• FMEA - Any Alternatives?

    From hitesh.rolekar@gmail.com@21:1/5 to All on Mon May 21 04:45:46 2018
    Hi, I have 5 years of experience working on FMEA over Process Maps

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  • From Christian Ferrer@21:1/5 to Stephen McKelvey on Wed Jun 16 15:02:49 2021
    On Wednesday, August 25, 2004 at 1:57:09 PM UTC+2, Stephen McKelvey wrote:
    We have tried using FMEA as part of our design process. Done properly (assembling teams of experts, exhaustively considering all the failure
    modes, documenting the findings, etc.) we find that it can be an
    expensive process that does not often yield any useful design
    improvements. Does anyone have any suggestions for streamlining the
    process or alternative techniques?

    It is now starting to be widely accepted that the FMEA in its original form is obsolete as a tool. The utility of the FMEA is limited since it is highly based on opinions. The use of the RPN distorts the assessment of risk by creating a pseudo-scale with
    little meaning and inconsistency from user to user. Firstly, the detection factor is not part of the definition of risk and therefore its use is not coherent in the risk calculation. Secondly, during the definition of risk, it is not very meaningful to
    multiply the severity score and the probability of occurrence together because it masks the actual scores that we are trying to understand. Furthermore, it seems there is no universally recognized, scientifically reproducible numeric scale for risk.
    Instead, the scores should be presented as polar coordinates to more clearly represent the matrix of risk magnitude, similar to how is done by reliability engineers in criticality analysis. However, since risk cannot be truly quantified, a given
    criticality matrix will most likely need boundary calibration based on a combination of context analysis, expert judgement and distributed cognition. This insights come from highly respected sources such as G. Watson and D. Snowden, whom I highly
    recommend.

    Feel free to use the FMEA in its classical form but only as a consultative brainstorming tool. However, better would be to arrive at a more coherent criticality ranking and instead of asking the question of detection, just focus on actually determining a
    mitigation strategy or control for those items with high criticality.

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