Critical success factors for SPC implementation in UK small and medium enterprises: some key findings from a survey

There is no doubt that quality has become a major feature in the survival plan of many organisations today. Statistical process control (SPC) is a powerful technique for monitoring, managing, analysing and improving the process performance through the use of statistical methods. In this paper, the implementation of SPC is examined and analysed, based on a survey of 33 manufacturing small and medium enterprises (SMEs). The results presented here are focused on 12 critical success factors (CSFs) identified from the literature. The results of the analysis have shown that the critical success factors, in order of importance, are: management commitment, process prioritisation, control charting, teamwork, measurement system evaluation and so on. Moreover, this research has revealed that the least important factor is the use of pilot study in SMEs.