While manufacturing organizations tend to use mature quality practices—in regards to governance models, availability and use of metrics, quality management frameworks and certifications, and training—do their practices include a focus on the customer? What defines a customer-centric, quality culture and what are the driving factors of its success?

To answer these questions APQC(American Productivity and Quality Center) conducted correlation analysis on data, specifically for the manufacturing industries, from American Society for Quality – The Global Sate of Quality survey conducted by APQC for ASQ. The customer-centric quality culture can be defined by four statements that elucidate the organization’s relationship with its customer around quality:

Most of the survey respondents indicated they agree with the statements. However all cultural attributes were not weighted equally. The emphasis was placed on customer service and product performance, rather than two-way engagement or quality and what it means to the customer.

source: http://www.industryweek.com