A quality philosophy

Citation

(2000), "A quality philosophy", Measuring Business Excellence, Vol. 4 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/mbe.2000.26704daa.006

A quality philosophy

A quality philosophy

I remember being introduced to TQM as a young engineer. Unfortunately this was not because the organization was actually implementing a Quality Management programme but because it had a book, hidden in a dark corner of the Technical Library, on doing business with the Japanese and I was involved in a team project to devise a marketing strategy for the Far East. The book considered the way each sector of the Japanese economy was run. But it was the chapter on manufacturing, TQM and, largely, Deming that held my attention. As the account progressed it really was like a light being switched on – dim at first but soon quite dazzling. In particular, Deming's 14 points seemed such simple, obvious and basic common sense that TQM had to be right. It would have felt right and comfortable as an untried theory, but the fact that Japanese firms had been able to use it to such a devastating effect made it all the more powerful. Why could not we all work like this?

At the time I encountered some resistance. "Our customers don't want or need it" (how do we know?) "We are in the business of producing at low cost – operators who introduce defects are not doing their jobs properly." And, at an R&D level, "We are an innovative organization and ISO accreditation would stifle our creativity."

Since then, the subject of quality itself has taken a bit of a bashing. The various standards, particularly ISO 9000 involved too much control – control from different sources and for different ends to old style Taylorism, but control nonetheless. The statistical techniques were too complicated to explain and made TQM difficult to sell to employees. Managers, reluctant to concede ground to operators and employees, played down the important HRM aspects of quality. Quality was even deemed a little old fashioned, too black and white and was superceded, to an extent, by the greyer concept of "excellence".

...But there are now signs of reassessment. The standards have been updated. The language has been softened and words like "control" effectively banished. New techniques like six sigma have been developed...

But there are now signs of reassessment (Dale et al., 2000). The standards have been updated. The language has been softened and words like "control" effectively banished. New techniques like six sigma have been developed. The concepts of empowerment, stakeholding and strategic human resource management have all advanced. Investors, chairmen and CEOs have grown suspicious of "excellence" without performance and bottom-line profit. The intense competition of online trading has reinforced the basic needs to do the job well and listen to your customers. The fact is that cutting defects will raise productivity and increase profit, as will creating the conditions for good production and service.

Quality is still relevant to organizations, employees, customers and suppliers. And it is still relevant to me – I carry a summary of the 14 points in my diary, which accompanies me everywhere. Looking again at my personal favourites:

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  quality must be designed in;

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  build relationships with customers and suppliers;

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  leaders do not control, they facilitate;

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  drive out fear;

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  break down barriers between departments;

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  people should be allowed pride in their work;

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  everybody should be looking to improve themselves.

These concepts seem so timeless and true that I can never accept quality should be dismissed as another fad and we should all move on to the next one.

Reference

Dale, B.G., Williams, R.T and van der Wiele, T. (2000), "Marginalisation of quality: is there a case to answer?", The TQM Magazine, Vol. 12 No. 4, pp. 266-74.