Robustness Development and Reliability Growth: Value-Adding Strategies for New Products and Processes

This book integrates key tools and processes into a comprehensive program for developing more robust and reliable technology-based products. Drawing on their extensive product development experience, the authors present a complete process for ensuring product performance throughout the entire lifecycle, from understanding customers’ needs through manufacturing and post-launch support.

The authors begin by presenting broad insights and high-level strategies for improving product quality. Next, they demonstrate how to implement robustness and reliability strategies that complement existing governance and decision processes. A section on tools and methods shows how to institutionalize best practices and apply them consistently. Finally, they tie strategies, decisions, and methods together through a case study project.

Product developers will learn how to

• Understand critical drivers of value in technology products, including reliability and durability
• Implement a process model and roadmap for improving reliability and robustness
• Increase robustness early in development, leading to shorter cycle times in later phases
• Improve the stability of production performance under stress conditions
• Assess both organizational and process capabilities for delivering robust and reliable products
• Understand and manage customer-driven requirements
• Use tools including descriptive and inferential statistics and DOE-based empirical models

Managers will understand expectations for

• Design concepts supported by rigorous analyses of alternatives
• Products and processes delivering higher value to customers
• Products with higher reliability and longer useful lives
• Product processes with lower costs and higher capabilities
• Development projects having shorter, more predictable cycle times

Readers are introduced to many thought leaders whose writings can be sources of further learning. This book is a valuable resource for anyone responsible for delivering reliable, profitable technology products, including general managers, program managers, engineers, scientists, and reliability and quality professionals.