the mentioned tools, values and methodologies,
which is to provide a quality product according to their customer needs. Rolls Royce is
working with quality and quality management from a sustainable perspective, and they are
continuously trying to improve their products, services quality, and also their processes
with sustainability in mind. Many of their achieved goals can be connected with the large
network and the close collaboration with the suppliers. Rolls Royce has also invested in
energy saving technologies and managed to come up with revolutionary solutions
especially in the aviation industry, the thing that is an indication of their quality efforts.
These innovations and creative ideas have contributed to the market leading position in
retail industry, and thereby created a competitive advantage thanks to its quality products
and services that fulfil customers needs before and after sales. Rolls-Royce pays high
attention to all kinds of benchmarking to keep their overall performance in the lead. They
set their quality management system that is known as RRQMS to embrace in one
framework all specific sets of standards such as SABRe and GSP for supply chain
management, and ASME for manufacturing operations and processes. Additionally, RollsRoyce also focus on ISO certification including ISO 9001 and ISO 14001. The main theme
of process improvement in Rolls-Royce is continuous improvement, whereby changes are
added incrementally. The use of Lean along with Six Sigma has opened many
opportunities to best serve their customer. Robust design method helped the company
improve product quality and continuous productivity.

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8. REFERENCES
Antony, J. & Banuelas, R. (2001). A strategy for Survival. Manufacturing Engineer. 80 (3),
119-121.
ASQ (2011). Benchmarking - Quality Management | ASQ. [online] Available:
http://asq.org/service/body-of-knowledge/tools-benchmarking [2013-05-25].
Bicheno, John; Holweg, Matthias (2009). The Lean Toolbox. PICSIE.
Bergman, B. and Klefsj, B. (2010). Quality from Customer Needs to Customer
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Beattie, K. R. (1999). "Implementing ISO 9000: A study of its benefits among Australian
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