FIRST SMOK SYSTEM INTEGRATION SEMINAR


EMERGENCY FLOOD RECOVERY PROJECT
INTEGRATION SEMINAR – 9TH OCTOBER 2002
QUALITY ASSURANCE PRESENTATION


INTRODUCTION

Whilst Quality Assurance has become an obligatory part of modern business practice, the concept has lost some of its original credibility due to the application in some instances, of excessively bureaucratic procedures and documentation.

It is considered that the term "Quality Assurance" is simply modern jargon for what has always been good engineering and business practice. Accordingly and for the purposes of the integration of Quality Assurance of the B2 component of the Flood Recovery Project, which involves so many different companies each of whom will probably have their own QA system including in most cases, full QA certification, the emphasis will be placed on simplicity, ease of use and flexibility relying of the fundamentals of good management of each sub-component rather than an elaborate formal QA documentation framework which would have to overlap each sub-component company's own system of QA.

The parties involved in the project will be encouraged to bring their criticisms and suggestions in relation to the system integration to the attention of IMGW at an early stage in an endeavour to achieve a QA system that meets the real needs of the project and the client with a minimum of duplication and unnecessary effort by all parties.

OBJECTIVES

Whilst until the present time, contractors have inevitably focussed their time and energy on the fulfilment of their own contractual duties and responsibilities, the primary objective of the project as a whole must of course be the successful and efficient integration of all of the various sub-components thus providing IMGW with a system that meets all of the intended objectives and which can be refined, developed and further improved as may be required.

To facilitate the integration of the entire system it is intended to establish a series of simple rules and procedures for the purpose of achieving the following objectives:

i) Quick and effective communications between the various project entities.

ii) Definition of procedures for testing the inter-action of the various sub-components.

iii) Identification of problems and non-conformances.

iv) Identification of recommendations and remedies to resolve problems and non-conformances and to improve the performance of the system.

With the above objectives in mind, the following measures are proposed:

a) Organisation of lines of communication based on an updating of the QAP 2 document (draft Quality Assurance report).

b) The nomination of a single representative of each project entity who will be responsible for QA co-ordination with the rest of the project (current contact details to be provided eg. telephone and fax numbers, e-mail and postal addresses).

c) Preparation of integration protocols identifying the known and anticipated interfaces between the various entities and sub-components and to define the following:

       (i) Required test procedures to verify the performance of the integrated system both in parts and finally as a whole.

       (ii) The method, presentation and format of reporting test results, non-conformances and problems together with recommendations for remedial action or improvements.

       (iii) To ensure that the authorised representative of entities involved in testing have signed the required documents recording their agreement or otherwise of the test results and any proposed remedial action or improvements.

        (iv) To record and to make known by circulation of documents to all interested parties, IMGW's decisions and instructions related to remedial actions or improvements

       (v) To ensure that primary data from the documentation of each sub-component is in a form that can be readily transferred from entity to entity as may be required via the telecommunications and telemetry systems (data samples to be indicated).

d) Discussion forum to expose the particular requirements of the various parties in relation to routine data exchange and resolving problems that may arise.

e) It is recognised that some documents which may be required by IMGW to be transferred within the overall project system, may be regarded by the "author company" to be of a confidential nature. To avoid delay and disruption to the integration process, any sub-component contractors having such concerns should bring them to the attention of IMGW at the earliest moment for discussion and resolution.

IMGW'S STRATEGY AND POLICY

The project client's primary intent with regard to the integration process is to achieve the proper and efficient functioning of the system in its entirety as soon as practically possible.

Nevertheless IMGW has a duty to ensure that each sub-component contractor fulfils its contractual obligations and consequently it must be recognised that some issues could become matters of disagreement and contractual contention.

The overall interests of the project are clearly linked to the quick and efficient resolution of any such problems with a minimum of delay and disruption and IMGW appeals to all parties involved in the project not to allow any contractual issues to delay the implementation of full and satisfactory system operation.

IMGW also recognises that during this process of integration and refinement of the system as a whole, some modifications to certain sub-components may be required which are beyond the scope of the original contractual obligations. In such circumstances it will be the policy of IMGW to identify such changes as quickly as possible and to accordingly negotiate the required modifications with the relevant sub-component contractors as a form of agreed variation to the original contracts.
IMGW is convinced that such agreements would be in the best interests of all parties but failing agreement, the more time consuming and less efficient option of competitive tendering would have to be considered.

ORGANISATION OF QUALITY ASSURANCE

Lines of communications are anticipated that will channel exchanges and contacts between the parties of the project through the Task Managers and the IMGW Integration Manager.
The intent being to ensure that IMGW are fully informed at all times and are fully implicated in the integration process and are consequently made aware at the earliest stage of any non-conformances or other problems and will thus be able to consider possible remedies and to decide on the appropriate course of action with a minimum of delay.

It is not intended that these proposed lines of communication should inhibit direct, informal and constructive contacts between the project entities, but to ensure that such direct contacts are productive with regard to the overall objectives of the project and the project client, IMGW should be kept fully informed of such contacts and any resulting proposals, recommendations or agreements.

B.2.12.2 Consultant