What is Grade vs Quality?
Grade is a category of features — economy versus premium. Quality is how well the thing meets its requirements — defect-free versus flawed. The exam's core insight: low grade can be perfectly acceptable; low quality never is.
A basic product that works flawlessly is low-grade, high-quality — often exactly right. A luxury product that fails is high-grade, low-quality — always wrong. Never let a scenario equate "cheap" with "poor quality."
Worked example
A site office needs a phone. The $60 rugged feature-phone (low grade) that survives two years of drops and never misses a call is high quality. The $1,200 flagship (high grade) that keeps crashing the site-inspection app is low quality. The project needed the first one — grade chosen to requirements, quality non-negotiable.