# FMEA Process Maturity Assessment: Is Your FMEA a Living Document or a Paper Exercise? > Source: https://netray.co/tools/fmea-process-maturity-assessment > Publisher: Netray (netray.co), AI and integration engineering for ERP and manufacturing systems. > Section: Free Tools ## Short answer Ten questions that score how well your organisation runs FMEA, from team and scope to rating discipline, action closure and linkage to the control plan. ## Category quality ## Audience - Quality manager - Quality engineer - Operations manager ## Tool **Kind:** assessment **Questions:** #### Who builds your FMEAs? **Options:** ##### One quality engineer, alone **Score:** 0 ##### Engineer plus a quick review **Score:** 1 ##### Cross-functional team, but attendance is patchy **Score:** 2 ##### Defined cross-functional team with a facilitator and real attendance **Score:** 3 #### How is the scope defined before analysis starts? **Options:** ##### No formal scope **Score:** 0 ##### Scope is implied by the part number **Score:** 1 ##### Scope and boundaries are written down **Score:** 2 ##### Scope, boundaries, functions and customer requirements are documented and reviewed **Score:** 3 #### Where do failure modes come from? **Options:** ##### Brainstorm only, from memory **Score:** 0 ##### Copy of a previous FMEA **Score:** 1 ##### Brainstorm plus lessons learned **Score:** 2 ##### Data-driven from NCR, scrap, returns and warranty, plus brainstorm **Score:** 3 #### How are severity, occurrence and detection rated? **Options:** ##### By whoever fills in the sheet **Score:** 0 ##### Team agrees, no written criteria **Score:** 1 ##### Written rating criteria are used **Score:** 2 ##### Written criteria, calibrated across teams, with evidence for occurrence and detection **Score:** 3 #### How do you decide which risks need action? **Options:** ##### We act on nothing unless a customer asks **Score:** 0 ##### RPN threshold only **Score:** 1 ##### RPN plus severity rules **Score:** 2 ##### Action priority or equivalent, with severity 9 or 10 always reviewed **Score:** 3 #### How well are recommended actions followed through? **Options:** ##### Not tracked **Score:** 0 ##### Tracked on the FMEA sheet only **Score:** 1 ##### Tracked with owners and dates **Score:** 2 ##### Tracked with owners, dates, evidence, effectiveness check and escalation **Score:** 3 #### How are the FMEA and the control plan connected? **Options:** ##### Separate documents, rarely compared **Score:** 0 ##### Control plan built once from the FMEA **Score:** 1 ##### Checked for consistency at reviews **Score:** 2 ##### Controls are traced line by line and updated together **Score:** 3 #### When is the FMEA updated? **Options:** ##### Only for new product launches **Score:** 0 ##### At customer or audit request **Score:** 1 ##### At scheduled reviews **Score:** 2 ##### At reviews and on triggers: change, escape, complaint, new failure mode **Score:** 3 #### How do field failures and internal escapes feed back? **Options:** ##### They do not **Score:** 0 ##### Sometimes, informally **Score:** 1 ##### CAPA process asks whether the FMEA was updated **Score:** 2 ##### Every escape is checked against the FMEA, and missed modes are added **Score:** 3 #### How is the FMEA data stored and searched? **Options:** ##### Scattered spreadsheets **Score:** 0 ##### Spreadsheets in a shared folder **Score:** 1 ##### Controlled documents with revision history **Score:** 2 ##### Structured database or QMS, searchable and linked to parts and processes **Score:** 3 **Bands:** #### Paper exercise **Min:** 0 **Max:** 34 **Verdict:** FMEA is mostly a customer deliverable. It probably is not preventing problems, and it may not stand up to an audit. **Recommendations:** - Define a cross-functional team and a facilitator for the next FMEA - Adopt written rating criteria and use them consistently - Start tracking actions with an owner and date #### Developing **Min:** 35 **Max:** 59 **Verdict:** The basics exist, but follow-through and linkage are weak, so the FMEA does not yet drive real change. **Recommendations:** - Use NCR and scrap data to drive failure modes - Review severity 9 and 10 lines regardless of RPN - Compare the FMEA and control plan line by line #### Managed **Min:** 60 **Max:** 84 **Verdict:** The process is controlled and used. The next gains come from evidence of effectiveness and faster feedback from escapes. **Recommendations:** - Add effectiveness checks before closing actions - Create update triggers from CAPA and complaints - Move FMEA data into a searchable structured system #### Living document **Min:** 85 **Max:** 100 **Verdict:** FMEA is part of how you run quality. Keep it that way as products and processes change. **Recommendations:** - Audit rating consistency across teams - Share lessons across similar parts and sites - Use FMEA data to prioritise improvement projects ## Content **Intro:** Most plants have FMEAs. Far fewer have an FMEA process that actually changes what happens on the line. Answer ten questions about your team, ratings, action follow-up and feedback loops to see where your process sits and what to fix first. **Sections:** #### How to use the assessment **Body:** Answer based on what happens in practice across your last several FMEAs, not on what the procedure says. If practice differs by product line, answer for the weakest line that matters, or run the assessment once per site. Each answer scores from zero to three, and the total is shown as a percentage, with a band and a short list of next steps. Use it as a conversation starter with your quality team rather than a formal audit score. #### What the questions test **Body:** The ten questions follow the life of an FMEA: who builds it, how scope is defined, where failure modes come from, how ratings are made, how risk is prioritised, how actions are closed, how the sheet connects to the control plan, when it is updated, how escapes feed back and how the data is stored. They draw on the structure of the AIAG and VDA FMEA Handbook, which describes planning, structure, function and failure analysis, risk analysis, optimization and results documentation as steps. **Bullets:** - Team and scope: questions 1 and 2 - Evidence and rating: questions 3 and 4 - Prioritisation and follow-through: questions 5 and 6 - Linkage and feedback: questions 7, 8 and 9 - Storage and search: question 10 #### Reading your result **Body:** A low score is common and not a reason for blame. It usually means the FMEA is treated as a deliverable for the customer. Pick the two lowest-scoring areas and improve those first; fixing action follow-up and the control plan link tends to give the fastest return. A high score is no guarantee of quality, so back the self-assessment with a review of two or three real FMEAs against the checklist in the related tools. **Cta:** If your FMEA data is scattered across spreadsheets, QMS and ERP, Netray can discuss approaches for making it searchable without a large migration project. **Faq:** #### Is this assessment an audit? **Answer:** No. It is a self-assessment to start a discussion. Audits against IATF 16949, AS9100 or customer requirements need evidence review of real records, and may reach different conclusions. #### Why does the assessment ask about severity 9 and 10? **Answer:** Because ranking by RPN alone can hide the highest-consequence items. Many customers and the AIAG-VDA approach expect that safety and regulatory effects are reviewed regardless of the overall number. #### How often should we run it? **Answer:** Annually is reasonable, or after major quality escapes. Compare scores over time and by site rather than reading a single number in isolation. #### What should we fix first? **Answer:** In most plants, action follow-through and the link between FMEA and control plan give the best return. Both are inexpensive to improve and are routinely checked in customer audits. ## Search terms fmea maturity assessment, fmea process audit, fmea self assessment, fmea best practices checklist, is our fmea effective, fmea process improvement, fmea audit questions, fmea quality system assessment --- Talk to an engineer: https://netray.co/contact?intent=erp_ai | Machine catalog: https://netray.co/agent/catalog.json