3.3 Implementing Quality
The stages of implementing quality in any programme can be described as follows.
- Identify customer expectations through market research.
- Develop specifications to reflect customer expectations and organisation capabilities.
- Meet specifications in the production process.
- Monitor customer satisfaction and organisation capabilities and feedback changes or improvements into the production cycle.
In this process, we see that quality is viewed from the customer's perspective as well as the producer's. We have already talked about the role of quality in meeting customer's needs and expectations
Activity 3.3
In the space below, summarise your understanding of the role of quality in meeting customer expectations.
From the perspective of the producer, in defining organisation capabilities and meeting specifications in the production process, the more closely specifications are met, the greater the likelihood of meeting customer expectations (and less of the cost of poor quality, as we discussed above).
In a typical organisation chart of a company, it is normal to see a department devoted to quality, just as there is a marketing department or purchasing department. This implies that the role of quality is only the function of this department - at least that is how the other departments see it, regardless of management exhortations that quality (like marketing, perhaps) is the function of everyone in the company.
The philosophy of TQM is that everybody is responsible for the quality of what they do. In effect, each person has a customer and a supplier. He is responsible for delivering the work he does to the standard of quality that the customer should expect. At the same time, he should expect to be given the work that comes to him from someone else to be completed to a sufficient level of quality to meet his needs. The whole process is thus controlled by expectations and responsibilities of quality output. When this perception pervades through the company, multi-disciplinary teams can easily function together. Each team has a quality improvement function and this responsibility is spread throughout the organisation, to the level of the operators. The quality department only serves the role of advisor to other departments, as well as providing specialist quality services like statistical studies of input, processing and output elements, quality training, and so forth. They do not take responsibility for the quality of the output. The control of quality is with a quality council, which comprises members of senior management. This council is responsible for steering the organisation along the path of TQM and incorporating essential elements of that into the strategic planning, managing and operational aspects of the organisation.
In the following sections of this chapter, we will read about the various TQM philosophies. It is important to point out here that the birth of TQM is in the manufacturing sector. It started basically as an engineering function. We will come across much manufacturing related terminology. However, TQM thinking is widely applied in the services sector today. Examples of prominent service organisations that follow strongly the philosophies of TQM are Walt Disney and McDonalds (although the latter combines strong elements of manufacturing in providing its service). There are essential differences in the implementing of TQM in services from those in engineering. Succinctly, these can be listed as:
- the intangible nature of services as opposed to manufacturing, where a product can be produced and stored until required;
- joint production and consumption of services;
- greater participation and role of staff in ensuring customer satisfaction in service industries;
- direct involvement of the customer in providing the service;
- more customised output in service industries since each customer is different and is a part of the production process;
- the number of transactions is normally much larger in a service organisation, compared to a manufacturer, although the financial reward from each transaction may be much smaller.
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