Management and the Technology Professional – B302
Case study answer 2
As the supervising engineer for step 6 in the manufacturing process I would immediately inform the project manager that the mistake has been made. Step 6 is part of the critical path and the result of running the step again will cost the a minimum of project 4 days. There is no opportunity to absorb this delay due to steps 7’s dependency on step 6, meaning that the process cannot be moved.
This course of action is the mostly costly to the project as a whole because of the addition of the extra 4 days at minimum. The impact of this decision means that the semiconductor products will need to be recalled from step 7 and transported back to step 6. However this negative is outweighed by the positive. In failing to properly test the semiconductor product, the consumer is potentially being sold a faulty product. Whilst failing to test the products doesn’t guarantee that it is faulty, it does guarantee that if the product turned out to be faulty then it would be my fault for not correctly testing them. The same thing can be said for the pharmaceutical industry. If an automated process manufacturers drugs in the same way every day would you feel happy to take the drugs if they had not been fully tested. Obviously the answer is no, even though the process of manufacture is controlled and performed by computers. If a person was to subsequently die from taking the drug and it is later found out that the drugs were not tested then the individual responsible and the company are liable.
If a faulty semiconductor product was subsequently integrated into a motherboard or device then the device could potentially fail. If this device is manufactured by another company, then the customers that purchase them will assume that it is their product that is faulty. This not only leads to the placement of unfair blame but also tarnishes the Intel Corporation and the assumption is made that Intel do not make reliable or functional parts. It would only take a large batch of faulty semiconductors distributed across several manufacturers to severely impact Intel’s corporate trust.
If as the supervising engineer I made the decision to ignore that missed test steps then I may as well ignore them continuously as whilst the testing step on a product like this could been seen as a pointless step due to the way the product is manufactured, it would only take one batch of faulty products to severely impact the perceived quality of Intel’s products. In a similar way to the manufacture of drugs, if one batch is missed, they may as well all be missed as the one time mistake can have the same impact as the continuous mistake. The difference being the continuous mistake consistently increases the chances of a fault going undetected.
If I was to talk to a colleague then such as the supervising engineer of step 7 and informed them of the missed tests then whilst I might have transferred some of the responsibility, i will not have removed my accountability. The supervisor of step 7 should not continue with their step if they are aware that a test wasn't performed at step 6. To seek advice from my supervisor would not leave me with any choices. My supervisor would have a responsibility to take an action as a result of my mistake. What ever my decision I will still be held accountable.
From an ethical point of view allowing the batch of untested semiconductors to continue through the process would be wrong. The British Computer Society code of conduct clearly states, “You shall carry out work or study with due care and diligence in accordance with the relevant authority's requirements, and the interests of system users.” The Association for Computing Machinery also states “Excellence is perhaps the most important obligation of a professional. The computing professional must strive to achieve quality and to be cognizant of the serious negative consequences that may result from poor quality in a system.” In both statements the ethical message is that the supervisor has a responsibility to prevent the potentially faulty products from being shipped out. In this scenario it means quickly informing the relevant people of the mistake so as to avoid further delays associated with starting step 6 again.
