Self-assessment system for supplier quality management (SQM)

Abstract

Supplier’s related quality costs for a purchasing company represent a significant portion of the selling price. Through proper control of supply quality, the reduction in supplier quality costs can be directly transformed into profits and the quality of products and services can be improved. Supplier quality management (SQM) is considered as a proactive approach in the buyer’s perspective to seek for continuous supply quality improvement and collaborative ongoing alliance between buyers and suppliers. Therefore, it is important for the buyers to understand their circumstances for managing their suppliers, and thereby to search for an improved way to rectify managerial deficiencies, if any. Furthermore, it is imperative for the manufacturing companies to seek for a good system to manage its suppliers through self-assessment approach. Consequently, development of a web-based SQM self-assessment system is proposed and implemented in this research. In this research study, the SQM critical factors for Hong Kong based China manufacturing industries are firstly identified through the extensive literature review. A mail survey is carried out to investigate the current situation about SQM practices of Hong Kong based China manufacturing industries. A hierarchical model of the identified factors is structured accordingly, which is then verified by experts’ opinions. Based on the developed model, the relative importance is determined to each factor via expert interviews with the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) methodology. With the determined weightings, a SQM self-assessment framework is finalized. Finally, a prototype web-based SQM self-assessment system is constructed with knowledge base built through literature search and industrial studies. I wish to express my deepest gratitude and appreciation to my supervisor Dr. K.S. Chin for his encouragement and supervision during my research study. Without his strict guidance, valuable suggestions and enthusiastic assistance for helping me to carry out this study, it is impossible for me to accomplish this research. I am also thankful for his patience and efforts in giving me insight into the true spirit of research. Sincere thanks are also due to my qualifying panel, Dr. John Ho and Dr. I.K. Hui for assessing and monitoring the progress of my research study. Their assistance much appreciated. I would like to especially acknowledge the generous assistance and support received from the responding companies and quality experts who kindly participated in the mail survey and expert interviews, by not only providing the valuable information to support this research, but also enlightening me to have innovative thinking. Last but not least, my heartfelt goes to my family, colleagues and friends for their enlightening discussions and ardent help, who had given me support and the cheerful time during the most perplexed time of my research time.

Date of Award	15 Jul 2004
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	City University of Hong Kong
Supervisor	Kwai Sang CHIN (Supervisor)