Correction, corrective action, preventive action
- Correction: deal with the instance. Sort the defective units, repair the leak, re-brief the team.
- Corrective action: remove the cause so the problem cannot recur. Change the setting, redesign the fixture, revise the standard and retrain.
- Preventive action: remove a potential cause identified before any failure, from a near miss, an audit finding, a trend or a lesson from elsewhere.
Most systems are good at corrections and weak at the other two, which is why the same problems recur.
The corrective action process
- Describe the problem with facts: what, where, when, how much.
- Contain it so the customer or people are protected now.
- Find the root cause with 5 whys, a fishbone diagram or an A3, going beyond the first plausible explanation.
- Define the corrective action that removes the cause, with an owner and date.
- Implement it, including updated standards and training.
- Verify effectiveness against the measure after enough time has passed.
- Close, and share the lesson with similar areas.
Examples
- A labeller jams weekly. Correction: clear the jam. Corrective action: the cause was label roll tension drifting after changeover; the changeover standard now includes a tension check with a marked setting, and jams stopped.
- Operators skip a torque check. Correction: re-brief. Corrective action: the torque tool now logs each check and the step cannot be signed off without it.
Why corrective actions fail
- Closed when the action is done rather than when the result is verified.
- The "root cause" is a symptom or a person.
- The standard is not updated, so the old way returns.
- Lessons are not shared, so the same cause produces the same problem elsewhere.