The Gap Framework

– It’s pretty easy to mismanage quality. High quality means that all your daily activities must be focused on meeting your customers’ expectations. That’s not easy, but that’s exactly where the Gap Framework for quality can help you. This model identifies five distinct times in your organization when there might be a difference, or a gap, between how you manage quality and how you should be managing quality. Let’s take a quick look at each one of these. The first gap happens when management doesn’t clearly understand what the customer wants. You design and produce products based on what you think the customer wants. But if this is wrong, you’re making the wrong stuff. Close this gap by staying close to your customer. Marketing and sales people can help you know when your customers’ needs are changing. The second gap is between the company’s quality goals and the written specifications their employees must follow. When those high-level goals aren’t clear, performance standards may not be able to meet your needs. This can happen in product design, factory operations, and even administrative procedures. Middle managers can make sure quality goals are understood and properly defined in day-to-day processes. Gap three happens when written specifications aren’t followed. If a job isn’t being done according to procedure, this must be addressed, or the specification needs to be rewritten. It’s up to first-level supervisors to determine Gap four is the difference between what the company promises and what they actually deliver. For example, don’t promise three-day delivery unless you can do this every time. Your customers expect you to meet your quality commitments, and it’s up to management to make that happen. This leads us to the final and most difficult gap to manage, the difference between what your customer expects and how they view the quality they get. It’s really hard to manage how someone perceives quality, but it’s also really important, because customers make future buying decisions based on their perception of your performance today. And so, you manage gap five by minimizing the other four gaps. Be close to your customers so you know their needs and requirements, even as they change. Make sure that written procedures are correct, are followed, and properly express the company’s quality goals, and don’t make promises you can’t meet. This will help you meet customer expectations and increase repeat business. The thing I like best about the gap model is that it can be applied at any level. You can evaluate the company’s overall quality program or you can analyze a single process. Try it out, download The Gap Framework handout in the exercise files. Pick a customer-related process in your department and weigh it against the first four gaps. How is your process stacking up against customer expectations? against customer expectations?