Masters of Innovation, Pioneers of Change.

William Edwards Deming (1900 – 1993) was an American statistician, professor, author, lecturer, and consultant. He is perhaps best known for his work in Japan. There, from 1950 onward, he taught top management how to improve design (and thus service), product quality, testing and sales (the last through global markets) through various methods, including the application of statistical methods.

Deming made a significant contribution to Japan's later reputation for innovative high-quality products and its economic power. He is regarded as having had more impact upon Japanese manufacturing and business than any other individual not of Japanese heritage. Despite being considered something of a hero in Japan, he was only just beginning to win widespread recognition in the U.S. at the time of his death.
In the 1970s, Dr. Deming's philosophy was summarized by some of his Japanese proponents with the following 'a'-versus-'b' comparison:
(a) When people and organizations focus primarily on quality, defined by the following ratio,

quality tends to increase and costs fall over time.
(b) However, when people and organizations focus primarily on costs, costs tend to rise and quality declines over time.

Dr. W. Edwards Deming is known as the father of the Japanese post-war industrial revival and was regarded by many as the leading quality guru in the United States.

Walter Andrew Shewhart (pronounced like "shoe-heart", 1891 - 1967) was an American physicist, engineer and statistician, sometimes known as the father of statistical quality control.
W. Edwards Deming said of him:
As a statistician, he was, like so many of the rest of us, self-taught, on a good background of physics and mathematics.

PDCA (plan–do–check–act) is an iterative four-step management process typically used in business. It is also known as the Deming circle/cycle/wheel, Shewhart cycle, control circle/cycle, or plan–do–study–act (PDSA).
PDCA is a successive cycle which starts off small to test potential effects on processes, but then gradually leads to larger and more targeted change. Plan, Do, Check, Act are the four components of Work bench in Software testing.

PLAN Establish the objectives and processes necessary to deliver results in accordance with the expected output (the target or goals). By making the expected output the focus, it differs from other techniques in that the completeness and accuracy of the specification is also part of the improvement. DO Implement the new processes, often on a small scale if possible, to test possible effects. It is important to collect data for charting and analysis for the following "CHECK" step. CHECK Measure the new processes and compare the results (collected in "DO" above) against the expected results (targets or goals from the "PLAN") to ascertain any differences. Charting data can make this much easier to see trends in order to convert the collected data into information. Information is what you need for the next step "ACT". ACT Analyze the differences to determine their cause. Each will be part of either one or more of the P-D-C-A steps. Determine where to apply changes that will include improvement. When a pass through these four steps does not result in the need to improve, refine the scope to which PDCA is applied until there is a plan that involves improvement.


Joseph Moses Juran (1904 –2008) was a 20th century management consultant who is principally remembered as an evangelist for quality and quality management, writing several influential books on those subjects.

Kaoru Ishikawa (1915 - 1989) was a Japanese university professor and influential quality management innovator best known in North America for the Ishikawa or cause and effect diagram (also known as fishbone diagram) that is used in the analysis of industrial process.

Ishikawa diagrams (also called fishbone diagrams, cause-and-effect diagrams or Fishikawa) are causal diagrams that show the causes of a certain event -- created by Kaoru Ishikawa (1990). Common uses of the Ishikawa diagram are product design and quality defect prevention, to identify potential factors causing an overall effect. Each cause or reason for imperfection is a source of variation. Causes are usually grouped into major categories to identify these sources of variation.

The categories typically include:
• People: Anyone involved with the process
• Methods: How the process is performed and the specific requirements for doing it, such as policies, procedures, rules, regulations and laws
• Machines: Any equipment, computers, tools etc. required to accomplish the job
• Materials: Raw materials, parts, pens, paper, etc. used to produce the final product
• Measurements: Data generated from the process that are used to evaluate its quality
• Environment: The conditions, such as location, time, temperature, and culture in which the process operates

Genichi Taguchi (1924) is an engineer and statistician. From the 1950s onwards, Taguchi developed a methodology for applying statistics to improve the quality of manufactured goods. Taguchi methods have been controversial among some, but others have accepted many of the concepts introduced by him as valid extensions to the body of knowledge.

Kaizen , Japanese for "improvement" or "change for the better", refers to philosophy or practices that focus upon continuous improvement of processes in manufacturing, engineering, supporting business processes, and management. It has been applied in healthcare, psychotherapy, life-coaching, government, banking, and many other industries.