The book addresses the complex issue of quality uncertainty due to information asymmetry in the backdrop of information economics, total quality management and marketing science. Reliability Engineering, Seven Management Tools and System Dynamics are used to develop theories on quality uncertainty and perception. Quality perception is identified as a multidisciplinary measure of business performance. The tools are developed to minimize quality uncertainty or to maximize quality perception. A few worksheets are provided for applying these theories to improve business performance.

1 Introduction1.1 Recent metrics for business performance1.2 Quality pursued in various disciplines1.3 Quality commonality and multidisciplinary approach1.4 Management of quality uncertainty and perception2 Quality uncertainty due to information asymmetry2.1 Prelude to quality uncertainty2.2 Information asymmetry and quality uncertainty2.3 Examples of information asymmetry and quality uncertainty2.4 Implications of asymmetric information2.5 Product manufacturing and quality uncertainty2.6 Causes of quality uncertainty due to information asymmetry3 Perceived quality through time3.1 Emergence of perceived quality3.2 Factors of perceived quality3.3 SERVQUAL as a metric of perceived quality3.4 Marketing science approach to product-quality perception3.5 Expected quality approach from information economics3.6 Critical appraisal of existing approaches3.7 Need of a robust approach4 Quality uncertainty and quality perception4.1 Theoretical background of probability and reliability engineering4.2 System reliability4.3 Success tree and failure tree method4.4 Paradigm for mathematical modelling4.5 Behaviour of asymmetry and quality uncertainty4.6 Fault tree or success tree analysis4.7 Market with multiple players4.8 Computation of quality uncertainty and perception4.9 Product life cycle and information asymmetry4.10 Managerial implications and strategiesAppendix A Worksheets 1 and 25 Root cause and failure analysis of quality uncertainty5.1 Theoretical background of seven management tools5.2 Cause-and-Effect methodology5.3 An illustrative case of ball bearing5.4 Root-cause analysis of quality uncertainty5.5 Innovative method of failure analysis5.6 Generic solutions5.7 Contributions to the theory of quality uncertainty5.8 Managerial implications of the root-cause methodAppendix B Worksheets 3 and 46 Dynamics of quality perception6.1 System dynamics methodology6.2 Causal loop mapping of quality perception6.3 Preliminary model, variables, data and analysis6.4 Towards market dynamics6.5 Quality perception and market dynamics6.6 Observations from simulation runs6.7 Evolving hierarchy of policies for quality management6.8 Managerial implicationsAppendix C Worksheets 5 and 67 Future directions of quality perceptionReferencesIndex