Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Intutive Quality Control- Part I

Intuition is not a bolt of lightning out of blue sky, nor it is magic. Research has shown that more experienced one is in any particular field , or more information about a particular field is available to a person in his subconscious brain , the more his judgements are based on intuition. You do not get intuitions about the fields about which you have no knowledge. The quality of intuition depends upon the quantity and quality of the information available in the subconscious brain. Intuition is a natural outgrowth of experience or as Gary Klein defines it " Intuition is the way we translate our experience into judgements and decisions".

All of us get intuitions. Some of us are more skilled at recognizing and using them while others have it to a lesser degree. Intuition works on patterns which are formed in the brain and these patterns are a result of repeated experiences which we have accumulated in our subconscious brain over a period of time. Whenever we get an input , it awakens a pattern in our brain and we get a sense of familiarity . The more observations and experiences we have in a particular Field , more patterns will be formed in our brain, and with more patterns better will be our intuition.

Quality control basically consists of a set of parameters/ measurements which defines the input, output or the process. These parameters have some tolerance limits attached to them within which the input or product must lie so that the output is of desired quality.

It is often seen that newcomers find it difficult to pick up subtle flaws in the product even when they are very conversant with the specifications and techniques. It generally happens that, they place too much reliance on the specifications, procedures and techniques and fail to notice the subtle flaws in the product because they lack the pattern in their brain and even when they have it, they usually ignore these intuitive signals. Experienced persons pick up these signals easily and with the patten matching, it is easier for them to pick up these subtle flaws missed out by the newcomers.

These parameters/specifications can be used to form a pattern in our brain describing as to what the input or output should look like . The patterns can be reinforced by deliberatly repeating the experiment of testing the specifications, getting feed backs and modifying the pattern till a reasonable good pattern of a what a product look like is formed and reinforced. The more patterns we have, the more expertise we have and it will be that much easier to do the checks mentally and make a decision whether to accept or reject the product. The key here is that of deliberate experimentation, practise and feed back.

The receipt of a signal about the product , its matching with the patterns in the subconscious brain and arriving at a decision which happens in a very short time span of a few seconds is what we call "Intutive Quality Control".

No comments: