Quality in Manufacturing: Walk Before You Run
Too many manufacturers jump straight into Lean, Six Sigma, or ERP rollouts—then wonder why their quality problems persist. The truth? These tools don’t fix broken foundations.
I recently spoke with Thiago Roveri, Director of Quality at RR Donnelley. He put it simply: “The biggest mistake companies make is they try to run before they can walk.” This often means skipping over things like process clarity, operator training, and documentation—essentials that should come first.
Before you invest in new systems, ask yourself: Do you actually understand the problem you’re trying to solve? If the answer is “sort of,” it’s time to stop, back up, and walk.
We surveyed 1,000 manufacturing professionals to better understand how quality is perceived. See the results in our research report: Are Leaders and Frontline Teams Aligned?
Step 1: Map Your Processes (Yes, Even the Unseen Ones)
Ask a manager to explain how a part gets from order to assembly, and you’ll usually get two versions: what’s supposed to happen, and what actually happens. The gap between the two is where quality breaks down.
Thiago put it plainly: “Everything you do in your organization —actually in your life—can be translated into a process.” Whether it’s how you plan production, approve materials, or inspect parts—each action has an input, a process, and an output. But too often, those steps aren’t documented. Worse, they’re assumed to be common knowledge.
Start with what you know, but don’t stop there. Map out not just the manufacturing line, but also the upstream and downstream flow—planning, purchasing, quality checks, and rework decisions. If people are involved, there’s a process. If there’s a process, it needs to be visible.
This isn’t about diagrams for the sake of formality. It’s about making the current state concrete so you can see where confusion, rework, or communication gaps creep in. As Thiago noted, without shared clarity, improvement efforts have nowhere to start.
Step 2: Implement a Problem-Solving Method (Start with 5 Whys)
When something goes wrong in manufacturing, it’s easy to point to the operator. The spec wasn’t followed. A measurement was skipped. A box wasn’t labeled. But those are symptoms—not root causes.
Thiago pointed out a common issue: teams jumping into fixes just because they think that’s what they’re supposed to do. The problem? “Sometimes, the teams and the company will jump into corrective actions even before having a clear understanding of what the problem and the root causes are.”
That’s where 5 Whys comes in. It forces the team to stop and think: What broke in the process? Why was this error even possible? It’s not always asking “why” five times, but digging deep helps you get past surface-level symptoms and find the real issue.
A fishbone diagram works well too, especially when the issue spans departments. Use it to break down potential causes into categories—people, methods, materials, machines—so you can see where the breakdown actually happened.
Thiago emphasized a mindset shift: it’s not about blaming the person—it’s about understanding how the process enabled the error. Until you know that, any fix is just a guess.
Step 3: Train with Purpose and Context
Work instructions won’t stick if no one gets why they matter in the first place.
Thiago made the case for something basic that’s often missed: helping operators understand how the product they’re building is actually used. In his words, “the operator is making something that he has no idea of how that is used, by whom, and when.”
You don’t need to fly people to customer sites. Even a short walkthrough or a few slides can connect the dots. Show what the product does. Show what happens if it’s wrong. As Thiago said, “This is why this is important — because this is how the customer applies our product.”
That simple context helps people take ownership. “When they do that,” he said, “they own the product more solidly and consistently.”
Step 4: Use 5S and Visual Factory to Reinforce Discipline
Walk through any plant, and you can tell whether it runs on discipline or improvisation within seconds.
Thiago recalled visits to factories where nothing was marked—no tape, signage, or visible status. In those places, you had to ask someone just to understand what was happening. However, in well-run facilities, the structure is obvious. “The factory should speak for itself,” he said.
That’s the goal of 5S and visual management. When tools, materials, and information are organized and visible, the floor runs more consistently. People don’t waste time searching. They don’t guess what comes next.
A few basics go a long way: taped zones for tools and materials, signs that show what “normal” looks like, and hourly metrics posted near workstations. These small things reinforce the standard without needing a supervisor to repeat it.
Clarity creates confidence. And when everyone sees the same signals, accountability gets easier.
Step 5: Track the Right Quality Metrics
Metrics only help if you actually know what they’re telling you.
In our conversation, we talked about tracking the Cost of Poor Quality across three key areas: customer, supplier, and internal. That means keeping an eye on things like warranty costs, incoming inspection issues, scrap rates, and defect trends.
It’s not about chasing perfect data. It’s about watching those three categories to see whether the basics are sticking. Are your first-pass yields improving? Are the same suppliers causing issues? Are your teams closing the loop on corrective actions?
If those trends aren’t moving, it’s not time for a new system. It’s time to stabilize what you’ve already got.
How Mastering the Basics Leads to Real Results
You don’t need a complex system to make quality improvements. You need structure, discipline, and clarity—starting with the basics.
Thiago has seen productivity improve by 90% without a single software change. Just by solving small problems that had been ignored because they weren’t visible, or because no one had asked why they kept happening.
If you’re wondering why new initiatives aren’t sticking, ask yourself: Have we really stabilized the base? Or are we trying to scale chaos?
Start where the problems start. And if you’re looking for more examples of how simple fixes can create real change, listen to the full episode with Thiago Roveri.
