Abstract:
A network application for automatically formatting and printing documents to be used as planning manuals by company personnel to produce quality products designed to satisfy customer preferences. Output documents can also be used as educational manuals and for dispersing among organizational personnel common information for integrated strategic planning and decision making for engineering and marketing teams. Facilitated collaborative work sessions among work groups inputting and sharing comments and ideas provide starting data to the network application.

Description:
RELATED APPLICATIONS 
     This application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. § 120 as a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/616,238, filed Mar. 13, 1996, now abandoned, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No 08/466,856, filed Jun. 6, 1995, now abandoned, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/248,616, filed May 23, 1994, now abandoned, which is a continuation-in-part application of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/229,967, filed Apr. 19, 1994, now abandoned entitled &#34;The Application of Groupware to ISO 9000 Registration via Facilitated Work Sessions&#34;. 
    
    
     U.S. patent applications Ser. No. 08/298,617, entitled &#34;The Integration of Groupware with Activity Based Management via Facilitated Work Sessions&#34;, and 08/247,817, entitled &#34;The Integration of Groupware with the Integrated Quality Control Methodology via Facilitated Work Sessions&#34;, filed concurrently herewith are assigned to the same assignee hereof and contain subject matter related, in certain respect, to the subject matter of the present application. The above-identified patent applications are incorporated herein by reference. 
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     1. Technical Field 
     This invention relates to a computer network application for sharing, combining, formatting, and printing into a predetermined document format information gathered from customers&#39; descriptions of preferred product attributes, design characteristics defined by engineers designing the product, and input from any number of users or interfunctional work groups formed within an organization to produce quality products designed to meet customers&#39; preferences. The application is implemented in a networked, multi-user environment. This invention effectuates the documentation of engineering and marketing decisions via facilitated computer-based, cooperative work sessions, thereby streamlining the process for quality product design. 
     2. Description of the Prior Art 
     The Quality Function Deployment (QFD) methodology is a difficult and time-consuming process for an organization to implement. The typical approach is to collect the &#34;voice of the customer&#34; information from in-depth interviews or focus groups and to collect engineering characteristics from interfunctional teams. However, a lack of tools means excessive resource and time is spent in collecting and organizing all of this information. Facilitated work sessions using GroupWare tools were developed in response to this need. 
     There are several applications that build the QFD &#34;house of quality&#34; that are commercially available today. The QFD methodology has been in use in Japan since 1972 and in the US since the early 1980s. 
     GroupWare 
     GroupWare refers to computer applications that allow groups of people to work together through the sharing of information. Most GroupWare products provide one or more of the following functions: 
     Calendar 
     Electronic Mail 
     Word Processing 
     Data or Document Management 
     Group Decision Support 
     Work Flow Support 
     GroupWare products all run on a network, so that information is easily shared and accessible to all users who need it. LotusNotes is a GroupWare product that provides word processing and documentation management functions. TeamFocus is a GroupWare product that provides group decision support functions in an electronic meeting setting. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     This invention comprises a network application for manipulating information gathered in a multi-user collaborative environment in order to conduct Quality Function Deployment sessions. The information gathered in the multi-user environment includes input such as comments and ideas from customers or from the cross-functional design team members. These are input into computer storage to be accessed by special programs for formatting and printing in predefined formats. GroupWare tools allow the team members to quickly organize their ideas, reach consensus, and make decisions. Customer wants and needs, importance, and perception can be programmed for automatic input into QFD applications. Product characteristics, importance, and their relationships can also be programmed for such automatic input. Measures and target values for the product design characteristics can be programmed for automatic input into QFD applications. User intervention is unnecessary after the information gathering session and before the import into the present invention QFD application. The initial facilitated work sessions document the customer&#39;s wants and needs, the importance of each, and the customer&#39;s perception of each attribute of the product or service. After that, the other facilitated work sessions with the cross-functional design teams determine those product characteristics that affect the customer wants and needs. The relationships between the customer attributes and the product characteristics are identified. Also identified are the relationships between each of the product characteristics. In another facilitated session, measures are identified for the product characteristics and target values are set. 
     The participants in the information gathering sessions are prompted to identify the QFD data for the &#34;house of quality&#34;. Networked PC&#39;s and workstations facilitate the information gathering among the work groups, organization of the data gathered, and group approval of the final organized list. They also aid in the prioritization of the data and in defining the relationships between the data. Commercially available group decision support tools fit very well with these information gathering sessions. Commercially available database tools work well for storage of and access to the data that is collected in these information gathering sessions. Specialized bridge programs of the present invention automate the movement of data between these various tools. Commercially available GroupWare applications that support document management can make the latest version of reports and documents available to all personnel in the organization. 
     Other features and advantages of this invention will become apparent from the following detailed description of the presently preferred embodiment of the invention, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. 
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
     FIG. 1 is a sample &#34;house of quality&#34; document. 
     FIG. 2 is a representation of the overall system configuration and the various applications available on the file server. 
     FIG. 3 is a functional flowchart of the session for documenting the customer wants and needs. 
     FIG. 4 is a functional flowchart of the session for documenting the product characteristics and relationships. 
     FIG. 5 is a pseudocode implementation of the TeamFocus EXPORTIO bridge program. 
     FIG. 6 is a pseudocode implementation of the TeamFocus EXPORTAE bridge program. 
     FIG. 7 is a pseudocode implementation of the TeamFocus EXPORTGM bridge program. 
     FIG. 8 is a pseudocode implementation of the QFDCAPT bridge program. 
    
    
     DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT 
     Overview 
     The Quality Function Deployment (QFD) methodology is based on the belief that products and services should be designed to reflect customers&#39; wants and needs. Customer wants and needs, the &#34;voice of the customer&#34;, must be communicated from marketing people to design engineers to manufacturing staff in order to ensure that customer attributes are incorporated into the products and services that are developed and sold. QFD builds a &#34;house of quality&#34;, which is a conceptual map that can be used for interfunctional planning and communication. The &#34;house of quality&#34; shown in FIG. 1 contains: 
     1. The customer wants and needs (attributes) for the product. 
     2. The relative priority of the customer attributes (wants and needs). 
     3. Customer perceptions of competitor&#39;s products for those attributes. 
     4. The product characteristics that affect the customer attributes. 
     5. The relationship of the product characteristics to the customer attributes (strong or weak, positive or negative). 
     6. The technical importance rating of the product characteristics. 
     7. The relationships among the product characteristics, which indicate bottlenecks, tradeoffs, and dependencies. 
     8. Measurements of the product characteristics (benchmark). 
     9. Product design criteria. 
     Quality Function Deployment is a difficult and time-consuming process for an organization to implement. A lot of information has to be collected and organized into the &#34;house of quality&#34;. The typical approach for the &#34;voice of the customer&#34; information is to conduct in-depth interviews or focus groups with a large number of customers. This is both costly and time-consuming since there are no tools applied to the task. The work is done in a manual fashion, either one-on-one or in small groups. Without GroupWare tools, taking notes during the session often slows the entire process down as the scribe must make sure everything written down is accurate. 
     The typical approach for the remainder of the house of quality is to have interfunctional teams identify the engineering characteristics that affect the customer attributes and their relationships to each of the customer attributes, i.e., strong or weak, negative or positive effect on the attribute. Again, this is a time-consuming process. In addition, team building and consensus are required for the teams to really be successful. This is difficult to achieve without GroupWare tools and a strong facilitator. Quite often, one or two people dominate the discussion during a session. As a result, valuable information is suppressed and fewer team members &#34;buy in&#34; to the decisions and tradeoffs that must be made. 
     Outside of the interviews and team meetings, other problems arise. The interviewer has to take time to prepare all of the documentation from notes taken during the session. There are software packages that will build the house of quality document; however, all of the information must be loaded into the software package. 
     GroupWare tools can help overcome some of the risks of the manual methods for Quality Function Deployment mentioned above. Team members can submit ideas anonymously, so that people uncomfortable speaking out in a group can share their ideas. Also, since ideas are submitted electronically via computer keyboard, nothing is forgotten or incorrectly recorded. Some time is saved, since all team members can type their ideas simultaneously. Finally, and probably most importantly, GroupWare helps the product design teams reach a consensus more rapidly than manual methods, because everyone has a voice and everyone has a vote. 
     Technical Background 
     This invention provides a more efficient means to collect and organize the data captured during Quality Function Deployment sessions and a process to transform the data into a format usable by existing database and QFD software applications. 
     The approach to Quality Function Deployment described here is being used successfully in IBM. IBM&#39;s GroupWare product, TeamFocus, is used in facilitated work sessions for Quality Function Deployment. TeamFocus is a GroupWare product that provides group decision support functions such as: 
     Electronic Brainstorming 
     Idea Organization 
     Voting 
     Topic Commenting 
     Alternative Evaluation 
     Group Outlining 
     Group Matrix 
     One type of facilitated work session documents the voice of the customer. Electronic meeting software such as IBM&#39;s TeamFocus or Ventana GroupSystems can quickly capture this information from groups of customers. After that, another type of facilitated work session collects the remaining information from the interfunctional teams. Electronic meeting software can collect this information much faster than in a traditional group meeting. The meeting facilitator helps the group achieve consensus, keeps them focused on the tasks, and moderates the discussions so that dominant personalities do not take over the meeting. Following the facilitated sessions the resulting data is stored in a database tool such as Microsoft Access, thus making the data available for import. The import file can be produced automatically by specialized bridge programs. The QFD reports can be stored in a another GroupWare tool for document management, such as LotusNotes, for access throughout the organization. The most recent version of the document can be stored online where it can be retrieved by any team member that requires it, provided they are on that network. 
     Customer Wants and Needs Exercise 
     This initial facilitated session surveys customers of the product or service to determine their requirements. Instead of using questionnaires, interviews, or focus groups, a facilitated session with a group of customers quickly captures their wants and needs regarding the product or service. These requirements or attributes of the product or service are assigned a relative importance. Also as part of this exercise the customer&#39;s satisfaction with each attribute of the product or service is rated, as are one or more competitors. Multiple sessions may be held with various market segments, as requirements may vary among the different market segments. 
     Referring to FIG. 2, the customer group gathers in a joint meeting to provide input in response to questions provided by a facilitator, shown as a PC (2). The PC server (5), operating system and applications (6) are also shown. The session can also include a projector (4) and screen (3) for viewing and a printer (7) for hardcopy output. Each customer participates in the meeting via a PC (1) and the questions and answers may be selectively displayed on the screen or on each PC. 
     Referring to FIG. 3, the Customer Wants and Needs Exercise begins with a brainstorming exercise. A GroupWare tool such as IBM&#39;s TeamFocus is used for the brainstorming. In TeamFocus Idea Organization or Group Outliner, each customer suggests specific attributes or requirements that they have for the product or service, based on their usage of the product or service. The responses from the group are collected, reviewed, and consolidated into a list that everyone concurs with. Next, the team collects additional information about each requirement or attribute. This information could be supporting comments on why the requirements are needed or suggested measures of how much is needed. The additional information is collected using TeamFocus Group Outliner or TopicCommenter so that the customer&#39;s exact words are recorded. Next, the customers are asked to rate each requirement or attribute on a 1 to 10 scale against several criteria. First, the customers rate the attributes on their relative importance. Then, the customers indicate their level of satisfaction with the current product or service for each of the attributes. Finally, the customers indicate their level of satisfaction with one or more competitor&#39;s products for each of the attributes. The TeamFocus Alternative Evaluation or Group Matrix tool is used for this exercise, so that the group response is quickly and accurately captured and calculated. The TeamFocus session data is copied to diskette and exported to a database tool such as Microsoft Access for storage and later retrieval. An export file is created from the Microsoft Access database tool. This file is converted into an import file for the QFD/Capture tool by a specialized QFD bridge program. The session data is loaded into the QFD/Capture tool using QFD/Capture&#39;s import utility. The &#34;house of quality&#34; can then be constructed in the QFD/Capture tool. Hardcopy documentation may be generated from TeamFocus, the Microsoft Access database, or from the QFD/Capture tool. The documentation can also be stored in a GroupWare tool such as LotusNotes, a document management tool, for sharing the QFD information across the organization. 
     Product Characteristics Exercise 
     The Product Characteristics Exercise identifies all the product design characteristics that affect the customer requirements or attributes. Referring to FIG. 4, the Product Characteristics Exercise begins with a brainstorming exercise. A GroupWare tool such as IBM&#39;s TeamFocus is used for the brainstorming. In TeamFocus Idea Organization or Group Outliner, each member of the cross-functional design team suggests product characteristics that they are aware of that would influence the customer attributes. The responses from the group are collected, reviewed, consolidated into a list, and organized with concurrence from everyone in the group. Next the design team looks at the relationships between the customer attributes and the product characteristics. The relationships can range from &#34;strong negative&#34; to &#34;neutral&#34; to &#34;strong positive&#34;. In TeamFocus Group Matrix, each member of the cross-functional design team suggests a rating for each of the relationships on a scale of -9 to +9. The responses from the group are collected, reviewed, and discussed to attain concurrence from everyone in the group. Next the design team looks at the relationships among the product characteristics. Again, the relationships can range from &#34;strong negative&#34; to &#34;neutral&#34; to &#34;strong positive&#34;. In TeamFocus Group Matrix, each member of the cross-functional design team suggests a rating for each of the relationships on a scale of -9 to +9. The responses from the group are collected, reviewed, and discussed to attain concurrence from everyone in the group. The TeamFocus session data is then copied to diskette and exported to a database tool such as Microsoft Access for storage and later retrieval. An export file is created from the Microsoft Access database tool. This file is converted into an import file for the QFD/Capture tool by a specialized QFD bridge program. The session data is loaded into the QFD/Capture tool using QFD/Capture&#39;s import utility. The &#34;house of quality&#34; can then be constructed in the QFD/Capture tool. Hardcopy documentation may be generated from TeamFocus, the Microsoft Access database, or from the QFD/Capture tool. The documentation can also be stored in a GroupWare tool such as LotusNotes. 
     Measurement and Target Values Exercise 
     Additional facilitated sessions can similarly be run to identify other QFD information needed to complete the &#34;house of quality&#34;. Other information might include measurements for each of the product characteristics, target values, and measurements of competitor&#39;s products. This information can be collected using TeamFocus Idea Organization or GroupOutliner, if needed, or simply collected by voice discussion if there is general agreement. 
     Bridge Programs 
     The TeamFocus sessions produce data files comprised of all the groups&#39; responses to the facilitator&#39;s prompts for information. Upon execution of the export programs, these files are formatted into dBase III format for import into database tools, such as Microsoft Access. An export file from the database tool can be used by other bridge programs to construct import files for various tools such as ITI QFD/Capture. Reports and documents can be created from the TeamFocus tool, the database tool, or from the QFD tools. 
     EXPORTIO 
     Referring to FIG. 5 showing a pseudocode implementation of the bridge program EXPORTIO, this specialized program used by IBM bridges data from a TeamFocus Idea Organization (IO) session to a dBase III database file. The program begins with a prompt to the user to enter the path to the SESSION.DBF file created by TeamFocus. The program then verifies that the path entered is correct, and if so, reads the file to determine the names of all available sessions. These are entered into a list box control on the main form. The default source and destination paths are set as the current directory. They can be changed by the user if need be. The user can select as many sessions as desired to be exported. When OK is clicked, the EXPORT program validates all data fields entered by the user. If all is valid, the Session Id for the first selected session is used to determine input file names. The file containing all the IO list items and their associated comment filenames is named &#34;LIST --  x.IO&#34; where x is the Session Id. The first LIST --  x.IO record is read and assigned to the Idea field. The next line is then read and assigned to the Comment File Name variable. This represents the name of the file that contains any comments associated with that Idea. If the Comment File exists, then each line of the file is read and appended to the Comment field. Session Id, Idea, and Comment are then written to the dBase III database file. This process of reading and processing 2 LIST --  x.IO lines at a time is then repeated until the file is empty. 
     EXPORTAE 
     Referring to FIG. 6 showing a pseudocode implementation of the bridge program EXPORTAE, this specialized program used by IBM bridges data from a TeamFocus Alternative Evaluation (AE) session to a dBase III database. The program begins with a prompt to the user to enter the path to the SESSION.DBF file created by TeamFocus. The program then verifies that the path entered is correct, and if so, reads the file to determine the names of all available sessions. These are entered into a list box control on the main form. The default source and destination paths are set as the current directory. They can be changed by the user if need be. The user can select as many sessions as desired to be exported. When OK is clicked, the EXPORT program validates all data fields entered by the user. If all is valid, the Session Id for the first selected session is used to determine input file names. The file containing all the AE alternatives and their associated comment file names is named &#34;ALT --  x.AE&#34; where x is the Session Id. The first ALT --  x.AE record is read and assigned to the Alt field. The next line is then read and assigned to the Comment File Name variable. This represents the name of the file that contains the description associated with that Alt. If the Comment File exists, then each line of the file is read and appended to the Desc field. Session Id, Alt, and Desc are then written to the dBase III Alternatives database file. This process of reading and processing 2 ALT --  x.AE lines at a time is then repeated until the file is empty. The file containing all the AE Criteria and their associated comment file names is named &#34;CRI --  x.AE&#34; where x is the Session Id. The first CRI --  x.AE record is read and assigned to the Cri field. The next line is then read and assigned to the Comment File Name variable. This represents the name of the file that contains the description associated with that Cri. If the Comment File exists, then each line of the file is read and appended to the Desc field. Session Id, Cri, and Desc are then written to the dBase III Criteria database file. This process of reading and processing 2 CRI --  x.AE lines at a time is then repeated until the file is empty. Now the results must be created. The file that contains each user&#39;s decision data is located in that user&#39;s directory and is called &#34;DEC --  x.AE&#34; where x is the Session Id. The first line of this file contains the number of alternatives. The second line is the number of criteria. The remainder of the data is grouped into alternative and associated criteria result. Loop through this data assigning the first record in the group to alternative. Then read as many lines as there are criteria and assign to criteria (counter) field. 
     EXPORTGM 
     Referring to FIG. 7 showing a pseudocode implementation of the bridge program EXPORTGM, this specialized program used by IBM bridges data from a TeamFocus Group Matrix (GM) session to a dBase III database. The program begins with a prompt to the user to enter the path to the SESSION.DBF file created by TeamFocus. The program then verifies that the path entered is correct, and if so, reads the file to determine the names of all available sessions. These are entered into a list box control on the main form. The default source and destination paths are set as the current directory. They can be changed by the user if need be. The user can select as many sessions as desired to be exported. When OK is clicked, the EXPORT program validates all data fields entered by the user. If all is valid, the Session Id for the first selected session is used to determine input file names. The file containing the GM rows and their associated comment file names is named &#34;ROW --  x.GM&#34; where x is the Session Id. The first ROW --  x.GM record is read and assigned to the Row field. The type is assigned as &#34;ROW&#34;. The next line is then read and assigned to the Comment File Name variable. This represents the name of the file that contains the description associated with that Row. If the Comment File exists, then each line of the file is read and appended to the Comment field. Session Id, Row, Type, and Comment are then written to the dBase III Alternatives database file. This process of reading and processing 2 ROW --  x.GM lines at a time is then repeated until the file is empty. The file containing the GM columns and their associated comment file names is named &#34;COL --  x.GM&#34; where x is the. Session Id. The first COL --  x.GM record is read and assigned to the Column field. The type is assigned as &#34;COL&#34;. The next line is then read and assigned to the Comment File Name variable. This represents the name of the file that contains the description associated with that Column. If the Comment File exists, then each line of the file is read and appended to the Comment field. Session Id, Column, Type, and Comment are then written to the dBase III Labels database file. This process of reading and processing 2 Col --  x.GM lines at a time is then repeated until the file is empty. The file containing the GM columns and their associated comment file names is named &#34;COL --  x.GM&#34; where x is the Session Id. The first COL --  x.GM record is read and assigned to the Column field. The type is assigned as &#34;COL&#34;. The next line is then read and assigned to the Comment File Name variable. This represents the name of the file that contains the description associated with that Column. If the Comment File exists, then each line of the file is read and appended to the Comment field. Session Id, Column, Type, and Comment are then written to the dBase III Labels database file. This process of reading and processing 2 REL --  x.GM lings at a time is then repeated until the file is empty. The file containing the GM Relations and their associated comment file names is named &#34;REL --  x.GM&#34; where x is the Session Id. The first REL --  x.GM record is read and assigned to the Relation field. The type is assigned as &#34;REL&#34;. The next line is then read and assigned to the Comment File Name variable. This represents the name of the file that contains the description associated with that Relation. If the Comment File exists, then each line of the file is read and appended to the Comment field. Session Id, Relation, Type, and Comment are then written to the dBase III Labels database file. This process of reading and processing 2 REL --  x.GM lines at a time is then repeated until the file is empty. Now the results must be created. The file that contains the group&#39;s results is called GRUP --  x.GM where x is the Session Id. This file contains 1 line of data which must be parsed to obtain the results matrix. The data is grouped by column, so the results for each row associated with column 1 appear first, then all row data for column 2, etc. Loop through this data, parsing out the Relation value and outputting Row, Col, Rel, and Session Id the GM Results dBase III file. 
     QFD Bridge 
     Referring to FIG. 8 showing a pseudocode implementation of the bridge program QFDCAPT, this specialized program used by IBM bridges data from a TeamFocus session stored in Microsoft Access to a commercially available QFD application such as ITI QFD/Capture. The program initializes program variables and directories and then prompts the user to input what &#34;rooms&#34; of the &#34;house of quality&#34; are being imported to ITI QFD/Capture. The program then checks to make sure the appropriate Microsoft Access export files exist. An export file should exist for each &#34;room&#34; of the &#34;house of quality&#34; in QFD/Capture. For example, the customer wants and needs exercise should result in files for the &#34;WHAT&#34;, &#34;WHY&#34;, and &#34;WHAT vs WHY&#34; &#34;rooms&#34; of the &#34;house of quality&#34;. The program then opens a file which is the QFD/Capture import file. Next, it writes the appropriate header information to the QFD/Capture import file. For each &#34;room&#34; in the &#34;house of quality&#34; that was selected, the appropriate information is read from the Microsoft Access export file and written to the QFD/Capture import file. When all &#34;rooms&#34; have been handled, the program writes the appropriate trailer information to the QFD/Capture file and closes the file. At this point, the QFDCAPT program ends. 
     For some QFD tools, it is possible to execute the import command right from the bridge program. If this is desired, the appropriate command can be inserted after the import file is closed and before the program ends. 
     Advantages Over the Prior Art 
     The combination of facilitated work sessions and GroupWare products, when applied to the Quality Function Deployment methodology, allows an organization to build its &#34;house of quality&#34; in less time than it would otherwise have required. The facilitated work sessions allow the interfunctional teams to focus their efforts and make effective use of their time. They also promote teamwork and ownership of the design decisions and tradeoffs that are necessary in product development. The GroupWare tools allow the work team to quickly collect, organize, and document their ideas. At the end of the facilitated session, the team has immediate documentation of their work, which can be loaded into QFD software packages for further analysis. The GroupWare tools also allow for the proper management of the documentation, making immediate access throughout the organization possible. 
     Alternative Embodiments 
     It will be appreciated that, although specific embodiments of the invention have been described herein for purposes of illustration, various modifications may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. In particular, although this invention was developed specifically to construct the &#34;house of quality&#34; for customer requirements and engineering requirements, these methods need not be limited to that. Other &#34;houses of quality&#34; such as business requirements, parts characteristics, operations requirements, and production planning can also be developed with this invention. This invention would also apply to the Dynamic QFD methodology that links the various &#34;houses of quality&#34; into one. Other bridge programs can similarly be written for other QFD applications. The advantages offered by the bridge programs are in time saving and accuracy, as the data need not by manually keyed into each tool. Accordingly, the scope of protection of this invention is limited only by the following claims and their equivalents.