Quality function deployment in software development

Quality function deployment (QFD) is a methodology that has been developed over the last sixteen years in Japan to enable all people working on the development of a product to understand and know the customer´s requirements. The initial idea was developed by Yoji Akoa and has been applied mostly to hardware development. It was introduced in the USA to Ford and is now extensively used by the three large motor manufacturers and their suppliers. In the last three years software companies have started employing the methodology in software development. QFD employs matrix analysis to develop design requirements from customer requirements, product functions from design requirements, test requirements and process requirements from customer and design requirements, and so on. There are a set of matrices which are linked, the output of one going into the input of another. Matrices have been developed covering the whole development process, enabling requirements to be traced not only through design but throughout the whole development process. There are a number of software tools available which support the methodology. One QFDPlus from Ford is demonstrated