Using Evaluations in Quality Management

When Heli, the quality engineer, makes a usage decision for an inspection lot, the quality score is determined for the lot. A quality score is an integer value that describes the quality of an inspection lot. Heli can use it for further analysis and a quality management evaluation. The quality score can be calculated by a procedure that Petra and Marco predefine for an inspection type in the material master. The SAP S/4HANA system can then automatically assign a quality score to an inspection lot.

Review the related process in SAP S/4HANA below.

Petra, the quality planner, selects a method for the calculation of the quality score on the inspection settings defined in the inspection type of the material master of the inspected material. For example, the quality score is calculated based on the usage decision code. When Heli, the quality engineer, makes a usage decision by selecting an appropriate usage decision code, the system automatically assigns a quality score to the inspection lot. Marco, the application consultant, assigned this quality score to the usage decision code (UD code) before when he customized the system.

In most of our customers systems, the worst quality score is 1 and the best quality score is 100. If the quality score is based on the usage decision code, a rejection corresponds to 1 and acceptance corresponds to 100. Some customers also define an usage decision code for acceptance with minor deviations and assign, for example, a quality score of 80 to this usage decision code.

As you can see in the figure, there are other methods available to calculate the quality score, for example:

• Calculating from a minimum quality score of characteristics: If all characteristics are accepted, the quality score will be 100 (or the defined maximum in your system). Otherwise, the quality score depends on the weighting of the rejected characteristics. The higher the weighting, the lower is the quality score.
• Calculating weighted from a quality score of characteristics: If all characteristics are accepted, the quality score will be 100 (or the defined maximum in your system). Otherwise, the quality score is calculated as a weighted sum of the UD code of the individual characteristics. In this case, the quality score is lower if a high amount of critical characteristics is rejected.

Irrespective of the chosen procedure to calculate the quality score, the score is always calculated by the system when the quality engineer executes a usage decision. Later, the quality engineer can generate a time-series plot of the quality score, for example, for a material/supplier combination, to see whether the supplier quality changed over time.

In SAP S/4HANA Quality Management, Heli, the quality engineer, analyzes various information to enhance quality control and operational efficiency.

Identify which data Heli can analyze in the following figure.

As displayed, the following data can be analyzed:

• Data from quality inspections:

  Through the Inspection Lot Analytics app, the Quality Engineer can assess inspection lots for which usage decisions have already been made that consider factors like time, inspection type, material, and plant. For example, the Quality Engineer can create a time series depicting the quality score evolution of a purchased component over time, focusing on material/supplier combinations.

  Using the Characteristic Analytics app, the Quality Engineer conducts a similar analysis, albeit concentrating on individual inspection outcomes rather than the overall quality score of inspection lots.

  For more comprehensive insights, SAP S/4HANA offers the Inspection Lot Detailed Analytics and Characteristic Detailed Analytics apps designed for detailed drill-downs. Using the former, the Quality Engineer can, for example, initiate an overview of average quality scores for goods receipt inspections of a material purchased from multiple suppliers. Subsequently, they can scrutinize the quality score's temporal evolution for a specific supplier.

• Data from quality notifications and data from non-conformance management:

  Using the Nonconformance Analytics app, the Quality Engineer can analyze defects, based on, for example, time, material, and plant, defect category, defect code and defect code group, supplier, customer, and more. The app also encompasses data from quality notifications. For example, they can display monthly defect counts for a material over time to assess potential improvements in product quality.

  For deeper analysis, SAP S/4HANA offers the Nonconformance Detailed Analytics app. This app also provides a drill-down functionality into the data so that the Quality Engineer can analyze the defects in the system from various perspectives. The Quality Engineer can generate a chart indicating total defects for the current year per defect code. In subsequent analyzes, they can select specific defect codes to inspect material-related defect counts and identify items with notable defect occurrences.

In this demonstration, the following analytical functionalities of SAP S/4HANA Quality Management are demonstrated:

• Quality Engineer Overview
• Manage Defects
• Inspection Lot Analytics
• Display Results History