The focus of Quality Function Deployment (QFD) is to:

Quality Function Deployment (QFD) is a structured methodology fundamentally centered on the customer. Its primary focus is to capture, interpret, and translate customer needs—collectively known as the "Voice of the Customer" (VOC)—into specific, actionable technical requirements for product development and production. The entire QFD process, including its central tool, the "House of Quality" matrix, begins with identifying what the customer truly wants. This customer-centric approach ensures that the final product is designed to deliver value and satisfaction by systematically embedding customer desires into every stage of its lifecycle, from concept to launch.

A. While QFD is a tool for identifying requirements, its specific focus is on ensuring those requirements are derived directly from the customer's voice.

C. Developing a project's Critical Success Factors (CSFs) is a broader strategic activity; QFD focuses on product features, not overall project management metrics.

D. QFD helps define product success from the customer's viewpoint, but "defining success" is too general; QFD's specific focus is the method of doing so via the VOC.

1. Hauser, J. R., & Clausing, D. (1988). The House of Quality. Harvard Business Review, 66(3), 63–73. On page 64, the authors state, "The foundation of the house of quality is the belief that products should be designed to reflect customers’ desires and tastes... It starts with the customer."

2. MIT OpenCourseWare. (2004). 2.744 Product Design, Lecture 10: Concept Development II. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The lecture notes specify that QFD is a method to "Translate customer needs (the 'voice of the customer' [VOC]) into engineering characteristics."

3. Akao, Y. (Ed.). (1990). Quality Function Deployment: Integrating Customer Requirements into Product Design. Productivity Press. In Section 1.2, "The Voice of the Customer," the text establishes that capturing customer requirements is the essential starting point for the entire QFD framework.