Factors Affecting Product Quality in Electronic Arts
Endrullat et al., (2016) suggested that maintaining the quality of products is one of the most important considerations for any organization as it fosters customer satisfaction and develop brand loyalty as well as reduce the risks of the product failing or underperforming. Stark (2017) also added that a high quality of products can improve the reputation of the company and help to get accreditations from internationally recognized quality standardizations. Good quality products moreover help to fulfill the customer expectations and thereby improve the value for money of the products and help to increase customer base (Wagh et al., 2015). Additionally, according to Jiménez-Jiménez et al. (2015), effective management of product quality can improve organizational productivity and performance and therefore foster organizational growth and development.
Electronic Arts, popularly known as EA is a computer and video gaming designing company from USA and is considered as one of the leaders in the industry. The company became the second largest developers of computer games after Activision and has successfully launched several games in the market that acquired significant fame among the customer. Some of the most successful games launched by EA included Medal Of Honor Series, FIFA series, UFC Madden, Star Wars Series, Need For speed Series, NBA Live, Battlefield and NHL (ea.com, 2019).
Even though many of the games have achieved success for the company, some of the newer games (such as FIFA 18, Star Wars Battlefront I and II and Anthem) developed by the company have received several criticisms from customers. Some of the most significant complaints against these games included poor design of the games, hidden costs, poor customer service and technical support, profit centric designing and poor content (Christiansen, 2019). These factors adversely impact the product quality of EA. Additionally, it has also been pointed out that EA has poor customer service and technical support as well as a shortage of skilled workers which also affects the product quality (; Gurwin, 2019).
The study aims to understand the primary factors that have affected the quality of the games designed by EA and the factors that affect the perceptions of product quality among the customers. Based on this five strategies would be suggested that can be used to improve product quality.
Using the 6M Kaizen Checklist, the factors that have impacted the quality of the products of EA have been discussed, identifying the factors that are related to the employees (man), management, method, material, machine and environment.
Strategies for Improvement
It had been pointed out that one of the most significant reasons for a deterioration of the quality of the games designed by EA is due to a poor design and inadequate testing of the product. As a result, games such as Star Wars Battlefront I, The Simpsons Skateboarding, Star Wards Battlefront, Madden NFL 25 and GI Joe-The Rise of Cobra has several design flaws which makes them prone to crashes and thereby adversely impacts the experience of the customers. According to Menell et al. (2017) the poor testing process also causes the flaws to go unnoticed before product launch and thus increase risks of product failures.
Games such as Anthem and Star Wars Battlefront have included a process of micro transactions within the games. These games require the customers to pay additional money to unlock hidden contents of the game and purchase locked modules in the game. This causes the customers to spend more money than they expected to get the complete experience of the game. Moreover, in online gaming platforms, these transactions can provide undue competitive advantage to some players and thus takes away the focus on gaming skills and thus affect the gaming experience. Since the customers have already purchased the games, the hidden costs can adversely impact the perception of the product quality. According to Gupta et al. (2016) these hidden costs can reduce loyalty of the customers and reduce the brand image.
Shin et al. (2017) pointed out that effective customer service is vital to attract loyalty of the customers and develop a good and long lasting relation with them. Good and responsive customer service can improve satisfaction of the customers while poor service can reduce the perceptions of service quality among them. However, Electronic Arts fails to support their customers effectively through a good customer service. Many customers fail to get technical support while using the product and therefore have to depend upon third party vendors to help them. EA also has poor systems to address customer grievance as a result of which they generally remain unanswered and unacknowledged. Martin et al. (2016) suggested that poor after sales support can significantly reduce the perceptions of product quality and reduce the reputation of the organization. Therefore it is vital to ensure better customer satisfaction by improving the perceptions of product quality (Sutton, 2019).
According to Alagu and Thanuskodi (2018), a recent trend in EA’s product designing approach is a deviation of focus on the product quality to a focus on the profitability and cost reduction. This profit driven design can impact the quality of the product and lead to poor designing of the product. Games such as Star Wars Battlefront II and Need for Speed 2015 were nothing more than upgraded copies of the previous versions of the game launched by EA in order to reduce the costs of designing new game from a scratch. Tao et al. (2018) further pointed out that design of the product should be made through a shared focus on quality, profitability as well as improving the value for money of the product and therefore foster better perception of product quality.
PDCA Cycle
Some of the games of EA such as the Simpsons Skateboarding, Need for Speed payback and NHL have been criticized of having bad or poor content that is not original. These games provide an experience that is almost the same as many other games developed by EA previously and therefore shows poor content development for the product. According to Gurwin (2019) the quality and depth of the content in video and computer games plays a crucial part in shaping the product experience and a poor content can reduce the perceptions of quality of the product.
Alagu and Thanuskodi (2018) suggested that technical challenges are a constant factor for game designers as the quality of the product is influenced by the technological environment as well as the resources required to develop and render the high graphics and media contents of the game. Some of the technologies are also very expensive and increases the costs of production. Additionally, the newer games such as Anthem or Star Wars have very high system requirements for its smooth operation which can also hamper the experience of the customers who do not have the recommended hardware resources.
The process of designing good and advanced games requires skilled workers and a strong team of designers and testers. According to Christiansen (2019) currently the demand for skilled game developers, designers and testers is very high in the market and the number of designers currently employed is inadequate to meet the production targets of the company. Due to such a demand, several games such as NFL 25 have been developed by less experienced developers leading to a deterioration of the quality of the products.
PDCA is an abbreviation for Plan-DO-Check-Adjust/Act. It is an iterative process that comprises of four steps of planning, doing, checking and adjusting or acting and can be implemented by businesses to continually improve the product quality (Prashar, 2017). This framework is also called the Deming Wheel or Deming’s cycle and has been utilized by Toyota to develop the quality of their products (Pietrzak & Paliszkiewicz, 2015). Outlined below are the steps of the PDCA cycle:
Step 1: Plan: This involves identifying the key objectives of quality improvement of the product, establishing important goals and milestones for achieving better quality through effective planning.
Step 2: Do: This step involves the analysis and testing of the plan designed in the previous step incrementally to understand the products performance and collecting data about the performance for evaluation.
Total Quality Management (TQM)
Step 3: Check: The data collected in step 2 is then evaluated and analyzed and compared to the product plan and quality parameters to see if the design meets the necessary quality standards and specifications.
Step 4: Adjust/Act: The final stage involves investigating the design of the product to identify any defects based on the data analysis from previous step and adjusting the design to fix those problems.
TQM can be understood as a strategic approach that aims to develop the environment of the organization and also the skills and competencies of the workers in a way that can support better productivity of the organization. TQM also can be used to improve the standards of product quality and thereby improve the value for money of the products for the customers. TQM implies that the entire organization should be involved to achieve excellence in operational qualities and therefore support better quality of the products. Effective engagement of the management is also necessary through which proper planning, training, staffing and funding for the product development can also be ensured and thus develops the quality of the products. According to Sharma and Modgil (2015), the factors that needs to be addressed to implement TQM strategies includes improving customer satisfaction (by addressing the customers’ expectations and needs effectively), total commitment of the employees (by engaging them in a more effective manner in product designing), strategic thinking (to find effective solutions to designing problems and develop better design and marketing strategies), integrated systems (by effectively connecting the various processes and steps of product design and developing team coordination), information based decisions (by developing the design based on data collected from product testing), continuous development (by continually evaluating, testing and adjusting the design of the product to reach quality excellence), communication (by facilitating effective sharing of knowledge and information) and process focus (by improving process efficiency).
This framework aims to improve the quality and performance of the product through a team based collaborative effort by which variations in the product design and unnecessary expenses related to the design process are eliminated to streamline the procedures. Developed by Motorola, the Sig Sigma framework helps to develop the operational processes and removing product defects to support better quality products. To achieve this, the framework depends on empirical and statistical data that can be used to evaluate the operational performance and product quality and also helps to reduce the time of the designing and production process, reduce development costs, foster customer satisfaction as well as support better profitability of the organization (Allen, 2019).
DMAIC is one significant method that is used within the Sig Sigma approach which consists of five phases such as define, measure, analyze, improve and control. The first phase (define) aims to explore and understand the requirements for a given product and also the expectations of the customer on the product, the second stage (measure) aims to collect all relevant information related to production capacity and organizational competencies, the third stage (analyze) aims to investigate a causal relationship for product defects and failures, the fourth stage (improve) aims to optimize the operational process to prevent product defects by removing the causes of defect and the final stage (control) aims to maintain better quality of the product and control product failures. According to Mason et al. (2015) this strategy can be used to overcome technical challenges related to effective product designs and improve the efficiency of the design and manufacturing process.
Martin (2016) pointed out that for any businesses that relies on customer, ensuring their satisfaction is the most important consideration as it can help to promote loyalty to the brand and thereby ensure profitability and performance. Effective customer service and support can also improve the perception of product quality through effective after sales support, provide a better value for money and improve brand image. According to Cao et al., (2018) an effective customer service can be developed by developing an understanding of the customers’ expectations and needs, fulfilling the promises and commitments made to them, ensuring clarity in the operations, handling customers with respect and effectively addressing the customer feedbacks and complaints and using such information for the design and development of the products. For effective customer service, strong communication skills, sense of empathy, patience, domain and technical knowledge, product and process knowledge are required. Call centers can be operated by EA that can be used to handle calls from the customers and provide them after sales and technical support or assistance with the product as well as handle any feedbacks and grievances of the customers more effectively. Effective strategies to collect feedback from the customers can also be used such as customer survey forms and feedback forms which can help to further improve customer services.
According to Howcroft (2017) the quality of products can be directly associated with the levels of skills and competencies of the workers developing the product. Developing the skills and competencies of the workers therefore can help in better competencies to develop good games that are free of flaws and bugs and reduce the risks of product failures. Training the employees to acquire new skills of product development and designing can not only help them to achieve professional growth and success and develop job satisfaction, but also improve the quality of the products and thus better customer satisfaction through better product experiences. Broadbent et al. (2015) further suggested that skills development programs, employee training programs and mentorship programs can help the workers to understand their jobs effectively and prevent manual errors that can affect product quality by developing advance skills among them, improving the capacity to learn and improve the process and product knowledge.
Conclusion
Since the quality of a product is an important parameter that can influence the success of any business and product, it is vital that any organization should focus on the maintenance of quality of its product in order to attract and retain customers and develop brand loyalty.
EA is one of the market leaders in Computer Game Designing and over its history have developed several highly successful games which were immensely popular among the customers. However, some of the products launched recently have been criticized of a deteriorating product quality. Using the Kaizen 6M checklist the factors associated with poor product quality has been identified and five strategies have been recommended that can be used to overcome those factors and improve the quality of the products and its perceptions towards it.
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