For the first time the International Conference on Quality Engineering and Management (ICQEM) was organized, taking place at the School of Engineering of the University of Minho, in the historic city of Guimarães, Portugal, in 2014.This event combines two areas that are not usually brought together: Quality Engineering and Quality Management. The Organizing Committee hopes that the results of this effort will translate into a successful venture, to be repeated on a periodic basis, making gradually of this conference an important scientific event in the field of Quality.With this special issue, the ICQEM14 Organizing Committee intent to make a small but important contribution to the development of the Quality field, both in terms of the scientific perspective and the practical and managerial one.