HACCP (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point)

A systematic preventive approach ensuring food safety by identifying, evaluating, and controlling hazards that may be significant for food production. The HACCP system involves identifying potential biological, chemical, or physical hazards in a production process and establishing critical control points for their prevention, elimination, or reduction to safe levels.
See also: Food Safety Management, Risk Analysis

HALT (Highly Accelerated Life Test)

A testing process used during product development to rapidly induce failures by subjecting products to extreme stress conditions (e.g., thermal, vibrational, or mechanical stresses). HALT helps identify design weaknesses, quantify product margins, and improve overall reliability by simulating years of usage within a short testing timeframe.
See also: Stress Testing, Reliability Engineering

HASA (Highly Accelerated Stress Audit)

A proactive evaluation method that applies extreme stress conditions to products or processes to audit manufacturing consistency and robustness. HASA is used to identify latent defects or process inconsistencies before full-scale production, ensuring that quality and reliability criteria are consistently met.
See also: Process Audit, Accelerated Testing

HASS (Highly Accelerated Stress Screening)

A screening method applied during the manufacturing phase that subjects products to severe, controlled stress conditions (such as high/low temperatures and vibration) with the goal of precipitating early-life failures. HASS acts as a final quality assurance step to filter out items with latent defects before products reach the customer.
See also: Quality Screening, In-Process Testing

Hawthorne Effect

A phenomenon where individuals modify their behavior in response to knowing that they are being observed. This effect can lead to temporary improvements in productivity or quality when subjects in studies or work settings change their performance simply because they are under observation rather than due to any specific intervention.
See also: Observation Bias, Experimental Artifact

Heijunka

A lean manufacturing technique focused on production leveling, which means distributing production volume and variety evenly over time. Heijunka aims to reduce waste and inefficiencies such as inventory build-up or production bottlenecks by smoothing out the production schedule.
See also: Lean Manufacturing, Just-In-Time (JIT) Production

Hoshin Kanri

A strategic planning and management process that aligns an organization’s functions, activities, and resources with its long-term objectives (often referred to as its “true north” goals). Also known as policy deployment, Hoshin Kanri ensures that everyone in the organization works in a coordinated manner toward the same strategic goals.
See also: Strategic Planning, Policy Deployment

Hoshin Planning

Closely related to Hoshin Kanri, Hoshin Planning is the process of setting strategic objectives and cascading them throughout the organization. It translates broad organizational goals into specific, measurable actions that can be executed across all levels and functions.
See also: Hoshin Kanri, Strategic Deployment

House of Quality

A visual tool used in Quality Function Deployment (QFD) to translate customer requirements (the voice of the customer) into specific technical requirements and design parameters. Represented as a matrix, the House of Quality facilitates communication between what customers need and how the organization’s products or services can meet those needs.
See also: QFD, Customer Requirements Analysis

Hypergeometric Distribution

A discrete probability distribution that describes the likelihood of drawing a specific number of successes from a finite population without replacement. It is used when sampling from a population where the outcomes are either classified as “successes” or “failures,” and the probability changes on each draw because the population is finite.
See also: Binomial Distribution (with replacement), Statistical Sampling

Hypothesis

A testable and falsifiable assumption or proposed explanation for an observed phenomenon. In research, a hypothesis provides a basis for designing experiments and statistical tests to confirm or refute its validity.
See also: Research Methodology, Theory, Falsifiability

Hypothesis Testing

A statistical process used to decide whether there is enough evidence in a sample of data to infer that a certain condition holds for the entire population. It involves setting up a null hypothesis (a statement of no effect or difference) and an alternative hypothesis, then using sample data to determine which hypothesis is more likely to be true.
See also: Statistical Inference, p-value, Null Hypothesis