Quality Management Maturity Grid for quality maturity assessment and training

Crosby’s Quiz is an app I wrote as a Quality consultant to let people of different positions in a company assess the Quality Management Maturity of the company, e.g., before starting the implementation process of ISO 9001.

Usually, you use Crosby’s Quality Management Maturity Grid by asking a number of people to assess the company; the more the merrier from different levels and roles across the company as it helps to give a more complete picture. Each gets a copy of the grid and makes a subjective judgement about which Stage the company is at for each category; they mark the grid in the appropriate position.

I started using the grid that way, but I soon realized that it does not make easy for people to be objective in their assessment, since it is clear that the low maturity side is the left of the grid, and that going right is a sign of maturity. I prepared a set of cards (thirty: t.i., five cards for six categories: one card for each stage at each category) but I soon changed to an app, where they just needed to click on their option, one page for each category, and the rows representing the maturity stages being not in order, but mixed randomly. The results tended to be more consistent throughout the different levels and closer to reality.

It is really interesting not only to see the scores for each category (as well as the total), and the arithmetic mean across all levels, but also to see how individuals from different departments or roles in the company mark each category; big variances in scores indicate that people see the company as being very different in this area. It can be a fascinating exercise.

The thing I particularly like about the Quality Management Maturity Grid is that it is:

(a) very quick and easy to use,

(b) insightful – it makes you think, and

(c) – most important – it doesn’t just show you where you are but, also, what your company would have to be like to get a higher score; it therefore acts as your route-map for strategic quality and helps you plan your quality improvement initiatives so that you move steadily towards the right in the grid.

Used in a different way it also let you know if people in the company have a minimal quality intuition (if not training). For that I created the draggable list (again, one page for each category) and let them do their best trying to put it in the correct order. Again, the results can be fascinating!

Ways to use this app:

1. To let someone try to order the Crosby Grid and see, how good he/she is in putting it in order. [minimum: 0 points; maximum: 30 points]

2. To let people assess the maturity of their company (by letting them pick the maturity stage for each category). (two modes: ordered or mixed). [minimum: 6 points; maximum: 30 points]

This app is ideal for Quality managers, consultants and professionals; anyone involved in quality assessment, audits, training and management; for ISO 9000 implementation; for Company owners, students, etc.

I hope you enjoy using this tool.