Good morning Ladies & Gentlemen,
I am delighted to be offered this opportunity to speak to you all on the topic of Global Quality Network. I will speak for 15-20 minutes and will not be adding too much to your PowerPoint boredom level, there are only a few slides to be presented.
Slide 1
Let us recall the primary role of this IAQG General Assembly. This is a two way communication forum, to update you on the actions launched through the IAQG and to gather your feedback and inputs for these and future actions priorities. It is vital that this forum is active rather than passive. We have an obligation to ensure that these assemblies add value. We are all here because our companies trust us when we say that this meeting is important and that it is valuable.
You will have the opportunity to give us your views, comments, suggestions this afternoon. Please use this session to help ensure that the IAQG stays focussed on the right priorities by contributing actively throughout the day & be sure to spread the messages from today through your companies when you return. If you only file the presentations in your offices, if you only brief a handful of Quality specialists then you are passive and we really need each and every one of you to be active members of our Global Quality Network.
We must all understand the changing nature of the quality role in modern aerospace companies.
Quality is no longer only a label for a specialist department, it is woven into the fabric of every department in the company from the CEO to the shop floor. This brings new challenges, new opportunities and new threats to traditional Quality leaders. These are facts of a changing business world, the only question is whether we, collectively and individually in this room have the vision, the understanding, the capability and the energy to master these new Quality challenges.
Slide 2 – Globalisation
To understand the effects that globalisation is having on our
industry we need only look to the rationalisation clearly achieved in
the aircraft and engines sector. We have now reached a stable duopoly in airframes above 100 seats. We have reduced to only 4 engine manufacturers capable of powering these aircraft although these 4 have been obliged to create alliances and joint ventures to give a more international level of acceptance and efficiency. In the equipment supply business the consolidation is equally impressive with the creation of giant corporations with global supply chains and global customer bases. We are in the business of globalisation, we feed the trend with the means to travel throughout the global network of customers and suppliers and we need the trend to continue if we are to survive and prosper. The last group in this value chain to achieve the level of rationalisation demanded by commercial realities are the airlines themselves. Even if we do not consider the 160 small airlines worldwide and excluding also the 160 freight airlines, we still count 60 airlines in the Americas, 70 in the Asia-Pacific and Middle East regions and 120 in Europe and Africa. This is commercially unsustainable and with or without the current conflict, it cannot continue like this.
The supply side of our industry is dominated by a handful of global giants while the demand side is still too fragmented and is suffering as a result of local, regional & national myopia. So the trend must, and will, continue and our companies will adapt and survive or resist and die.
So how does all of this globalisation affect the Quality departments of our companies and how does it affect us, as Quality leaders in our industry.
We also must adapt to survive and this means that we must be prepared to work in a truly international context. This means much more than simply collecting local or national inputs into a pseudo-international approach.
It means that we must be prepared to progressively work in international bodies in preference to national or regional bodies. It means we must take more direct control of our future by working together as industrial companies and relying less on local or national associations to represent our interests in the politically correct but now increasingly inappropriate structures of the past.
The Airbus policy on this subject is clear. We will direct our efforts towards the initiatives and actions of the IAQG and towards a truly
international approach. We will progressively withdraw our resources from the old local and national structures as these become replaced by the growing set of international initiatives and actins. Airbus will not become a Quality Dinosaur, extinction is not on our agenda.
In parallel with this shift towards an international approach, there is another key change which must be embraced. As I mentioned earlier, the role of Quality is changing. In some companies Quality is shrinking, away from the challenge of actively helping the company to adapt to the new challenges of globalisation and in these companies, Quality will become reduced to a small group of specialists that no-one understands and no-one values.
In more successful companies, Quality is expanding, into the challenge. Using the skills, experience, tools and techniques of Quality specialists and finally speaking the language of business.
Slide 3
I will borrow some words from Joseph Juran who hopefully is well known to everyone here today.
“Top Management concepts of Quality derive from the way in which quality has an impact on the business… On volume of sales, share of market, costs, ROI, employee and customer relations”.
“See to it that you engage in both breakthrough improvement and control, and orient these activities to the business objectives of the company”.
“In my observation, the Quality manager who engages in breakthrough and control, with a clear emphasis on business objectives, has little problem with lack of interest on the part of his top management”.
In the words from Juran lie the key to the future of New Quality, here lies the opportunity.
The words are simple, the opportunity is clear but beware :
Slide 4
Another quote, this time from Thomas Edison on the subject of opportunity.
“Opportunity is often missed because it comes dressed in overalls and looks like work”.
This work will only get done if we are prepared to resource the activities. We will only resource the activities if we genuinely believe the work to be worthwhile. The work will get done more efficiently if we work together and support each other.
Slide 5
The IAQG is built upon this principle of working together on activities that are worthwhile.
Purpose : “Establish and maintain a dynamic cooperation based on trust between international aerospace companies on initiatives to make significant improvements in quality performance and reductions in cost throughout the value chain”.
You will hear more of the purpose, vision, strategy and actions of the IAQG later from Gary and Steve, but by bringing global standards, requirements, tools and techniques the benefits will apply to everyone in the value chain.
The value of IAQG as an industry driven body, able to tackle tough issues in a professional and rapid way is becoming well recognised by the Regulatory Authorities.
The Authorities are very supportive of the drive for global standardisation and the FAA vision has been clearly presented.
Slide 6
“To face with the challenges of worldwide aeronautical production : a manufacturing system where new parts may be released wherever they are produced from under just one authority surveillance is a goal fully supported by the other attending authorities and agreed by the Industry itself”.
The creations of these standards, in the 9100 series, are being progressively driven down from the primes through all levels in the global supply chain. This will greatly reduce the burden of multiple auditing both for suppliers and customers.
You will hear more this afternoon on the subject of special processes harmonisation. We know that this is a subject of great importance. We know that you tell us this is one of the most significant sources of variation in our processes. You tell us that this variation is a big cost driver and source of waste. We are making progress on harmonising the management systems but technical harmonisation is proving difficult. In order to really move forward in this we will need to quantify the value of this waste. This is the only way we will be able to consider the investment that will be needed in dedicated Engineering resources. The costs will be high to achieve real value adding harmonisation, so the savings will have to be even higher and we will need to have a good commitment to materialise these savings in order to launch these investments.
To support the successful deployment of these standards the Airbus policy is clearly to adopt international standards in preference to national or company standards wherever possible. This policy is shared by all IAQG council members so for those of you still unfamiliar with the 9100 series of standards please take the action to become familiar and to become compliant as soon as possible.
Slide 7
In conclusion, there are great opportunities and great obligations that have to be taken up by the Global Quality Network :
· If we listen, to the changing global environment in which we work
· If we understand, what we need to do to help our companies adopt and master these changes
· If we act, professionally as business leaders, speaking the language of business and not only as narrow Quality specialists.
We can benefit from these opportunities, we have a tremendous contribution to make in our industry, and this will be possible only if we work;
Slide 8
Together – In a Global Quality Network