2014 QFD Black Belt^® Certificate Course
The 26th Symposium on QFD

Typically given as in-company training, the QFD Black Belt^® Certificate Course is opened to the public once a year at the QFD Institute's annual Symposium on QFD. For those who are new to Modern QFD, this offers once-a-year opportunity to take both QFD Green Belt^® Course and QFD Black Belt^® Course on a single trip.

The 2014 dates and location will be announced here by January 2014. Please sign up for free newsletters to receive announcements. Or, please feel free to contact us now if you need to plan for the 2014 training budget soon.

As a course offered by the QFD Institute, you are assured of the Excellence in Training unparalleled to others (testimonials). The course description below addresses largely the public QFD Black Belt^® Course, which is based on a generic QFD process and curriculum.

Those who are seeking QFD application methods specific to their special field or situation should consider an in-house training, which may include extra components that address the unique needs of your project. Please inquire at QFD Institute, Tel: +1 734-995-0847 (9 am - 5 pm US Eastern Time).

This workshop is part of the international program in Quality Function Deployment; it is the only internationally recognized QFD certificate programs authorized by Dr. Akao (founder of QFD) outside Japan.

• Hands-on practice of Modern QFD on a team project;
• Step-by-step instruction of several standard QFD deployments;
• In-depth review of important Modern QFD tools and deployments
• Understanding of the full depth and breadth of Modern Comprehensive QFD; and
• 1,900 pages of QFD materials including the QFD Institute QFD Black Belt^® manual (1,200 pages) and Modern QFD templates.

QFD Green Belt^® graduates who are:

• QFD project team members including marketing, sales, R&D, design, manufacturing, service, quality, and others, as appropriate for your industry sector
• Quality consultants and Six/Lean Sigma (DFSS/DFLS) Master Black Belts
• Trainers, facilitators, and internal quality gurus
• ( Attending from Overseas )

Prerequisites—One of these conditions must apply:

• You have a Full Status QFD Green Belt^® Certificate ; OR
• You are attending the 2014 QFD Green Belt^® Course; OR
• You have earned a Provisional QFD Green Belt^® Certificate since September 1, 2013; OR
• You are attending the 2014 Green Belt^® Update Course.

Verification of Prerequisites: You may be asked to provide your Certificate number or your previous course information to verify eligibility.

  

New topics to be taught in 2014 QFD Black Belt^® Course [NEW]

• Advanced, Modern QFD tools and analytic methods for quality, strategy, management, product planning, decision making, invention, and design;
• Voice of Gemba — QFD's unique approach to customer visits, and how to design Gemba Visits and new Gemba Analysis tools;
• Semi-customized deployments common to most industries, such as project, customer, quality, technology, function, reliability, cost, manufacturability, production, service, etc.;
• How to input, process, and output field data for each deployment;
• Incorporating Blitz QFD^® (matrix-free QFD for immediate results) into Dr. Akao's Comprehensive QFD to speed up the process;
• Improved algorithms for defining Customer Needs (Demanded Quality) for "new-to-world" products and services;
• Why and how of replacing ordinal scale calculations with ratio scale calculations of customer needs priorities, sales point, competitive benchmarking, and matrix relationship weights, to improve the meaningfulness and accuracy of QFD in a Six Sigma world [NEW];
• How to expertly link QFD with Design for Six Sigma (DFSS / DFLS) [NEW];
• Introduction to Lifestyle Deployment with Kansei Engineering [NEW];
• Integration of latest Kano methods [NEW];
• Enhancing Customer Need Hierarchy Diagram with measures, targets, and Kano categories [NEW];
• Using Customer Voice Table with specification documents [NEW];
• Introduction to General Theory of Innovation, a TRIZ-evolved new-to-world business innovation method for general business management [NEW];
• Speed Deployment to additionally accelerate your project [NEW].

 

The resulting benefits you may expect upon successful completion of this course include:

• Mastery of generic Modern QFD tools and deployments and knowledge of how Comprehensive QFD works
• Knowledge of new-to-world methods in product development, quality and innovation, and how they can be incorporated into projects
• Knowledge of how to facilitate a QFD project team
• Provisional QFD Black Belt^® Certificate

To assure the integrity of your certificate as demonstrated in application, full status QFD Black Belt^® will be earned upon successful completion of:

• Having a QFD Master Black Belt^® custom-tailor a QFD process for your company;
• Co-facilitating a QFD project with the QFD Master Black Belt^® using your custom-tailored QFD process (apprentice); and
• Facilitating by yourself a second QFD project using your custom-tailored QFD process and submitting your work to a QFD Master Black Belt^® for approval (journeyman).

Testimonials of past attendees

 

1) A laptop computer (with CD drive, MS Excel^®, MS Word^®, and Adobe Acrobat^®) or calculator as you will receive a CD with QFD software templates and case studies.

2) Relevant marketing and technical data for a small project or a part of a large project that you are currently working on or plan to work on in the future.

IMPORTANT: There is no need to reveal any confidential data. The goal is to make the QFD exercises real and meaningful to you!  If it is not feasible to bring such data, you may join others or use a generic or hobby project. → Detailed instructions on this will be sent to you after your registration is complete.

Please see Things to Bring and Things to Take Home for the QFD Black Belt^® attendees.

(Optional) You may also bring your project team and both learn and work on your real project.

Team Discounts: With three (3) or more registrations from the same company, a $200 per person discount may be applied toward the "QFD Facilitator's Package," "QFD Black Belt^® Package #1," or "QFD Black Belt^® Package #2," and a $100 per person discount toward the "QFD Green Belt^® Package."

• QFD Institute's QFD Black Belt^® Course Manual (1,200 pages)
• CD-ROM with case studies and the Modern QFD templates
• Additional case studies and reports (approx. 550 pages)

This course will be taught these instructors, the only two QFD Red Belts^® outside Japan who are certified by Dr. Akao (founder of QFD); both are a recepient of Akao Prize for Excellence in QFD.

Glenn H. Mazur (www.mazur.net)

• Executive Director, QFD Institute and International Council for QFD (ICQFD)
• Certified QFD Red Belt^® (international)
• Certified QFD-Architekt #A21907 (QFD Institut Deutschland)
• 1998 Akao Prize^® winner for Excellence in QFD
• Academician, International Academy for Quality
• Application / implementation expert
• Trained over 2,000 QFD Green Belts^® worldwide
• Kansei Engineering Lifestyle QFD expert
• Convenor of ISO Working Group 2 Technical Committee 69 Subcommittee 8 (writing the international standard for QFD)
• President, Japan Business Consultants, Ltd.
• Senior Member of ASQ
• Member of Japanese Society for Quality Control
• National Academies of Science Board, Innovation (ret.)
• Adjunct faculty, University of Michigan (ret.)

Richard E. Zultner

• Software Quality Specialist
• Certified QFD Red Belt^®
• 1998 Akao Prize^® for Excellence in QFD
• Director, QFD Institute
• President, ZULTNER & COMPANY
• TOC Software Jonah
• Six Sigma Master Black Belt

The QFD Institute permits only full status QFD Black Belts^® who have successfully completed the "train-the-trainer course" or higher to teach its QFD Green Belt^® Courses. Individuals' QFD Belt status may be verified through the QFD Institute office.

Three (3) registration options are available, depending on your previous QFD Belt status:

1. Facilitator's Package (no prerequisites)
2. QFD Black Belt^® Package #1
3. QFD Black Belt^® Package #2

Please see the PDF Brochure for the details of these options, prices, and other information such as the Early-bird Discount ($200 until May 1, 2014) and Team Discounts.

For questions, please contact us (+ 734-995-0847).

The 2014 venue will be announced here by January 1, 2014.

Please sign up for free Newsletters to receive announcements, or contact us if you need the information sooner in order to apply for the 2014 training/travel budget.

 

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*NOTES:

• Travel information ... How to Get There (the information coming soon)
• Destination Information ... Things to do and enjoy (the information coming soon)