SOFTWARE FAILURE MODE AND EFFECT ANALYSIS (SFMEA) - Software Design for Six-Sigma: A Roadmap for Excellence - page 412

reliability target settings. The input to SFMEA is the array of functional requirements
that is obtained from quality function deployment (QFD) and axiomatic design analy-
ses. Software FMEA documents and addresses failure modes associated with software
functions. The outputs of SFMEA are 1) a list of actions to prevent causes or to detect
failure modes and 2) a history of actions taken and future activity. The SFMEA helps
the software DFSS team in:

1. Estimating the effects on users,
2. Assessing and selecting software design alternatives,
3. Developing an efficient validation phase within the DFSS algorithm,
4. Inputting the needed information for Design For X (e.g., design for reliability)
5. Prioritizing the list of corrective actions strategies that include mitigation,
transferring, ignoring, or preventing the failure modes altogether,
6. Identifying the potential special design parameters from a failure standpoint
and documenting the findings for future reference.

SFMEA is a team activity with representation from quality and reliability, oper-
ations, suppliers, and customers if possible. A Six Sigma operative, typically belts,
leads the team. The software DFSS belt should own documentation.

FMEA: A HISTORICAL SKETCH 4

16.2

A FMEA can be described as a systematic way to identify failure modes of a system,
item, or function and to evaluate the effects of the failure modes on a higher level.
The objective is to determine the causes for the failure modes and what could be
done to eliminate or reduce the chance of failure. A bottom-up technique, such as
FMEA, is an effective way to identify component failures or system malfunctions
and to document the system under consideration.
The FMEA discipline originally was developed in the U.S. military (Military
procedure MIL-P-1629) 5 . The method was used as a reliability evaluation technique
to determine the effect of system and equipment failures. Failures were classified
according to their impact on the military mission success and personnel/equipment
safety. The military procedure MIL-P-1629 has functioned as a model for latter
military standards MIL-STD-1629 and MIL-STD-1629A, which illustrate the most
widely used FMEA procedures.
Outside the military, the formal application of FMEA first was adopted to the
aerospace industry where FMEA was already used during the Apollo missions in
the 1960s. In the early 1980s, U.S. automotive companies began to incorporate
FMEA formally into their product development process. A task force representing
Chrysler Corporation (Auborn Hills, MI), Ford Motor Company, (Dearborn, MI) and

4 See Haapanen, P. and Helminen (2002).
5 It was entitled procedures for performing a failure mode, effects, and criticality analysis and was issued
on November 9, 1949.