Axiomatic design application for minimising the difficulties of QFD usage

This work presents a theoretical proposal for a conceptual model of QFD application aiming at minimising the difficulties in its use. To develop this model, the following stages were carried out: literature review to identify information about QED use, analysis of data collected in a field research and review of data from previous interviews with QFD users, and the application of AD (Axiomatic Design) to develop the conceptual model considering data from previous stages. The main difficulty which was identified and has yet to be solved is related to the development of the quality matrix. The results demonstrate the application viability of AD to develop the proposed theoretical model, but the article concludes that an empirical application is needed to achieve broader validity. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.