This document provides an overview of starting an SPC (Statistical Process Control) project. It discusses common challenges faced when implementing SPC, such as negative perceptions. It emphasizes having a structured plan for an SPC project, including developing a business case, gaining senior management support, defining strategies and KPIs, conducting training, and planning pilot projects. Future posts will expand on each step, such as quantifying benefits for the business case and selecting a strong senior champion to guide the project.

1. Starting a SPC Project – Part 1
Welcome to my first real blog. Over the coming months, I’ll be posting regular articles, hints and tips
which will hopefully help you in your continuous journey of process improvement. The majority will
focus around Statistical Process Control (SPC) and how this quality tool can be successfully
implemented. DON’T WORRY – being an engineer rather than a statistician I don’t like to get bogged
down to much in the maths so I’ll try to keep everything as simple and practical as possible with
plenty of real life examples.
Also, there will hopefully be some sort of logical progression to the posts and cover various
applications and techniques which can be used across different industries.
This first blog seems to have coincided with us rolling out a new ‘advanced SPC theory’ training
course which has been developed to bridge the significant gap which exists between engineers and
managers who understand the basic concepts of SPC and process capability but are unable to
effectively apply it to their sometimes complex manufacturing environments and hence never
realise the full benefits. There will be much more on this topic in the coming weeks...
However, the first topic I would like to look and the one which is probably the biggest hurdle which
faces most engineers when trying to implement SPC is the general negativity surrounding this
subject in many organisations. Everyone has an opinion on why it is not for us!
Many people have had bad experiences of completing paper SPC charts for apparently no real
purpose but also there are many other reasons people give including:
- “SPC is only for automotive applications”
- “Our industry regulations do not allow SPC, we must do 100% inspection”
- “Our manufacturing volume is too low for SPC”
- “We don’t have time to do SPC”
- “Our manufacturing tolerances are too tight for SPC”

2. However, these same companies seem happy to shoulder the costs continuous inspection,
manufacturing scrap parts not to mention the hidden costs of repair and rework. I have previously
written about this topic here and strongly believe the root causes is a lack of understanding of
quality engineering at all levels of the business. Many companies still manage quality through final
inspection and many professionals continue to believe that quality tools are of relevance solely to
the automotive industry and not applicable to their business. This misconception stems from a
fundamental lack of understanding of how the tools can help. Although many professionals are
familiar with SPC and statistical terms such as Cp (potential process capability) & Cpk (actual process
capability), they often don’t fully appreciate their proper use and therefore struggle to relate them
to process performance or product quality.
A good example is the way in which process performance is measured. In many companies, quality is
only measured in terms of number of scrap or concessions (where the product fails to achieve the
quality standard but is allowed to pass through the process anyway where is may be repaired further
down the line or worst case at the customers final assembly line). This type of measure is purely re-
active and although providing a measure of ‘bad quality’ actually does very little to proactively
reduce or avoid errors. There is a clear need for a system in place to monitor the causes as well as
the effects of bad quality. This includes monitoring ‘right fists time’ yield (RFT), re-work, process
capability (Cp & Cpk) and SPC alarms and trends. These are the measures that really identify waste
and drive process improvement and if they are taken care of, ‘bad quality’ will naturally reduce and
productivity increase. At the moment it is undoubtedly a case of ‘wrong metrics driving wrong
behaviour’ whereby manufacturing errors are simply managed rather than their root causes
investigated and eliminated.
If you are considering implementing SPC you will probably be fully aware that these issues exist. This
is actually a good thing and tacking these attitudes and behaviours will be a key first step in getting
your SPC project off the ground. There are a few approaches but the objective is to ensure that your
first project, no matter how big or small is successful. This will be the focus of next weeks blog...
Ben

3. Starting a SPC Project – Part 2
Todays blog follows on from part 1 where I introduced some of the challenges which you might face
when trying to roll out SPC in your company. As you can see from the various points raised, many of
them are due to the inherent behaviours and practices in the business otherwise known as your
organisation ‘culture’. This probably runs right through your company from managers to the shop
floor but hopefully there are a few ‘believers’ in there somewhere who understand the benefits of
SPC and will be supportive!
In my experience, the only way to ensure a project which involves a major culture change to be
successful is make sure that it is visible and is structured around a clear business process that
includes actors from all levels of the organisation. The most critical point however, is that the
proposed benefits of the SPC project have to be clearly linked to the overall business objectives and
targets. If not, your project will never get the support and drive that is needed and will be doomed
to fail.
Companies all have a slightly different approach to rolling out SPC ranging from small pilots to huge
site or company wide deployments. However, all the successful projects I have seen follow a
structured plan which include the items below.

4. 1. Business Case
2. Senior Champion
3. Strategy including KPI’s
4. Cross functional SPC Business Process
5. Training needs analysis and plan
6. Clearly defined pilot projects
7. Deployment plan
The most successful projects which I have been involved with all had a common ingredient – A
strong champion who truly believed in the benefits of SPC. This person was not some distant CEO
but was at a senior enough level to ensure that the project was given high priority across all of the
organisation ensuring everyone pulled together regardless of which department was leading the
project. However, I have also seen projects fail although they had a good senior sponsor because
some of the other factors listed above and had not been considered.
During the final part of this short series I will expand on the basic plan above and look at what each
of these steps entails.
Ben
SPC Project - Key Tasks
During part 2 of this short series I highlighted the importance of having a structured process to
ensure the success of the SPC project. During this final part, I’ll outline some of the key components
and consideration for each step.
1. Business Case
- SPC is one of those topics where almost everyone will agree that it is a good thing and know the
general benefits such as improved process control, reduced waste, empowering operators etc.
However, any project will have an associated cost and these qualitative statements don’t cut it with
the financial guy’s when you need a budget for the project!

5. - A poor business case is the reason why many projects fail to even get off the ground. However,
there are many benefits which can be quantified and the return on investment of a SPC project is
normally relatively fast.
- The benefits should be considered using a fishbone type approach and broken down into
categories such as:
 Quality / Waste Improvement – Scrap, rework, concession etc.
 Production Easement – lighten inspection frequency, optimise maintenance etc.
 Organisation – Real time analyse reduces engineer analysis time etc.
 QMS – If SPC software is used there are many additional QMS benefits including reduced
audit time, tighter control of documentation, reduced human error etc.
The critical point in the business case is not only having a good ROI but ensuring that the benefits are
linked directly to the overall business objectives. Otherwise you will not receive the support needed.
I have a more detailed document which we use to calculate SPC benefits. Please email me if you
would like to receive a copy.
2. Senior champion
- Finding a senior champion could be the first step of the project but already having a business case
can’t hurt. A good focused project champion is the single most important element in determining
the success of the project. There are many famous ‘top level’ champions such as GE’s Jack Welch but
unless you are deploying a company wide initiative you need someone a little lower down the food
chain! Basically you need someone who has some cross functional responsibility. Generally this
could be the plant manager or maybe the business unit manager. The champion will ensure all of the
various stakeholders are fully engaged, attend high level project reviews, remove obstacles and
generally ensure the project stays on track and delivers the benefits.
3. Strategy including KPI’s
- We touched on this topic during part 2 and there are various ways in which SPC can be deployed
ranging from small pilot project to full company-wide roll-outs. Either way, it is important that there
is a both a clear strategic and deployment plan. The plan will form the backbone for driving and
monitoring the project. This should document the overall business benefits defined in the business
case, how these flow down into specific key performance indicators (KPI’s). It should also specific the

6. various stakeholders and their roles and responsibilities. The deployment plan should include the
time frame for each of the project elements.
- A key part of the strategy is to ‘sell’ the project to all the stakeholders. Although the project may
eventually be forced onto them by the champion it is far better for the project to be ‘pulled’ rather
than ‘pushed’. This can be achieved by running some basic manager training workshops and by
ensuring the KPI’s have clear benefit for each stakeholder.
4. Cross Function Business Process
- This is again a key point and an area where I have seen many projects fall down. As with all other
processes in your business there are many different people involved, with different roles and
responsibilities. For a SPC project we are generally talking about Operations, Engineering, Quality,
Design and IT - if SPC software is being used. IT is becoming an increasingly important stakeholder
and this point will be covered in a separate blog post.
It is important that each of the people involved know what is expected of them and when action is
needed. For example – a shop floor operator will probably be collecting some sort of measurement
data which will be plotted onto a control chart either manually or automatically. The next question is
whether the operator is responsible for analysing the charts for special causes? If so, what should
they do when they detect one – stop the process, call engineer/supervisor or do nothing? It is
important to document these processes and ensure everyone understand them. The SPC process
and related procedures should form part of your quality management system (QMS). Please contact
me if you would like to see some examples of these documents.
We are starting to see that setting up a successful SPC project is not as straight forward as simply
putting a control char tout on the shop floor. However, it needn’t and shouldn’t be too complicated
either. Next time I’ll cover the final 3 points in this series.
Ben

7. SPC Project - Key Tasks Continued...
OK, this will be the final part of this series where we have looked at some of the key things you need
to consider when launching a new SPC project. Last time, we started to add some detail to the key
project tasks and hopefully I explained how important the front end of this process is to the overall
success of your project. During this final part I’ll look at the deployment phase of project but still
focused on the organisation rather than the nuts and bolts which we’ll look at in the future.
5. Training Analysis & Plan
- Ensuring the project team and other stakeholders understand SPC will obviously be critical to the
project success. The level of understanding required though will differ though. Therefore, you will
need to develop a training strategy based on the roles and responsibilities of the team which you
defined in step 4.
- Generally this would be something along the lines of:
 Top level Overview – e.g. project champion and manager level stakeholders
 Basic SPC – e.g. engineers, shopfloor supervisors, key project actors
 Advanced SPC – e.g. project leader, engineers, SPC specialist roles
 Shopfloor – e.g. end users on the shopfloor.
- Once you have decided the necessary level of training, the next task is to deploy the training in the
right sequence and time frame. This should be done starting from the top because as mentioned
previously it is critical that the key stakeholders who will drive the project forward are fully ‘bought-
in’ and supportive. Training plays a key role in this. Also, the timing is important and should be
aligned with the pilot projects. There is no point training someone who then does not have anything
to do with SPC for 6 months!

8. 6. Pilot Projects
Now we are getting down to the bones! Success of the initial projects is very important as it has a
huge impact on how SPC is perceived in the future. Therefore, the pilot project should be carefully
selected. Some pointers would be:
 Should have clear and measurable business benefits
 Should currently be on the ‘quality radar’
 Should be manageable – i.e. do not choose an issue which has been the biggest quality
problem for 10 years which nobody has managed to solve yet! This can be the next one...!
- Once the projects are chosen, it is advisable to create a formal project charter document clearly
defining the purpose, scope, specific goals, steps and milestones, time frame, stakeholder
commitment, resource requirements etc. This is an important step and I’m thinking this could be an
article on its own in the future – In the meantime, please contact me if you would like an example.
7. Deployment Plan
So now all you have to do is put all of the above into some sort of time managed plan. Along with
the charter document, the deployment plan is your friend as it is what will be used to drive the
project forward by the champion and clearly shows how the project is progressing.

9. So that just about wraps up this short series of articles. Hopefully you have picked up a few tips and
realised that setting up a successful SPC project is not as simple as just putting a chart on the
shopfloor. However, you can be sure that a structured approach is time well spent and taking into
account the above steps will make your chances of success so much higher. Good luck! Please feel
free to contact me with any questions or simply post them on here.
Until next time...
Ben