Minutes from Board Review of Quality Management...

Minutes from Board Review of Quality Management System no 32/07

Improving PhD practice through the use of ISO 9001

Abstract:

In spite of complying with ISO 9000, some organizations remain ineffective. Is this caused by the ISO 9000 standard itself or is it due to the standard being poorly implemented in the organization? This paper aims at testing the hypothesis that the fault lies primarily in the standard. The empirical research design consists of setting up an ISO 9000 compliant management system for a single person company and then trying to show that no matter how well the management system is designed, the results will not meet the expectations of the standard. After four annual cycles of running this experiment, the results are not impressive. However, rather than identifying problems with the ISO 9000 standard, each cycle has primarily identified weaknesses in how the standard has been implemented. Continued research is needed for identifying the real weaknesses of ISO 9000.

Contents:

41 Introduction

52 Literature review

52.1 Scientific research as knowledge production

52.2.1 How to get into the system

62.2.2 A model of how to do scientific research

72.2.3 How to review scientific papers

72.2.4 Improving the research process through double loop learning and action research

82.2 Information systems; feedback and control

82.2.1 The basic GTD framework

92.2.2 Restrictions due to the GTD+R interpretation

92.2.3 Meeting some of the restrictions of ISO 9001:2008

102.3 Strategies for performance improvement

122.3.1 Costs of quality

122.3.2 Maturity levels and excellence models

122.3.3 Payoff functions in the GTD+R game design of GTD

132.3.4 Integrating payoff from GTD and ISO 9000 in weekly reviews

142.3.5 Claims of the ISO 9000 framework that we would like to challenge

152.4 Quality management system

152.4.1 General requirements

162.4.2 Documentation requirements

192.4.3 ISO 9000 implementation advice

202.5 Management responsibility

202.5.1 Management commitment

212.5.2 Customer focus

212.5.3 Policy and plans

222.5.4 Planning

232.5.5 Management system

232.5.6 Complexity theory as a basis for management systems design

242.6 Resource management

242.6.1 Provision of resources

262.6.2 Human resources

272.6.3 Infrastructure

272.6.4 Work environment

272.7 Realization of product

282.7.1 Planning

292.7.2 Customer-related processes

312.7.3 Design and development

362.7.4 Purchasing

372.7.5 Production and service provision

382.7.6 Control of monitoring and measuring devices

392.8 Measurements, analysis and improvement

392.8.1 General

412.8.2 Monitoring and measurements

442.8.3 Control of non-conforming products

442.8.4 Analysis of data

462.8.5 Improvement

503 Method

503.1 General comments

513.2 Data collection and analysis

524 Results

524.1 The context of doing industrial PhD research

524.2 The management system

534.2.1 Writing scientific papers

534.2.2 Overview of administrative processes

544.2.3 The management system

564.2.4 The monthly NTAX status process

564.3 Quality policy

564.3.1 Progress checklists







624.5.3 Quality policy

624.5.4 Planning

634.5.5 Responsibility, authority and communication

654.5.6 Management review






764.7 Product realization

764.7.1 Planning of product realization



834.7.4 Purchasing


884.7.6 Control of monitoring and measuring devices

894.8 Measurements, analysis and improvement

904.8.1 General

924.8.2 Monitoring and measurement

964.8.3 Control of nonconforming product

1014.8.4 Analysis of data

1024.8.5 Improvement

1055 Discussion

1055.1 Productivity

1055.3.1 Overview of results

1055.2 Control and defects

1065.2.1 Game theory

1065.3 Improvement

1065.3.1 Implications of the study for current theory

1075.3.2 ISO 9001 design theory

1085.3.3 Theory for using GTD as a basis for ISO 9001 design













1125.7 Product realisation

1125.7.1 Planning of product realization



1155.7.4 Purchasing


1165.7.6 Control and monitoring of measurement devices

1165.8 Measurement, analysis and improvement

1165.8.1 General

1165.8.2 Monitoring and measurement

1175.8.5 Improvement

1196 Conclusion and further research

1196.1 Conclusion

1196.2 Further research

121References

123Appendix

1 Introduction

Doing PhD research is a complicated and difficult task. In order to contribute on how the work can be done in an efficient manner, there is a growing body of literature on “how to get a PhD” (e.g. Philllips & Pugh, 2000). Some of the advice in this literature consists of designing a personal management system, in order to make sure work is progressing systematically, papers are filed in a proper manner and so on. The Getting Things Done (GTD) framework (Allen, 2001) is an example of an all-purpose management system for individuals. The ISO 9000 literature provides standards and guidelines for management system.

· The research question in this document consists of investigating how the GTD and ISO 9000 can be used as a successful approach for PhD self-management.

Following this introduction, the theoretical and practical context of the research will be explained through the literature review in section two. In chapter three there is a research design for investigating the general research question in a concrete setting, explaining how action research in one context should be able to contribute insights for the situation in general. The results are presented in chapter four. In chapter five the findings are is discussed within the context of theory and related research from chapter two, arguing how the findings from the particular action research case can be generalized for a larger population. Conclusion and suggestions for further research follow in chapter six.

2 Context

In section 2.1 we review literature on the dynamic nature of research as a production system. In section 2.2 we look at control strategies relevant for this particular type of system, primarily focusing on lean management and the GTD model. In section 2.3 we do a critical review of the social environment surrounding the ISO 9000-based qualtiy management system. Sections 2.4 to 2.8 are then designed to correspond with chapters 4-8 in the ISO 9001:2008 standard.

2.1 Scientific research as knowledge production

Before reviewing ways of controlling and improving the work done by a research scientist, we start by describing the nature of scientific work as seen through the SIPOC model and related literature that puts the work process into a context that makes it possible for analysis.

Figure 2.1. SIPOC model

The SIPOC model above (SIPOC = source, input, process, output & customer) presents a broad picture of the research process without identifying control mechanisms.

One way of thinking about this process is to see the source as starting with research ideas and ending the publication of scientific results and updates in the FRIDA database. As papers may also be rejected by journals and conferences, we will also refer to the model in figure 2.1 when it ends with rejection.

If we view the process from a higher level, it should also be possible to think of the h-index as a measure of customer satisfaction, meaning that the process in the SIPOC model shows how ideas are planted in publications, just like seeds are planted in a garden, the hope being that the papers will be cited if they are important and of high quality.

However, as will be illustrated in the Jenkins model and other comments below, it is the initial interpreation of the research process that will be prime interpretation of the diagram while parameters like the h-index will be used as a part of the control process to be discussed in section 2.3.

2.1.1 A model of how to do scientific research

Seen from the perspective of the Jenkins’ model of the research process, the process goes through eight steps. It starts with an idea and ends up as published results, using the following steps:

· Idea

· Literature search

· Research topic

· Research strategy

· Experiment design

· Data capture

· Data analysis

· Publish results

The results are typically published according to the IMRAD model (introduction, material and methods, results, and discussion).

Wallace (1969) has another interesting model that describes research as a wheel that looks as though it may be the basis for the “research wheel” used by Rudestam and Newton (1992).

2.1.2 How to write and review scientific papers

If we apply the design theory suggested by Petroski (1982) and others, then there is not really “one best way” of writing and reviewing papers, but there are many bad ways that should be avoided. There is some literature of this type, editors producing frequency statistics of reasons why they reject papers, typically including reasons that there is lack of theory or mismatch between theory and method. This kind of literature could perhaps be useful for understanding how to improve work processes.

Learning by failing is a principle that links with the issue of control, the topic of section 2.2. However, it should be possible to learn from previous experience without having to repeat the failures of others all the time. The IMRAD model and other models represent a way of not having to start from scractch. If we have a model of how to do research, then the focus could be to validate this model and perhaps compare and contrast it with other models. The lean model is a way of thinking about research in terms of maintaining a steady flow of papers through the SIPOC model, controlling the flow of the papers rather than the papers one by one.

Figure 2.1.2. Ecological system

The ecological system in figure 2.1.2 is used as a model for illustrating a production system having reached a stage of control without being controlled from above. From the viewpoint of a given researcher, the goal is to enter such an ecolocial system of other researchers and figure out how to become a part of the system.

However, due to the peer review process, it is difficult to get work published and improve the h index without working in a disciplined manner. The purpose of section 2.2 is to review literature on how to control and improve the research process.

2.2 The social aspects of the research process

In section 2.1 and 2.2, the perspective of production and control has been described more or less in the language of how to control any sort of machine. In section 2.3 the focus will be on psychological and social realities, as scientists are people, having to deal with subjects like politics, conflict, motivation and so on.

Figure 2.2. The game of science

In figure 2.2 a game tree is used for illustrating the general metaphor of this section, namely the role of interaction and decision making in order to succeed with science.

The figure 2.1, 2.2 and 2.3 illustrate three different mathematical structures for analysing the same problem domain. The ecological diagram in section 2.1 illustrated the idea of each system having its own dynmical structure. In section 2.2 we discuss the design of system for achieving control over a system, while in this section 2.3 the idea is that our attempts to control will be met by counter moves, like for instance seeing the relationship between “sensor”, “controller”, “system” as three player game representing a conflict between three different interests.

In section 2.3.1 the focus will be on external players, like researchers and academics surrounding the person trying to publish. In section 2.3.2 the focus will be on internal players in the sense of understanding motivation and self-control as games the individual is playing against a future self.

2.2.1 The social context of doing research

Phillips & Pugh (2000) start their book with a chapter on deciding to become a postgraduate and then a chapter on how to get into the system. In describing how to get into the system, they imply that doing PhD research can be seen as an activity within a larger system, indicating what some of the components of this system might be. The diagram below indicates that the student could see himself as a team player, representing the supervisor, the research group and the institution in a friendly battle against researchers from other communities.

Sinderman (2001) describes the world of science as a game that consists of two things; first it is necessary to be technically skilled to do good science, and then it is necessary to be socially skilled to understand the social aspects of the game.

Latour (1987) makes similar comments about science as a discussion game that consists of trying to convince the others in a battle of theory against theory. Schwanitz (2002) uses the metaphor of gangs fighting each other. When regarding such comments in the context of the model above, the general idea seems to be that the PhD student is supposed to help his supervisor, his research group and the institution in contributing in the conviction game as it is played against other institutions.

An example of a possible intervention for someone doing research and being a member of the Design Group at the University of Oslo, might be to interpret the theories and ideas of Kristen Nygaard in a context where they might make a contribution to new fields such as software process improvement and software quality management.

2.2.2 Games of self-motivation and flow

In the case of single-person organizations, organizational politics is reduced to understanding the game of self-control that we are all playing for getting things done. In this section I would particularaly like to look into psychological theories like Flow-theory (Czikzenmihaly, 1991) and how a game-design for GTD might be useful for motivating quality improvement. By stressing this aspect, the ISO 9000 exercise quickly becomes a research framework for doing self-motivation research. I believe this could be seen as a cotinuation of how Lewin (1943) used the framework of scientific management for doing his studies of applied psychology.

In the case of self-motivation, I have sometimes felt that I feel more motivated when I think like a machine. I don’t know if I have any good metaphors for explaining this idea in deeper detail, but when I used the Space 1999 episode “Ring Around the Moon” as a model for understanding my own behavior at DNMI, I believe this had a significant impact on my productivity. At least, there is no doubt that the trail of documents I produced at the time correspond with high productivity, although I am not sure about the quality. One of the main ideas was to get productivity and then work on quality, much like Japan evolved after the second world war. It was also a process that made me “think like a programmer” in terms of developing algorithms that would make me think less and try to create similar results to what I had previously done by developing algorithms and procedures. This was also an approach that I used at SKD, and I believe it was quite successful to a certain degree, the only problem being that I did not properly understand how to design a document in order to make it work as a scientific document.

2.3 Information systems; feedback and control

Information systems can be understood as control systems (Beniger, 1984). Information has to be about something, and it is this “something” that we want to understand and control. In figure 2.2 the box named “system” is supposed to be an ecological system similar to the diagram in figure 2.1.2 and the rest of the diagram illustrates the information system surrounding this system in order to understand, control and improve performance.

Figure 2.3. Control model

Although the system itself can be very complex, the structure of the information system does not necessarily have to be complex, as will be illustrated when we review the GTD and GTD+R control systems in section 2.2.1 and 2.2.2.

In section 2.2.3 and onwards, the focus will be on how to use ISO 9000 for improving performance of the GTD-based control system.

2.3.1 The basic GTD framework

The GTD method consists of planning, monitoring and review. The diagram below presents the method from the perspective of monitoring, showing how there are five steps of workflow (“horizontal control”) from (1) collection of stuff into “inbox”, (2) processing through the flowchart and (3) organizing into buckets at each terminal, (4) review from each bucket back to inbox and (5) next action at the bottom of the chart.

The principle of “vertical planning” is also included in the model through the loop described by boxes named projects and project plans. The idea is that the planning is driven by activity, but that planning can happen on different levels, from the very detailed (“ground level”) up to the highest possible level (“50 000 feet”). Nevertheless, planning is an activity that is driven by the main action, namely the workflow itself.

In the same way as planning, review is also an integrated part of the loop, recomended as a weekly review of all the boxes in the diagram. The added arrows going from the terminal boxes back to the inbox is how I have chosen to illustrate how the reviews can be integrated into the general workflow and how the workflow drives the reviews.

Figure 2.2.1. GTD workflow model (sligthly modified by adding feedback arrows)

The project planning (“vertical perspective”) on the left side of the diagram follows the five step method of (1) purpose, (2) goals, (3) brainstorming, (4) organizing and (5) next action. The planning process is handled as a part of workflow by first identifying the “next action” for an in-item as “planning”, and then using the review process for project control.

Allen (2001) has defined a framework for time management called Getting Things Done (GTD) with focus on process rather than on deadlines and priorities. The basic ideas look very similar to Lean Management (Womack & Jones, 2003), although not formal comparison seems yet to have been done.

Womack and Jones list the following:

1. Specify value in the eyes of the customer

2. Identify the value stream and eliminate waste

3. Make value flow at the pull of the customer

4. Involve and empower employees

5. Continuously improve in the pursuit of perfection

In the case of GTD, it seems that it is the three first points that are the most important ones. The first idea could perhaps link with the GTD project management model, while point two and three correspond to the ideas of collecting data and doing weekly reviews.

There are insights in the concept of ‘flow’ in terms of having clear goals producing a psychological state of happiness. It is apparent that updating this document causes a mild state of flow, but it does not necessarily mean that the process is meaningful. How can we improve the concept of ‘flow’ in a more efficient manner?

2.3.2 GTD+R as a design for viewing GTD as a game

Based on personal experiments in making GTD an easy, natural and fully integrated way of doing daily work, Ohta (2007) developed what he calls a game design for GTD. The system is designed as a card game, using Rhodia pieces of paper as cards, folders for keeping the cards during difference phases, a game board, rules and explanations.

The purpose of the game is to clear all the cards. As there is no explicit score system or payoff function, the game has to be thought of like playing Chess against nature. It is a single-person game, although in principle it might be possible to play against others by way of keeping track of winning or loosing the game of the day and then comparing after a certain number of days, or counting the number of wins or whatever one might agree upon.

If spending most of the day in front of a computer, it might be useful to implement GTD+R by use of mails and the folder for keeping mails. This makes it easier to count the number of mails in each folder, but it is still not so easy to define proper payoff functions that can be used for indicating whether the game of the days has be won or not. The goal should be to have as few items in the today folder as possible by the end of the day.

As seen in the overall flowchart, there are 8 boxes for organizing stuff as it is processes; (1) inbox, (2) someday/maybe, (3) references, (4) projects, (5) project plans, (6) calendar, (7) next actions, and (8) waiting for. In the case of GTD+R all processing is handled through the use of seven folders as described in the table below.

GTD+R

GTD

Inbox

Inbox

Today

Next action, calendar

Week

Calendar, daily review

Month

Calendar, weekly review

Someday/Maybe

Calendar, monthly review

Hold

Waiting for, weekly review

Blank (File)

References

The main difference here is that the calendar is represented in the shape of a simplified “tickler file”, and projects are represented as project plans to be processed and organized in a similar way to next action items.

While the general implementation idea of GTD+R is to use a paper based system, from a conceptual point of view it may equally well be implemented by the use of a email system or some other system.

2.3.3 Improving the research process through double loop learning and action research

The structure of the theory to follow consists of presenting a method for doing PhD research in terms of defining the specifications for PhD research, designing a system for managing the process and designing a system for improving the management system, structured in the shape of “double loop learning” (Argyris & Schön, 1978).

The loop on the right-hand side of the figure above consists of production (writing and reviewing papers, presenting work at conferences etc.). The general idea is to run the production system and then use management control for predicting progress. Problems within this inner loop should trigger improvements thought the outer loop on the left-hand side of the figure.

The process of action research is similar to the PDCA cycle that is explained in the ISO 9001 model (chapter 0.2 in the requirements standard). As will be explained in section 2.8 below, section 8 in the ISO 9001 standard includes requirements that fit well with the PDCA structure and the idea of designing improvement processes as action research processes.

2.3.4 Meeting some of the restrictions of ISO 9001:2008

Although ISO 9001 is fairly flexible in terms of how the requirements are being met, the following procedures have to be defined and documented:

· Document control

· Records control

· Internal audit

· Control of non-conforming product

· Corrective action

· Preventive action

The general idea of GTD 9001 is to use these six procedures for building and improving the whole system. The first procedure to implement is the “internal audit”, and the procedure should be implemented to be done as a part of the weekly review. As audits are carried out, the needs for implementing the other five procedures and all other requirements will automatically follow.

The important thing, of course, is that improvement projects and prevention projects are handled as any other project within the general workflow diagram at the top of this section (figure 3.1). The object of analysis and improvement is the workflow structure. The ISO 9001 model below (figure 3.1.2) is only a tool for analysing the quality management aspects of the management system.

Figure 2.3.4. ISO 9001:2008 Quality management model

While the GTD model is presented as a circular flow from top to bottom, the ISO 9000 model represents the same flow from left to right.

As there are about 50 clauses in the ISO 9004 framework that needs to be audited or checked each year, a simple way of integrating the management review (clause 5.6) with internal audits (clause 8.2.2) is to perform one audit each week and make sure that measurements and statistics related to each such audit follows an annual frequency.

First having given a literature overview on the PhD process and then an overview of payoff functions for ISO 9000 and GTD, the time has now come for presenting the ISO 9000 model itself (figure 2.3). The ISO 9000 model can be used as a model for understanding how quality management practice is being carried out in any type of organization, although the purpose of this document is to investigate the model within the context of single-person PhD research.

There is some literature on how to integrate the principles of lean production with the ISO 9001:2008 quality management standard (e.g. Guderian & Renaud, 2008), but there are few details on how this should be done. In the case of developing such an integrated model in the context of managing and improving PhD work, I have not found anything.

Nevertheless, lean and ISO 9000 are generic concepts, so the expectation is that the framework might work as well in the empirical domain of designing PhD research as in any other empirical domain. What the integration of the two theories promise is a quality management system that works according to just-in-time principles (pull-driven) with an approach towards improvement that is focused on reducing waste.

Although Grol et al (2003) discuss the PDCA cycle inherent in the ISO 9000 model as a research design, I have not found any literature so far on using the ISO 9001:2008 standard as a framework for quality improvement research. Endres (1997) suggests ISO 9000 for documenting the quality management system in any R&D unit, and supports this with some empirical research, but academic literature in general often has a rather critical view of the ISO 9000 standards. Seddon (1997), on the other hand, is known for holding particularly strong views against the standard, and has written several books about what he sees as problems with ISO 9000 and how to improve quality through alternative frameworks. Seddon's list of ten points, arguing against ISO 9000, is presented below.

1. ISO 9000 encourages organizations to act in ways which make things worse for their customers

2. Quality by inspection is not quality

3. ISO 9000 starts from the flawed presumption that work is best controlled by specifying and controlling procedures.

4. The typical method of implementation is bound to cause sub-optimization of performance.

5. The standard relies too much on people's, and in particular assessors', interpretation of quality.

6. The standard promotes, encourages, and explicitly demands actions which cause sub-optimization.

7. When people are subject to external controls, they will be inclined to pay attention only to those things which are affected by the controls.

8. ISO 9000 has discouraged managers from learning about the theory of variation.

9. ISO 9000 has failed to foster good customer-supplier relations.

10. As an intervention, ISO 9000 has not encouraged managers to think differently.

When reaching the discussion part of this thesis, a major issue will be to address each of these ten arguments against ISO 9000, testing whether the ISO 9001 design used in this document is able to meet each one of them.

In order to evaluate whether one strategy for developing quality management systems is better than another, it is necessary to have some sort of payoff measurement. The literature provides many ways of doing this. One way would be to use the “cost of quality” concept, measuring the cost of failure plus the cost of maintaining and improving the quality management system.

2.3.5 Costs of quality

As there are requirements related to resource management in section 6 of ISO 9001:2008, such measurements are likely to follow simply from the process of implementing the system. This measurement can be useful for analysing the stability in quality costs and a way of measuring improvements in terms of cost efficiency.

2.3.6 Maturity levels and excellence models

Another payoff function is the quality maturity measurements on a scale from 0 to 5 or 1 to 5, as defined by the ISO 9004:2000 guidelines. Using maturity measurement have the slight disadvantage that they are often based on subjective assessments, and going from a chaotic process to a stable process does not necessarily mean an improvement in costs or customer satisfaction. Nevertheless, the maturity measurements are defined as a part of the ISO 9000 system, so it is a natural point of reference when following ISO 9001. It has also been argued that the ISO 9004 assessments can be used as a basis for more elaborate total quality management (TQM) assessment methods, such as the EFQM assessment framework.

2.3.7 Integrating payoff from GTD and ISO 9000 in weekly reviews

ISO 9001:2008 is a generic standard that could be used for analysing all sorts of management systems, regardless of size, type and industry. The Lean Production principles are design principles that can be used for any kind of industry, focusing on customer value streams, flow and reduction of waste. GTD+R is a simple design of a Lean Production system for individuals, something that can be used for managing anything, and an interesting research question for this document is to figure out how far it is possible to go in the direction of fitting GTD with ISO 9001 in a way that does not bother with what the GTD system is used for.

One reason why we expect this to be possible is because of the action research approach. By managing the processes as if they were empirical experiments, the detailed management of each process can be described in the methodology chapter of each academic paper that is related to each process. Even though the processes related to doing PhD research include developing knowledge and skills in writing papers, doing reviews, presenting papers, doing empirical research, analysing etc., by using the AR approach for the management system, the only process we need to focus on is the process of writing papers, as the standard IMRAD approach for writing academic papers includes most aspects of managing the research. As a scientific paper is not usually refer to itself in terms of mentioning how long it took to be written and how much time went into writing it, this kind of information should be included on the web pages. The figure below illustrates the general design idea.

Figure 2.3.7. Weekly reivews with ISO 9001:2008

The diagram above illustrates the design idea in terms of algorithms (GTD mail) and data structures (web pages), together being the operative part of the management system. Applying the logic of GTD, this system is subject to weekly reviews (using the ISO 9004:2000 assessment method), which helps the system improve towards and beyond the requirements of the ISO 9001:2008 standard.

The GTD mail system is a standard implementation of GTD+R, using folders and mails rather than the paper folders and Rhoda notes described in the GTD+R manual. However, everything else is as described by the GTD+R manual, meaning that there is nothing in the structure of GTD+R that relates the management algorithm to the business processes of managing PhD research.

Everything specifically related to the fact that we are running a system for doing PhD research is connected to the content of the mails in the GTD+R system and the content and structure of the web pages. By designing the system in this way, it should also be possible to minimize the references to the actual production processes in the weekly review. In the weekly review, we are interested in control and improvement of the business processes, not in the content of the processes.

2.3.8 Claims of the ISO 9000 framework that we would like to challenge

The Ishikawa fishbone diagram is used for categorizing causes that result in problems. As the purpose of this particular research is to investigate how the ISO 9000 framework can help in improving adminsitrative work, it is interesting to use the ISO 9000 structure for branching the Ishikawa diagram, assuming that lack of compliance with certain aspects of ISO 9000 leads to problems in the work process.

Figure 2.3.8. Root cause analysis using the ISO 9001:2008 structure

The assumption in this model is that all problems can be systematically addressed by the ISO 9000 clauses and by improving parts of the management system related to these specific parts, it should be possible to eliminate problems and improve performance.

The model can be used for testing hypothesis concerning whether compliance with a given ISO 9001:2008 is expected to have an impact on eliminating problems and improving performance. This will be discussed in detail in the section 2.4 to 2.8. Before doing this, in section 2.2 some or the arguments against the ISO 9000 framework will be presented and discussed, particularly focusing on the arguments formulated by Seddon (1998). What Seddon believes is a better idea than ISO 9000 is to focus on systems thinking and lean production. The purpose of section 2.3 is to argue how systems thinking and lean production is not complementary to ISO 9000 but a good design approach for building ISO 9000 management systems.

2.3.9 The PhD management model

The purpose of this section is to flesh out the ideas from chapter 3 in order to explain how the management is actually implemented. As chapter 3 gives a good presentation of the overall structure of the management system, the only thing that is missing is an explanation of particular processes that have been relevant in this particular case of managing industrially driven PhD research.

2.3.9.1 Writing scientific papers

The most important process is the process of scientific writing, including journal papers, conference papers and the dissertation itself.

2.3.9.2 Overview of administrative processes

There are six control loops that are supposed to be used for managing the PhD process. Some of the processes I have defined myself, but the most important ones are the ones that have been defined by UiO.

· Annual progress report to UiO, included annual goals such as upgrade document, journal publication and trial defence.

· PhD Days Workshop twice each year

· Monthly reports to NTAX

· Supervision every two weeks

· Weekly update of this document

· Daily management by use of the GTD+R system

The practical problem consists of using the web, word documents (including this document) and the web-mail system for creating a management system for the PhD process that works according to the principles of ISO 9001.

The dotted line in the diagram indicates the importance of having a look at the NTAX mandate at least twice a year, to make sure that the research is also producing results that are useful from the practical point of view as seen by NTAX.

The weekly update of this document should be used for controlling the efficiency of the GTD+R system, and it should also provide input for the biweekly supervision system. The biweekly supervision system should be used for controlling that the weekly updates are functioning as expected.

From a practical point of view, I want to make sure that the supervision process is working as expected in terms of daily work being a reflection of what we have been discussing during supervision and how I return to each new supervision to discuss results of what we were discussing last time.

Although this should be the main focus of the weekly review and update of the quality manual, there should be similar control mechanisms for making sure that what I report to NTAX correspond with what we discuss during supervision, that the status reports for biannual PhD days correspond with NTAX reports and that the annual report to UiO correspond with the PhD Days status reports.

Problem parameters

Restrictions/constrains

Input (state A)

Ideas and unfinished papers.

Output (state B)

Published papers.

Solution variables

The new solution is expected to be an improvement of the previous version, meaning that the new solution consists of an update of the chapters 4.3.

Criteria

* The management system should be based on the GTD approach

* The system should be easy to operate

* It should be cheap as the focus should be on work, and the management system should thus be as integrated as possible with the natural flow of work

Production volume

The management system is updated annually, as specified in chapter 4.5.6

Usage

The management system is used on a daily basis

2.3.9.3 The management system

The control system consists of a set of five control loops, each linking one of the six control processes up to the level of the previous one.

Not included in this figure is the daily use of the GTD+R system and the weekly update of this document as that particular aspect has been described in the figure in section 4.1.1.

Finding a way to position the research

This feels like a stumble in the dark, but at the moment I’m trying to look at MIS theory, i.e. the design of management information systems in organizations. This perspective seems to be the perspective that is most useful for KOW and POS, it is a management perspective (as the books by Boddy et al and Laudon & Laudon are being used as a part of MBA education), and it seems relevant for TQM & BPR.

Managing the production of scientific papers

The system I use for writing papers depends slightly on whether it is a conference, a workshop or a journal, but as the main aspects of the system is the same, I use the same web site and framework for managing the process. However, the general control structure is indicated by the figure below.

The four boxes in the diagram all need to be controlled. Controlling the “call for papers” means that I have to mange the process of keeping track of relevant outlets for my research.

If we look at the control loop as a research design, we could perhaps say that the research question deals with understanding the relevant outlets (double loop learning), while the handling of feedback reviews when interacting with one particular conference or journal is more like the single loop learning of learning how to do and write up research.

Anyway, the inner loop of learning how to do research is not a trivial skill. It needs to be handled systematically. The administrative GTD system needs to be controlled to make sure that I’m not taking on too many tasks or too few tasks. I need to monitor the actual process of writing and submitting. I also need to monitor the feedback, understand what the feedback actually means, and use this for understanding whether I’m publishing in the right sort of outlet or not.

Presentation of scientific results

Perhaps I could count the number of PowerPoint presentations I have made, and I should also have a way for measuring the feedback I get from each presentation.

2.3.9.4 The monthly NTAX status process

The process is primarily managed through the GTD system at NTAX, making sure that the contact person at NTAX receives a monthly status report.

· There is a monthly reminder in the GTD asking me to go to NTAX

· At the conclusion of each supervision, I update and send the latest version of the status report to NTAX

· For each new deadline or change of deadline (conferences etc.) the checklists should make sure that the status report is also updated.

· As I receive a copy of the actual status report from NTAX, the report is fitted onto the web page, statistics are updated, and the mail itself is turned into a reminder for the next status report.



The ISO 9001:2008 standard contains the following requirements:

The organization shall establish, document, implement and maintain a quality management system and continually improve its effectiveness in accordance with the requirements of this International Standard.

The organization shall

a) determine the processes needed for the quality management system and their application throughout the organization (see 1.2),

b) determine the sequence and interaction of these processes,

c) determine criteria and methods needed to ensure the both the operation and control of these processes are effective,

d) ensure the availability of resources and information necessary to support the operation and monitoring of these processes,

e) monitor, measure where applicable, and analyse these processes, and

f) implement actions necessary to achieve planned results and continual improvement of these processes.

These processes shall be managed by the organization in accordance with the requirements of this International Standard.

Where an organization chooses to outsource any process that affects product conformity to requirements, the organization shall ensure control over such processes. The type and extent of control to be applied to these outsourced processes shall be defined within the quality management system.

Meeting this requirement seems much like a sum of meeting all the requirements of the standard. This means that this might be a good place for presenting a general model for how the GTD-based quality management system is designed, starting with the general ISO 9001:2008 model.

One way of interpreting the model in figure 2.3.4 is to think of the quality management system (QMS) to consist of five major processes, each process corresponding with each of the five clauses 4-8.

Process 4: Continual improvement of the quality management system

Process 5: Management responsibility

Process 6: Resource management

Process 7: Product realization

Process 8: Measurement, analysis and improvement

These five processes are linked as illustrated in figure 2.3.4, and the general idea should be to develop SPC for managing each of the five processes.

One way of controlling and measuring progress in the implementation of this design could be to maintain a table that keeps track of the maturity of each of the five processes.


2.4.2.1 General

The ISO 9001:2008 standard contains the following requirements:

The quality management system documentation shall include

a) documented statements of a quality policy and quality objectives,

b) a quality manual,

c) documented procedures and records required by this International Standard, and

d) documents, including records, determined by the organization to be necessary to ensure the effective planning, operation and control of its processes.

Hoyle (2006, chapter 4) gives an interesting discussion of documentation in general, but chooses to blur section 4.2.1 with the rest of section 4 of the standard. The kind of theories useful for handling this particular clause would be theories on how to produce minimal quality management systems, and how to mix between documents written in html and documents like this evaluation report.

A possible approach for producing statistics aim at improving the documentation could be to keep a count of the various documents of the system, following the a-b-c-d structure above.

2.4.2.2 Quality manual

We use this document as a quality manual, and that is why chapter 4 is structured according to the ISO 9001 standard.

The ISO 9001:2008 standard contains the following requirements (clause 4.2.2):

The organization shall establish and maintain a quality manual that includes

a) the scope of the quality management system, including details of and justification for any exclusions (see 1.2),

b) the documented procedures established for the quality management system, or references to them, and

c) a description of the interaction between the processes of the quality management system.

In what way does it seem reasonable to expect that the fulfilment of this requirement should have an influence on organizational quality and performance? Hoyle (2006) points out how such a document is valuable for showing mission, vision, getting an overview, training, etc. Although this seems reasonable enough, it does not bring a clear answer for producing hypotheses in the shape of how compliance with this particular requirement might influence aspects of the overall organizational quality.

One possible issue to investigate is the effect of using this evaluation document as a quality manual, as an obvious alternative approach might have been to look at the web page structure as a quality manual. Both documents give an overview of the quality management system, fitting with the requirements stated above, but the annual update of this document makes sure that the quality manual is a controlled document.

Using this document as a quality manual, and wanting to meeting the ISO 9001 requirements above, it should be sufficient to point out that the issue of exclusions (a) is handled by measurements in section 4.1, the issue of documented procedures (b) is handled by measurements in section 4.4.2.3, and the issue of interaction between processes (c) is handled in section 4.4.1. However, in order to make sure that the quality manual remains easy to read, not becoming too complex, the size of the document is used as a control parameter. Collis and Hussey (2003, p. 285) suggest approximate length of research reports, see table below.

Type of research report

Typical length

Undergraduate dissertation

15,000 – 20,000 words

Taught Master’s dissertation

20,000 words

M.Phil. thesis

40,000 words

Ph.D. thesis

80,000 words

As this evaluation report has been structured as a research report, the size of the report should be within reasonable bounds of what is suggested in the table above.

2.4.2.3 Control of documents

The ISO 9001:2008 requirements go as follows:

Documents required by the quality management system shall be controlled. Records are a special type of document and shall be controlled according to the requirements given in 4.2.4.

A documented procedure shall be established to define the controls needed

a) to approve documents for adequacy prior to issue,

b) to review and update as necessary and re-approve documents,

c) to ensure that changes and the current revision status of documents are identified,

d) to ensure that relevant versions of applicable documents are available at points of use,

e) to ensure that documents remain legible and readily identifiable,

f) to ensure that documents of external origin determined by the organization to be necessary for the planning and operation of the quality management system are identified and their distribution controlled, and

g) to prevent the unintended use of obsolete documents, and to apply suitable identification to them if they are retained for any purpose.

The general idea I would like to pursue in this case would be to find out how others have made flowcharts and checklists in order to fit with this requirement and see whether it is possible to produce an optimal approach. As this procedure should be totally independent of production and industry, it seems likely to expect that there might be some optimal way of designing a procedure to fit with these requirements. At the moment, however, I have done no literature research, although a good starting point might be to check Hoyle (2006).

Measurements, predictions and hypotheses on stability should follow naturally from having the procedure designed as a checklist. The first indicator might be the number of documents in current use and the number of documents being updated or controlled each year.

2.4.2.4 Control of records

The ISO 9001:2008 requirements go as follows:

Records established to provide evidence of conformity to requirements and of the effective operation of the quality management system shall be controlled.

The organization shall establish a documented procedure to define the controls needed for the identification, storage, protection, retrieval, retention and disposition of records.

Records shall remain legible, readily identifiable and retrievable.

According to chapter 2.7.2 in ISO 9000:2000, a record is a document that provides evidence of activities performed or results achieved. This seems to mean that a plan is not a record, but a plan used as a checklist is a record. In my QMS design, I try to integrate plans and checklists as much as possible, thus making the control of records as integrated with the control of documents as possible.

In order to keep control of the records I use, the most important aspect is perhaps to keep an overview of the records. I try to solve this by having the QMS contain hyperlinks to quality plans, and then have the quality plans contain links to the individual records. In this way, the topology for the whole documented system should be completely connected.

There are some documents, however, that are handwritten, such as records containing how many minutes I spend writing each day. Such documents are usually stored as long as they are being used for recording and then thrown away immediately afterwards. Perhaps there could be some reference to such documents in the quality plans, but I’m not yet quite sure how to do this.

When it comes to this particular document, the quality manual, and the SPC recordings and other recordings I use here, the way these records are maintained is explained in chapter 4.8.

2.4.3 ISO 9000 implementation advice

In conversations with DNV around 2002 or 2003, the people told me that a good way of starting implementation would be to start with clause 8.3 “non-complying product”, or at least this is what I remember from discussing the issue with the people on the phone. Whether starting with the clauses in chapter 8 of the standard, to get feedback mechanisms working, is “common knowledge” in the ISO 9000 consultancy world or not, I don’t know, and I have no idea whether this has been documented anywhere or not.

Schlickman (2002) suggests using the audits (clause 8.2.2) as a basis for corrective and preventing action (clause 8.5.1 and 8.5.2). What seems to be his argument is that this will be a minimum approach, and that there will always be corrective and preventive actions detected by audits because organisations change.

If I should find nothing else on the question of how to design ISO 9000 quality management systems, these two fragments of advise seem like a good starting point.

Hoyle (2003; 2006) appears to have a lot of sensitive things to say on ISO 9001 design, so it might be a good strategy to start reading what he might have to say on the topic of chapter 8 of the standard. Perhaps he has some good ideas that might help improve the design significantly.

In a paper on how to certify ISO 9001 quality management systems in small and medium sized organisations (Azevedo & Belchior, 2003), it is stated that the sequence of activities used in the ISO 9001:2000 certification process for the software company, that was considered satisfactory, was as follows:

· QMS (section 4 of the Norm): the establishment, documentation and the implementation of a quality system describing the necessity of the process to be known and documented

· Resource management (section 6): presents the available and necessary resources to practice quality

· Accomplishment of the product (section 7): shows the implementation of the product with the focus on customer procedures and requirements.

· Responsibility of the direction (section 5): integrates the high level administration in the actual implementation process of the QMS, validation and adopting the quality process before all the collaborators.

· Measurement, analysis and improvement (section 8): describes the process of measurement, analysis and improvement, being able to return to any of the stages of implementation.

What seems to be an interesting hypothesis, is that the implementation of a quality management system could perhaps be done in the exact opposite sequence as described here, starting with section 8, then section 5, then section 7, then section 6, and finishing with section 4.


The way chapter 5 of ISO 9001 would be expected to be useful for improving the design of the GTD management system would be in terms of improving how goals are set, how plans are made and how annual reviews are conducted.


The ISO 9001:2008 requirement goes as follows:

Top management shall provide evidence of its commitment to the development and implementation of the quality management system and continually improving its effectiveness by

a) communicating to the organiztion the importance of meeting customer as well as statuory and regulartory requirements,

b) establishing the quality policy,

c) ensuring that quality objectives are established,

d) conducting management reviews, and

e) ensuring the availabiliy of resources.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 308) argue that clause 5.1 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “it helps to provide the leadership necessary to implement and then maintain Lean”.

What would happen if there is no compliance with this clause? What would happen with the GTD if there is no leadership? According to GTD literature, it is said that people enrol on GTD and people fall off. It is necessary to be committed to the GTD idea. It seems to me, however, that this particular point is simply the results of other clauses in section 5 being met. It is difficult to measure commitment.



Top management shall ensure that customer requirements are determined and are met with the aim of enhancing customer satisfaction (see 7.2.1 and 8.2.1).

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 308) argue that clause 5.2 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “this is synonymous with constantly providing customer value – the foundation of Lean”.

In the case of applying ISO 9000 for evaluating a GTD system used for managing action research (industrial PhD research), there are three core customer groups. I have to keep the sponsor happy, I have to keep the university happy, and I have to make sure that the indended readers of the research (journal editors, conference editors, doctoral committee) are happy.

In the context of goals, customers and planning in GTD, Allen (2001) talks of five levels of planning, from fifty thousand feet to ground level. This will be presented in more detail in the context of goals and plans for ISO 9000, but there is a difference between long-term customers such as university and industry as compared to short-time customers when it comes to writing for particular journals or conferences.



Top management shall ensure that the quality policy

a) is appropriate to the purpose of the organization,

b) includes a commitment to comply with requirements and continually improve the effectiveness of the quality management system,

c) provides a framework for establishing and reviewing quality objectives,

d) is communicated and understood within the organization, and

e) is reviewed for continuing suitability.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 308) argue that clause 5.3 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “it demonstrates management’s commitment to the sixth Lean strategy: continual improvement”.

In the case of doing PhD research, the policy should be to do top quality research in compliance with correct research methods and research ethics. The plans for the project should be those that have been set up in agreement between the university and the organization sponsoring the research, and there should be mechanisms for measuring progress and reporting progress back to those who have invested in the research and expect return on their investments.

2.5.4 Planning2.5.4.1 Quality objectives


Top management shall ensure that quality objectives, including those needed to meet requirements for product [see 7.1.a)], are established at relevant functions and levels within the organization. The quality objectives shall be measurable and consistent with the qualtiy policy.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 308) argue that clause 5.4.1 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “quality objectives are a type of key performance indicator, helping to monitor the effectiveness of processes and highlight the need for corrective action (continuous improvement)”.

In other words, this is the place to discuss the types of performance indicators that should be used in the case of doing PhD research. Hirch (ref) argues that the h-index is the most important indicator for an individual research, and there is much research related to the h-indicator. The h-indicator relates to the researchers long-term performance, stressing impact factors, and does not necessarily reflect upon the output of the PhD. In the case of a PhD project, it may be more important to make sure that there are sufficient publications at high level journals.

In the context of understanding the ISO 9000 model as a model for improving research performance, the hypothesis related to this particular point should reflect the idea that choosing and monitoring the choice of quality objectives has an impact on research performance. If I only measure the count of publications, then a lot of IRIS and NOKOBIT publications might increase the numbers, but this is not sufficient for the purpose of PhD research. We need more high level publications in order to demonstrate that we are authorities on the issue being investigated.

2.5.4.2 Quality management system planning


Top management shall ensure that

a) the planning of the quality management system is carried out in order to meet the requirements given in 4.1, as well as the quality objectives, and

b) the integrity of the quality management system is maintained when changes to the quality management system are planned and implemented.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 308) argue that clause 5.4.2 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “this is where planning for the overall implementation of Lean would be done”.

Further literature review on this point could then focus on how to do the planning for the overall implementation of Lean. One starting point might be to have a look at whether Allen (2001) has any suggestions on how to plan for the overall implementation of GTD. The way I understand his approach, GTD is always developing, with the weekly review being the focal points for finding opportunity for improvement.

A planning model based on this idea could be to make the overall plan consist of key processes that seem to be working well and a “next action” in terms of one particular process that is in particular focus due to some type of 80/20 analysis. This 80/20 analysis may either be based on statistics or it could just be a gut feeling for what is in need for improvement.

2.5.5 Management system

Perhaps it could be a good idea to divide the system into subsystems corresponding with the modules of the ISO 9000 structure. At least for the moment, I try to develop the management system (chapter 5 in ISO 9001) and the production system (chapter 7 in ISO 9001) as two different systems.

2.5.5.1 Responsibility and authority


Top management shall ensure that responsibilities and authorities are defined and communicated within the organization.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 309) argue that clause 5.5.1 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “clear lines of authority reduce many kinds of waste – things get done quicker and correctly when people know who to go to for solving problems”.

There may be two issues to consider here. Firstly, as I am working in a single-person organization, I have to make sure that I am communicating with myself in an efficient manner in order to avoid procastrination and confusion. Secondly, I need to know who are key personnel in the case of janitors and other people I have to keep in touch with in order to make sure the system works smoothly.

2.5.5.2 Management representative


Top management shall appoint a member of the organization’s management who, irrespectable of other responsibilities, shall have responsibility and authority that includes

a) ensuring that processes needed for the quality management system are established, implemented and maintained,

b) reporting to top management on the performance of the quality management system and any need for improvement, and

c) ensuring the promotion of awareness of customer requirements throughout the organization.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 309) argue that clause 5.5.2 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “this role helps to provide the glue for Lean activities and Lean resources”.

In the case of a single-person organization, there is only one person who can be appointed management representative. It is yet not quite clear how to implement this role in a way that makes it possible to measure results.

2.5.5.3 Internal communication


Top management shall ensure that appropriate communiation processes are established within the organization and that communication takes place regarding the effectiveness of the quality management system.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 309) argue that clause 5.5.3 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “good communication helps to reduce many kinds of waste. In the words of Harold Dogdge, ‘Show me a quality problem, and I’ll show you a communication problem’. Communication of the effectiveness of the Lean system keeps it visible and alive”.

I use this document and the GTD system for communicating with myself in order to avoid forgetting things and making sure that I manage to get things done. The GTD model with my added feedback arrows (figure 2.2.1) shows how daily works accumulates to weekly, monthly and longer range projects, and how plans and status reports are written and communicated to all relevant levels for the various stakeholders of the research process.

H5.5.3: The current implementation of GTD is sufficient for avoiding qualtiy problems due to problems in my communication with myself.

2.5.6 Management review2.5.6.1 General


Top management shall review the organization’s quality management system, at planned intervals, to ensure its continuing suitability, adequacy and effectiveness. This review shall include assessing opportunities for improvement and the need for changes to the quality management system, including the quality policy and quality objectives.

Records from management reviews shall be maintained (see 4.2.4).

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 309) argue that clause 5.6.1 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “it provides management with the opportunity to review oucomes from Lean and to lead by example by initiation continuous improvement”.

The quality management system is reviewed annually, as can be seen from all the annual SPC diagrams in this chapter (chapter 4) and ISO 9000 statistics in the appendix. Updates related to specific issues, such as quality policy and quality objectives, are handled by the weekly review while the management review functions as a formal summary of all the reviews done since the previous management review. This document as a whole is used as a record for documenting the management review process.

H2.5.6.1: By running all the audits in sequence, the general aspects of the management review is handled sufficiently as a part of the audit of clause 5.6.1.

2.5.6.2 Review input


The input to management review shall include information on

a) results of audits

b) customer feedback,

c) process performance and product conformity,

d) status of preventive and corrective actions,

e) follow-up actions from previous management reviews,

f) changes that could affect the quality management system, and

g) recommendations for improvement.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 309) argue that clause 5.6.2 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “this defines what topics are of value to management when reviewing progress toward goals, including Lean objectives”.

The design idea for complying with this clause consists of the following table describing how the annual process of reviews and audits helps collecting the data.

ISO 9001-related requirements

What we do

Results of audits

Appendix

Customer feedback

Chapter 4.2 and 4.3

Process performance and product conformity

Chapter 4.3

Status of preventive and corrective actions

Chapter 4.5.3

Follow-up actions from previous management reviews

Chapter 4.5.6

Changes that could affect the quality management system

-

Recommendations for improvement

Appendix

As the design idea of weekly reviews makes sure that all aspects of the quality management system is being checked more or less within an annual cycle, there appears to be no reason for additional structure. In order to make sure the system is working, however, it might be a good idea to identify and measure the number of clauses not being handled by the annual audit program.

H2.5.6.2: Given the use of weekly reviews, there is no need for additional management reviews on top of this.

2.5.6.3 Review output


The output from the management review shall include any decisions and actions related to

a) improvement of the effectiveness of the quality management system and its processes,

b) improvement of product related to customer requirements, and

c) resource needs.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 309) argue that clause 5.6.3 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “it ensures that actions are identified to stay on course with implementing the Lean strategies”.

The way I have designed the system for meeting this requirement is to have a table in section 4.5.6.3 with columns corresponding to each of the requirement issues a, b and c and rows representing each annual review. This means that whatever I enter into the table is by default a decision and action item. When I carry out management review next year, I will see whether the decision has been acted upon and the action carried out.

H2.5.6.3: The design of maintaining a table for annual updates is sufficient making the management review result in decisions and actions that will be carried out before the next management review.



The text of the ISO 9001:2008 requirements goes as follows:

The organization shall determine and provide the resources needed

a) to implement and maintain the quality management system and continually improve its effectiveness, and

b) to enhance customer satisfaction by meeting customer requirements.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 309) argue that clause 6.1 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “resources are an essential input to any system including quality management and Lean strategies. They must not be wasted on non-value-added tasks and must be properly managed”.

In the context of doing PhD research according to the model in chapter two, providing resources for meeting customer requirements means writing and submitting academic papers while providing resources needed for implementing and improving the quality management system corresponds with the weekly reviews.

2.6.1.1 Optimising resources for enhancing customer satisfaction

PhD research can take long time, and there are jokes about procrastination being a major problem among PhD students. Having a PhD is a result of being an expert. According to Ericsson (2000), one of the most important aspects in the process of becoming an expert is to focus on self-improvement for about four hours each day. Bolker (1997) suggests that a PhD student should start by writing systematically for 15 minutes each day, until one gets the hang of it and develops habits that make it possible to write for four hours each day.

As there is a scientific basis on how to spend resources in order to become an expert, the optimization in this case is reduced to making sure that the SPC charts evolve in a manner that makes the process average for writing papers to fit with the idea of four hours concentrated work each day, and then try to reduce the variation around this target. Following this approach means that we are accepting the hypothesis suggested by Ericsson (2000), and we also accept the hypothesis inherit in the ISO 9000 model, implying that controlling the provision of resources having an impact on product quality and process quality. In other words, the only hypothesis we are testing in this case is whether it is possible to maintain stable processes of reading and writing.

H6.1.b: The resources spent on reading and writing are stable are an optimal level

2.6.1.2 Optimising resources for maintaining and improving the QMS

One way of automatically turning this GTD system into a research paper would perhaps be to use the theory of quality costs while formulating the research problem to be the problem of getting a PhD as quickly as possible, based on the idea of writing scientific papers as quickly as possible.

There is a very interesting analysis of Taylor’s “scientific management” from the perspective of Newtonian physics in Pitches (2005, p 23-27) where it is pointed out that scientific management was defined as a predictive science where the aim was to predict the time it would take for a “first class man” to perform any type of work. Although the term “first class man” is perhaps emphasised a bit too much when we are perhaps more interested in predicting the time it takes to carry out a certain task by “the average man”, but the aim in focusing on “first class men” seems clear enough as this would make the best men set the benchmark for how certain tasks could be carried out.

In summary, the research question of Taylor’s “scientific management” seems to be: what is the “one best way” of carrying out a given task, given that we may select the people to do the task and define the way they should do it. When we read “Shop management” (1903), Taylor states clearly that what he would hope would emerge out of scientific management would be a book describing how all sorts of work should be carried out in the most efficient manner, just like engineering books.

Clearly, this seems to explain how the term “scientific” is the right term for explaining what Taylor tried to achieve, and it should also explain why the work carried out by Shewhart, Deming, Juran and others could also be termed “scientific management” although for these people the way to optimize the performance of an organization was perhaps related to optimizing quality costs for the organization as a whole rather than trying to optimize production within individual units without measuring the impact on the total.

Nevertheless, what seems interesting in the context of the weekly review for the GTD system is probably how to perform the review in an optimal manner, focusing on not spending too much time on the review (minimize control costs) while, at the same time, making sure that all relevant aspects of the GTD have been properly reviewed (minimize failure costs).

The chapter 6.1 concerning “provision of resources” could perhaps be linked with chapter 8 in terms of keeping track of preventive costs, internal failure costs, external failure costs and appraisal costs. However, in order to experiment with a simple way of getting started with ISO 9000 as a model for improving academic research, it might be better just to keep track of CAR and PAR in terms of letting CAR include simple appraisal costs such as keeping the SPC up to date and internal failure costs in terms of fixing QMS related problems, while PAR could be used for more elaborate appraisal costs, such as doing internal audits (self-assessments) and prevention costs in terms of updating the theory parts of this document (chapter 1, 2, 3, 5 and 6).

The general hypothesis we want to test, however, is whether it is possible to maintain a stable process in terms of the resources spent on weekly GTD reviews. It is expected that the appraisal process should become stable quite quickly, but that the correction and prevention process may take some longer time. In each of these process, it is not easy to determine what is the optimal amount to time that should be spent on updating. Allen (2001) may have some suggestions, while there may be other suggestions in GTD+R. The ultimate goal, however, is to spend as little time as possible on administrative work while spending sufficient time in order to make sure that the QMS is continually improving.

H6.1.a: The resources spent on updating the QMS are stable are an optimal level


2.6.2.1 General


Personnel performing work affecting conformity to product requirements shall be competent on the basis for appropriate education, training, skills and experience.

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 310) argue that clause 6.2.1 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “making sure round pegs are in round holes is key to standardizing processes required by Lean”.

In the case of doing PhD research, the competence requirements were assessed at the entry point of the PhD process, and the purpose of the process itself is to improve on education, training, skills and experience in order to become a professional research scientist.

It is doubtful whether parameters like experience makes sense to measure, as that would only produce one more year of experience for each year. Education and training can be measured in ECTS points by taking exams as this is defined as the “educational part of the PhD” in the annual status report. From a more practical point of view, however, the peer review system and the process of being a PhD student makes a person a part of a learning experience.

H6.2.1: The general criterion on human resources is met by default.

2.6.2.2 Competence, training and awareness


The organization shall

a) determine the necessary competence for personnel performing work affecting conformity to product requirements,

b) where applicable, provide training or take other actions to achieve the necessary competence,

c) evaluate the effectiveness of the actions taken,

d) ensure that its personnel are aware of the relevance and importance of their activities and how they contribute to the achievement of the quality objectives, and

e) maintain appropriate records or education, training, skills and experience (see 4.2.4)

Guardian & Renaud (2008, p. 310) argue that clause 6.2.2 in ISO 9001 support lean strategies in the way that “competent personnel reduce the probability of aste in the form of rejects, excess processing time, etc. Engaging the frontline workers is one of the most important factors for the success of Lean strategies”.

The Lean perspectice in a research context means that we want to make sure that papers are easily published, thus being certain that I am fully competent in the context of the journals I am writing too. If papers are rejected it is important to see whether this has to do with lack of knowledge, meaning that I have to read and study more. In some cases the rejection of a paper could mean that I need to take a course in statistical methods or whatever, fitting with the course-and-training context of the clause, but normally the issue will have to be handled through my own reading habits.



The organization shall determine, provide and maintain the infrastructure needed to achieve conformity to product requirements. Infrastructure includes, as applicable,

a) buildings, workspace and associated utilities,

b) process equipment (both hardware and software), and

c) supporting services (such as transport, communication or information systems).

In order to see how this clause may be used for improving the PhD research, I have focused on controlling the most critical issues, such as the email system not breaking down and having sufficient storage on my computer. I propose using SPC in all cases, focusing both on weekly and annual variation in order to prevent short-term and long-term surprises.

H6.2.2: The current system of daily reading is sufficient to meet the requirements.



The organization shall determine and manage the work environment needed to achieve conformity to product requirements.

I should need to make this statement more explicit in terms of a hypothesis on how improving the work environment is expected to have an effect on quality and productivity. The most important parts of the work environment is to have peace in order to read and write and meet people in order to present and discuss.

2.7 Realization of product

The diagram below shows the production system labelled with requirement structure from chapter 7 in ISO 9001:2000.

The purpose of this model is to show how the ISO 9000 production requirements fit into a standard double-loop structure as defined in a standard electrical engineering model. In addition to helping explaining the ISO 9000 requirements, the purpose of such a model should also be to help predict and improve performance.

The general purpose of the control loop is to provide a constant flow of scientific papers being published in high quality academic outlets, and the structure of the diagram shows that all six subchapters of chapter 7 in ISO 9001 contribute in concert for making the system work.

7.1: Keep an outlook for “calls for papers”

7.2: Make sure the implied requirements are embedded in checklists

7.3: Develop the paper

7.4: Get data for the case study

7.5: Publish and present at conference

7.6: Make sure all SPC-diagrams remain valid.

Clause 7.1 and 7.6 are wide in the sense that they deal with the QA of the whole production process, while sections 7.2-7.5 follow the production of each individual production stream.

One approach for systematically trying to improve the production system might be to tabulate the annual ISO 9004 assessments in a Pareto diagram and use this for identifying the most important aspects of the structure to be improved.

2.7.1 Planning


The organization shall plan and develop the processes needed for product realization. Planning of product realization shall be consistent with the requirements of the other processes of the quality management system (see 4.1).

In planning product realization, the organization shall determine the following, as appropriate:

a) quality objectives and requirements for the product;

b) the need to establish processes and documents, and to provide resources specific to the product;

c) required verification, validation, monitoring, measurement, inspection and test activities specific to the product and the criteria for product acceptance;

d) records needed to provide evidence that the realization process and resulting product meet requirements (see 4.2.4).

The output of this planning shall be in a form suitable for the organization’s method of operations.

The implied hypothesis in this document is that it is possible to use the planning process from GTD in a way that is consistent with the requirements above and in a way that helps control and improve product quality. One of the key ideas in GTD is to run projects by focusing on the “next action”. A simple way to implement this can be by developing checklists and using a “next action” kanban that is moved between the different folders in order to keep track of the what and when of the next action defined by the checklists.

In order to make this approach work, it is necessary to keep track of the checklists. Several control parameters can be natural to use, such as a the number of checklists in use and the individual progress on each list.

The general production plan can be seen as a set of production goals that we try to meet. In section 2.7.3 there will be specific plan on how to reach each goal in particular. The goals are:

· Research proposal

· Upgrade document

· Conference papers and presentations

· Journal papers

· Trial defence

· Thesis

· Trial lecture and defence

· Administrative documents (PhD Days report, annual UiO report, …)

As the research proposal has been accepted, this document will be skipped in the further discussion. In the case of the upgrade document, the best thing is probably to use this as a basis for an early version of a thesis.

One way of handling the planning process is to apply the principles of Genetic Algorithms in turn of thinking of all the documents catalogued in the list above as a population that is ranked from time to time in order to maintain all documents at the same time while selecting which document to focus on depending on environmental pressure.

The status report of the PhD Days Workshop should provide a good mechanism for this as the document template is structured in a way to create discussion on status, challenges and progress.


In the process of writing papers, the customers (editors) are addressed first indirectly by reading the “call for papers”, then at the stage of submitting, then when receiving feedback, and then there may be rounds of review and feedback until the paper is presented or published. This communication can be seen as dealing with updates of requirements for how the paper (product) should be written.

2.7.2.1 Determination of requirements related to the product


The organization shall determine

a) requirements specified by the customer, including the requirements for delivery and post-delivery activities,

b) requirements not stated by the customer but necessary for specified or intended use, where known,

c) statutory and regulatory requirements applicable to the product, and

d) any additional requirements considered necessary by the organization.

If we look at the literature on “how to get a PhD”, I expect there are chapters written about submitting a thesis and then, later, defending the thesis. I do not expect to challenge any of the literature on this. In the case of writing individual papers we have a repeating process with possibility for learning, so here it is important to develop checklists for capturing any problems I might have in not properly understanding the requirements for submitting papers to conferences or journals.

The PhD Days Workshop is an example of a seminar that I return to over and over again, and I still have problems with filling out the status report in a proper way. In this case there are no specific rules, the way of improving the process should consist of learning from others.

At the moment, however, I have no papers or seminars in the pipeline. The essential part of the work consists on progressing steadily with the dissertation text, but I have not reached the level where I have to check whether I have capture all the requirements of the committee, so I delay further progress on this item.

2.7.2.2 Review of requirements related to the product


The organization shall review the requirements related to the product. This review shall be conducted prior to the organization’s commitment to supply to the customer (e.g. submission of tenders, acceptance of contracts or orders, acceptance of changes to contracts or orders) and shall ensure that

a) product requirements are defined,

b) contract or order requirements differing from those previously expressed are resolved, and

c) the organization has the ability to meet the defined requirements.

Records of the results of the review and actions arising from the review shall be maintained (see 4.2.4).

Where the customer provides no document statement of requirement, the customer requirements shall be confirmed by the organization before acceptance.

Where product requirements are changed, the organization shall ensure that relevant documents are amended and that relevant personnel are made aware of the changed requirements.

In the case of writing papers, I interpret this clause as developing a checklist that includes important dates, theme of paper and other issues relevant for getting it published. In the case of writing for UKSS, relevant themes would typically mean that I make contributions to some kind of systems theory. In my theory of PhD design, this point is handled by point 7.2.2 in the generic checklist I use for each individual paper.

2.7.2.3 Customer communication


The organization shall determine and implement effective arrangements for communicating with customers in relation to

a) product information,

b) enquiries, contracts or order handling, including amendments, and

c) customer feedback, including customer complaints.

What are the alternative design approaches for meeting this requirement? As usual Hoyle (2006, pp. 391-398) spends several pages discussing the issue in a detailed manner, suggesting a

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