Organizations across the globe are looking for ways to deliver projects that live up to the “quality” standards set by the organization and its customers. Nowadays, successful projects are not those that only meet the customer’s requirements on a timely basis. A business is known to deliver successful projects when it delivers quality projects to its clients, which means maximum productivity with minimum wastes.

The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) Guide has an entire chapter dedicated to the importance of Quality and quality management tools in delivering successful business projects. Project Managers are realizing the benefits of applying quality management tools in managing their projects. This ensures the application of quality tools like Cause-and-effect diagram, Check Sheet, Control chart, Flowchart, Histogram, Pareto chart, and Scatter diagram in the planning, execution, and delivery stages of the project.

These 7 Quality Tools are utilized in Project Management through three defined phases:

  • Quality Planning: This is the project initiation process, where the quality is defined. In the quality planning process, project management professionals (PMPs) set the standards for the project which will be executed and then delivered to their clients. Quality tools like Cause-and-effect or Ishikawa or Fishbone diagram, Flowchart, and Histogram can be used in this stage to plan and predict the project quality. The aim of this phase is to plan the projected trajectory using quality control tools.
  • Quality Assurance: In this phase, PMPs can ensure that the quality control process is followed. It involves the use of Check sheets, Scatter diagram, Pareto chart, and Control chart to gather data and organize facts to identify the defects in the process. This stage helps in identifying the problems in the process and helps the team correct them to ensure project quality. Project management teams can decide which of these 7QC Tools are used in these two phases.
  • Quality Control: This is the most important phase of controlling the quality of the projects. Here all the 7 quality management tools are utilized to evaluate the progress of the project and ensure quality control. PMPs are responsible to analyze the results collected from the data analysis and determine the accurate project quality. Ultimately, this step determines the project delivery. If the project quality meets the customer’s requirements or not is evaluated in this phase.

Utilizing these seven quality management tools makes sure that the project is completed on time and has no extra costs involved. Quality management principles of Lean and Six Sigma guide these 7QC tools. Thus, project managers and PMPs will benefit a lot by learning about the importance of quality tools in project management. The PMBOK Guide covers all the essentials of these quality tools and their application in successful project delivery. Aspiring PMPs can learn all about the application of quality tools in project management through the PMP Certification Training. Quality management has been implemented by organizations across all major industries to deliver quality projects to their clients.