Whenever your organization makes a buy a description of what the consumer needs has to be provided to the supplier. Unless there’s a means of making certain the message of what’s required is not distorted there’s a risk that the provider will misinterpret your needs. One mechanism for providing Clear and unambiguous messages of what’s required is your purchase specification. There are three kinds of specification. First, there are industrial specifications. These are specifications produce by a national or governing body like the British Standards Institute. They set out criteria for the quality of materials which needs to be used, the standard of work needed in manufacturing and any vital dimensions, chemical composition or allowable tolerances.
Nuts, bolts and substances are the sort of items often covered by commercial specifications. They are all items with a large program and so manufacturers can plan production with the assurance that there will be a massive demand. This confidence allows them to have extended production runs that give them high levels of efficiency and reduced price. These low prices can be passed on to the purchaser in the shape of lower prices. This is one reason for establishing a procurement process using a commercial specification whenever possible.
The second type of Specification is the layout specification. This specification provides precise details for how a product is to be made or a service delivered. It gives in-depth detail for both operational and non-functional requirements and covers assumptions, limitations, performance, dimensions, weights and dependability. If the price of the standard Thing is unacceptably high or if there’s a supply risk because the item is protected by a patent, it can be worthwhile creating your own specification to be able to increase the potential supply base.
The danger in doing so is that you may generate a specification that is too detailed and so incur unnecessary cost since it does not allow providers to use their experience in finding the most effective way to make it. It may also mean that you are unintentionally assuming all responsibility for the functioning of the buy. By way of instance, if you define that a dimension needs to have a tolerance of 0.01 centimeters as it should be 0.005 centimeters then the obligation for any product failure is yours. The third type of specification is the operation specification. This avoids the drawbacks of the design specification by providing the specific functionality that is required but not the way of achieving that performance.