Quality Management: Creating and Sustaining Organizational Effectiveness

Citation

Narasimhan, K. (2007), "Quality Management: Creating and Sustaining Organizational Effectiveness", Managing Service Quality: An International Journal, Vol. 17 No. 5, pp. 594-595. https://doi.org/10.1108/msq.2007.17.5.594.7

Donna C.S. Summers is a Professor of Industrial Engineering Technology at the University of Dayton and has wide experience in industry and academia. She also has worked as a consultant to a number of companies and, since 1995, for the University of Dayton's Continuous Quality Improvement Programme. She has been the Chairperson (Education) for the American Society of Quality Control since January 1994.

The book comprises 12 chapters and 5 appendices, and covers eight critical areas of creating and managing an effective organization. Appendix A contains Z Tables for normal curves and Appendix B contains factors for computing central lines and three sigma control limits for average and range charts. Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA) criteria are given in Appendix 3. A comprehensive bibliography and glossary of key terms are also included. Some websites for quality are given in Appendix 4. Appendix 5 is in fact a chapter on Attribute Charts, which might as well have been included in Chapter 10 on Problem‐Solving Techniques.

The first three chapters deal with organization system level and cover, respectively, issues related to defining organizational effectiveness, developing an organizational philosophy based on the works of quality gurus such as Crosby, Deming, Feigenbaum and Juran, and an introduction to some of the popular quality systems and awards: ISO 9000:2000, ISO 14000, six sigma and MBNQA.

The theme of Chapter 4 is creating a customer focus. First, the concepts of value and customer satisfaction are briefly covered and then the application of quality function deployment process is fully explained with a detailed example. While dealing with the concepts of customers' requirements, needs, and expectations, the inclusion of Professor Noriaki Kano's work on satisfiers and exciters would have been useful.

The next three chapters focus on effective organizational leadership for aligning the needs and expectations of customers with the organizations processes and activities, strategic planning and its deployment, and the development and management of human resources to ensure engagement in a continuous cycle of learning and training.

Chapters 8‐10 deal, respectively, with performance measures (based on the concepts of balanced score card, cost‐of quality, and benchmarking), process management to eliminate non‐value‐added activities and wastes, and provide customer delight, and a comprehensive coverage of problem solving tools such as check sheets, histograms, Pareto analysis, cause‐and‐effect diagrams and control charts.

The topic of project management, which is essential for effective achieving an organization's mission and goals, is covered in Chapter 11; both, critical path method (CPM) and program evaluation and review technique (PERT) are briefly covered. In the final chapter, the author explains the importance of auditing business results.

The text is well supported by 133 exhibits and 77 examples from industries, which demonstrate the successful application of techniques and approaches. Chapters end with questions to encourage readers to consider how they would know that their organization is operating effectively.