What is a key feature of a flowchart in quality management?

A key feature of a flowchart in quality management is that it helps in mapping processes. Flowcharts visually represent the sequence of steps or decisions within a particular process, providing a clear and organized way to understand how a process operates. This clarity is essential in quality management because it helps identify potential areas for improvement, inefficiencies, or bottlenecks. By mapping out a process step-by-step, stakeholders can more easily communicate, analyze, and optimize that process.

Other options, while relevant in some contexts, do not capture the primary function of flowcharts. For instance, graphs of frequency distributions are typically used in statistical analysis to depict the number of occurrences of values, rather than to outline the steps within a process. Ranking causes of problems is more aligned with root cause analysis techniques rather than the basic mapping utility of flowcharts. Similarly, the collection of qualitative data is a broader research activity, which is not specific to the visual and procedural focus of a flowchart.