1.1 The concept of Quality
The concept of Quality is very similar to the concept of beautiful or good. It is very difficult to define and one definition can be the opposite of another. At the same time, we must deal with reason and attempt to define clearly what we are hoping to achieve in the study of this topic. According to some of the major thinkers on Quality, its presence is hardly ever acknowledged but its absence is always noted.
However, if we were to ignore Quality as if it never existed, it would be possible to make a strong case against such an omission. All that would need to be done is to ask if anything would be different without Quality. The answer would undeniably be - yes, things would be very different. The presence of Quality is what makes fine arts, music, paintings, aesthetics in architecture, of the goods we use and the sort of life we lead, the environment, the interaction we have with our family, colleagues, business partners and the wider community - all experiences we enjoy or from which we benefit in some way. If we removed Quality from all this, the experience of life would be very different.
One of the definitions of the word Quality could be "worth". Once we accept that, we are moving along the path towards the greater paradigm. We see that logically, our lives would be very different if the concept of Quality did not exist. Empirically, Quality is seen in a good essay, a pleasant and efficient business transaction. A visit to the supermarket from where we get everything that meets our expectations indicates the presence of Quality. If we had come across items that were out of date, damaged or too expensive, we would view them to be shortcomings that we noticed in our transaction.
We see then that Quality is a concept beyond the systems that we will talk about later in this subject. It remains a concept, a shapeless yet all-pervading understanding of how things are when they are properly aligned and we experience them smoothly, without any negative reactions to our experience.
This brings us to think that Quality is only subjective - each person has his or her own ways of measuring it and no objective ways of defining or measuring if it exists. Yet, we must not mystify this subject; in the study of Quality you will come across objective measurements that are defined by different thinkers on the topic. We must accept that there are ways of improving everything that we do. We, as humans, have been doing this from the dawn of time. That is what brings us from the caves to the comfort of our houses and bettering our role in life. This includes, of course, the improvements in our ways of waging war and causing extensive harm to the "enemy" while restricting harm to ourselves as much as possible. This extends to our awareness of the damage to the environment, the cost to society of operations of corporations, of building roads, air and sea ports, setting up production plants in different locations and the impact of doing so on the environment, wildlife and society. Our perceptions of Quality drive this improvement in our thinking just as much as our drive for economic benefits.
In literature, Quality is sometimes talked about as "what the customer wants". The customer is then defined as "internal" (someone who is within the area of process, the one who experiences whatever is done immediately when it is done) and "external" (someone who, typically, buys what is done or receives it as a final output). This makes everybody who interacts with you a customer, even if it is a colleague.
We are still far from a formal and clear definition of Quality. Pirsig (1999, p. 251) defines Quality as "... the response of an organism to its environment." He describes the use of analogues to describe the environment for an organism as "Quality" because, he says, these definitions are used by the organism as experiences to make and progressively develop its state of existence. This reflects what we had discussed earlier. Quality becomes all-pervading, absolute. It drives our way of being and living.
There is much more to be explored in understanding Quality. That is like setting out on a journey and lies beyond the parameters of the current study guide. However, we encourage you to continue that exploration on your own and discover in its course the various traits of Quality in various contexts. For our present context, let us read the following quote, based on the ancient Chinese text Tao Te Ching of Lao Tzu.
The quality that can be defined is not the Absolute Quality.
The names that can be given to it are not Absolute names.
It is the origin of heaven and earth.
When named it is the mother of all things.
Quality [ romantic Quality ] and its manifestations [ classic Quality ] are in their nature the same. It is given different names [ subjects and objects ] when it becomes classically manifest.
Romantic quality and classic quality together may be called the "mystic".
Reaching from mystery into deeper mystery , it is the gate to the secret of all life.
Quality is all-pervading.
And its use is inexhaustible!
Fathomless!
Like the fountainhead of all things ...
Crystal clear like water it seems to remain.
I do not know whose Son it is.
An image of what existed before God.
...
That is why it is called elusive
Meet it and you do not see its face
Follow it and you do not see its back
...
From Pirsig R. 1999, pp. 253-254
We see from this the universal nature of Quality. We see it in ancient and modern works of architecture, literature, science - our wider experience of life. The construct of Quality is with the person who is doing something that he cares for. Because he cares, he assures the Quality of his output. The breakdown of Quality occurs when the link between care and output is broken. If he does not care for what he does, he does not care about the Quality of his output. We see here the link between the internal and external traits of Quality. We see also the motive to improve what we do. In later chapters, we will repeatedly come across this concept of improvement incrementally in the pursuit of Quality. Fundamental to the impetus to improve is the realisation that something is not at its best possible stage. This acceptance is at the heart of Quality because it starts the journey towards knowledge, the journey of Total Quality, continuous improvement in ISO 9000, the criteria for external and internal focus in Malcolm Baldridge award. The link between the internal and external focus is crucial because it is the link between the maker, or doer, and the consumer. The link, in other words, between the producer and the customer. This is the essence of the study of this subject. If the producer is producing something that he does not care about, except in revenue and profit terms, there is a breakdown of Quality. The care for the customer, who is the final user of the product, is not kept in focus in the production process, except in just meeting her needs so that she actually buys the product. We will see that Quality literature talks about more than meeting customer needs, even while keeping them at the centre of the production function.
From the above, it may be felt that the corporate focus being on the customer is justified for the long term success of business. Some thought would clarify that the focus on the internal and external is not only corporate but also individual. In a business sense, this is the aligning of corporate goals with individual goals.
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