Using QFD to drive improvement/innovation strategy in China and other developing countries: creating and sustaining a project culture by lean multiple voices collection and Design for Lean Six Sigma (DFLSS)

The Voice of the stakeholders such as customers, suppliers and employers could serve as company's strategic references. If these are collected systematically, QFD can be used to transform to consensus based corporate values, which can be used to become new business drivers. The case study presented shows how the selected organization can apply rapid systematic balanced voice collection in QFD and Design For Lean Six Sigma (DFLSS) approach to create project for continuous improvement and product innovation. With pressure of commodity costs rising and fluctuation, the rapid, sustainable and correct identification of voices to pinpoint and maximize values, and reduce cost become of prime importance to corporate survival and competitiveness. China is a value-based managed country, the corporate culture reinforcement by the above tools have proven to be a successful example for other enterprises in developing countries. The paper will discuss the above approach and digest the lessons learnt from the applications.