Z
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Z Score: A measure of company stability derived from various financial indices, used to gauge the possibility of a company's future success or failure.
Zero Carbon Home: a domestic dwelling built to very high environmental standards (for example, with respect to insulation) which has its residual energy needs provided by renewable sources of energy. In the UK, newly built zero carbon homes have been exempt from stamp duty from 2007.
Zero Defects: A standard of performance or standard of manufacture which the American quality guru Philip B. Crosby says should be the goal of endeavour when speaking of "quality". Crosby's view is directly at odds with Deming's view: Deming states that the goal of quality is to achieve stability of the system giving rise to it, and that this system will contain a number of inherent, or "common causes" of error (qv). Crosby's view is put in his well-known book Quality is Free. In it, he contends that if people worked harder, and with greater conscientiousness and with greater enthusiasm, no mistakes would be made ("right first time"). In his book, Crosby describes the launch of an in-company zero defects campaign with a weekend family zero defects day.
Zero Redundancy: The expectation that the services and manufactured goods employed by a user or consumer will all be trouble free at all points of use - from acquisition to disposal - with regard to quality.
ZIP Code: US terminology for a zone improvement code, devised by the US Postal Service.
Zornig H. H. (Colonel): A person whose name begins with Z, and at one time director of the Ballistic Research Laboratories, Aberdeen, Maryland. Credited with having popularised the expression Operating Characteristic, an important term used in sampling.
