During a recent ASQ Inspection Division meeting, I had the opportunity to sit down over lunch with some of the very best minds in the quality field. After exchanging pleasantries, I was quickly engaged in an insightful discussion about corrective actions. My colleagues discussed a problem I understood well: Corrective actions assigned to trends can lead to superficial or ineffective solutions. A member of the table chimed in that it all relates to the old analogy: You cannot see the forest for the trees. It can be in our best interest as inspectors then to seek the expertise of outside evaluators for that all-important outside perspective.
An example of this issue—and one my team and I address regularly—relates to documentation validation. Many Air Force calibration laboratories have processes in place to verify documentation accuracy before returning the calibrated equipment back to the customer. Numerous laboratories have identified flaws in the verification process, usually through the internal quality program. A common corrective action implemented for this issue—and determined through trend analysis meetings—is to add processes for an additional documentation verification. The common outcome of this action is to simply add unbudgeted costs to an already minimally manned laboratory without additional value.