In the current global dynamic and competitive business environment of Industry 4.0, small and medium-sized enterprises face a major challenge of expanding their market activities and adapt to new conditions in order to survive in times of economic or pandemic crisis. The implementation of comprehensive quality management in business environment within EU organizations is a response to this challenge for global competition (Abdul, Sumantoro, & Maria, 2019). Current problem is the fact that the implementation and monitoring of quality management as a process of business management in the majority of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is not sufficiently used, underestimated, or even considered to be obsolete (Rigby, Bilodeau, 2018). In an enterprise with good financial health and healthy corporate culture, all transactions and processes are carried out properly and the relationships among all stakeholders (employees, suppliers, and customers) are successful. For other companies, it is necessary to take steps to ensure quality and follow them (Fernandes et al., 2017) in order to move towards the concept of Industry 4.0. According to published professional literature, each research worker has developed their own framework for mapping value production operations based on specific needs and interests in the fields under review. However, the relationship between the quality processes and value stream maps has not been adequately addressed in professional literature, especially in the case of small and medium-sized enterprises. Therefore, for achieving the objective of the contribution, the following research questions have been formulated: To which extent quality participates in generating value added within production process? In which production operations does the quality factor contributes most to generating value added?
Keywords: Quality value stream map, Value stream map, quality management, added value for the customer.
Special Issue: Quality Management in the Era of Industry 4.0
