What is Total Quality Management (TQM)?

Total Quality Management (TQM) is a combination of quality and management tools aimed at increasing business and reducing losses due to wasteful practices. An important part of TQM is its philosophy toward continually improving your business and products.
The basic principles for the Total Quality Management (TQM) philosophy of doing business are to satisfy the customer, satisfy the supplier, and continuously improve the business processes.

Globalization and Tqm

Implement Total Quality Management (TQM) requires regular review its performance and effectiveness. A typical management review meeting is held to review its implementation, project status and project performance. This article present a case study of a typical Management Review Meeting
I was in a management review meeting on 25 September 2007. The Agenda for the day was to review the progress of the Total Quality Management ( TQM ) in implementation in the organization.
A few days before the management meeting, I did some research into the TQM implementation data from several companies under this organization. I collated data such as Vision and Mission Statements, Strategic Planning worksheets, SWOT Analysis data, TQM implementation projects and their respective results etc.
I started to analysis these data and correlate the results with the key actions. I compiled those key actions that achieved the targeted results etc..... and presented to the management team. Despite having data to quantify the progress of the TQM implementation, the management team could not conclude whether the companies has succeeded in TQM implementation.

Quality of People

The key to TQM is people, and this implies both management and staff members at all levels. People are, when all is said and done, what makes it happen - or not. Engaging the hearts and minds of the people is the first milestone along the path to success.
For management, especially top management, issues to be addressed include:

• Vision Development
• Strategic Planning and Deployment
• Objectives and Measures
• Resource Management
• Leadership Styles
• Management Development

For the staff, issues to be addressed include:

• Skills and Competencies
• Organization & Job Design
• Performance Management
• Motivation
• Empowerment
• Facilitation and Problem Solving Skills
  

Systems and Work Processes

Organizations are systems! These systems are composed of a series of processes. An organizational system is a group of related processes. In order for managers to change elements of a system, they need to understand what a process is and how to define problems in operational ways. We will begin with defining the problem we want to solve in measurable terms. We will then introduce selective tools for measuring a work-related process. We will do so in order to produce some form of organizational change. We will employ a five step problem approach. This approach is designed to structure the way you as a manager approach problems. The SPC tools are designed to help you make your case. The focus on CPI is designed to underscore that management is a journey not a destination.

TQM Focuses on Continuous Improvement Rather than Major Breakthroughs to Produce Quality Improvements. A Culture Change.

Traditional management relies inordinately on technological advances such as automation and computers to produce improved quality and productivity. TQM does not ignore these breakthroughs, but places more value on small, incremental gains resulting from daily attention to enhancing how work is done, called continuous improvement by TQM. Continuous improvement relies on feedback from the customers both internal and external. This feedback is both informal, e.g. stakeholder analysis, and formal, e.g. focus groups and surveys. Because TQM is based on continuous process improvement it requires a long term change in organizational culture which must be accepted by those at the top of the organization.

TQM is customer not specialist driven.

Users of products or services define what they want rather than have their needs defined by specialists. In TQM, customer needs and expectations, not agency established standards, define quality. No matter how good your products and services are by some "objective" standard, they cannot have total quality unless they meet your customers needs. A customer is anyone who receives or uses what you produce or whose service satisfaction depends upon your actions. There are two general types of customers in TQM internal and external. An internal customer is someone in your organization whose part in the work process comes after yours. An external customer is the ultimate recipient of your product or service. TQM cannot be implemented unless it is a top down organization. TQM reflects a different paradigm of management. E.g. The chain on the automobile line in Japan versus U.S.

Management Leadership of TQM

Management leads the commitment and the organization's total effort to ensure that our goals are achieved. Management leadership means focusing on the vital few goals, aligning of activities, maintaining constancy of purpose, and creating an environment where employees are not fearful of exposing weaknesses. Managers show by example that TQM is supported in daily activities.

The common elements of a successful shift to TQM are:

• Top Management commitment / leadership.
• Shared Values - Policy Deployment.
• Line Management ownership.
• Cascade training in TQM - compulsory.
• Widespread use of teams / councils / committees.
• Employee involvement / empowerment.
• Recognition and celebration.
• Voice of the customer.
• Challenging quantified goals - benchmarking.
• Focus on processes / improvement plans.
• Specific incorporation in strategic planning.

Appoint a representative or coordinator

We have to identify and nominate a senior executive to coordinate TQM activities in the organization. This person should have some qualities like belief in the process, good communicator, friendly and caring, good listener, good facilitator etc. He should also have good knowledge about the organization and report directly to Chief Executive Officer (CEO). It should always be remembered that responsibility and accountability of TQM remains with Chief Executive and TQM coordinator merely helps while performing the task.

How Can Master Control's Integrated Quality Management Software System Benefit You?

With more than a decade of experience in the rigorous FDA and ISO environments, MasterControl has developed an integrated software solution that combines industry best practices with the flexibility to meet every customer's unique needs.The Master Control™ quality management suite consists of configurable, easy-to-use, and connected applications for automating, streamlining, and effectively managing document control, change control, training control, audits, corrective/preventive action (CAPA), customer complaints, and other documents- and forms-based quality and business processes under a single Web-based platform

TQM Principles

Specifics related to the framework and implementation of TQM vary between different management professionals and TQM program facilitators, and the passage of time has inevitably brought changes in TQM emphases and language. But all TQM philosophies share common threads that emphasize quality, teamwork, and proactive philosophies of management and process improvement. As Howard Weiss and Mark Gershon observed in Production and Operations Management, "the terms quality management, quality control, and quality assurance often are used interchangeably. Regardless of the term used within any business, this function is directly responsible for the continual evaluation of the effectiveness of the total quality system." They go on to delineate the basic elements of total quality management as expounded by the American Society for Quality Control:
1) policy, planning, and administration;
2) product design and design change control;
3) control of purchased material;
4) production quality control;
5) user contact and field performance;
6) corrective action; and
7) employee selection, training, and motivation.

What we do to accomplish that:

We support and promote a total quality management culture. By providing appropriate sources we encourage improvements and employees’ initiative. Our plans and strategies are updated in accordance with market demands. Based on benchmarking and achieved results we set achievable objectives. We plan and develop our human resources. All our employees are pulled into continual improvement process through team work and responsibility delegation. To achieve top quality and set targets we facilitate our existing sources. All processes, inclusive supportive ones, are systematically controlled and tried. We make use of people’s creativity for innovation and process improvement.

A TQM perspective

The global business environment becomes more and more turbulent, as future seems to be more unpredictable, as choice increases and as people become more aware, quality management becomes more and more indispensable.
While human endeavour enters ever-widening spheres of existence, it is easy to become obsessed with one’s own activity, and believe it to be fundamentally different to that of everyone else. Once taken back to first-principles, though, it will be seen that it is not so. The basic rules, concepts and relationships exist in all working situations. This means that everyone can learn from the experience of any other organisation, indeed that they must learn to extract the better aspects of other types of enterprises. Disgruntled doctors or teachers may mutter that they are not working in a factory, and thus industrial methods are not their concern, but this demonstrates a remarkable ignorance of the basic economic facts of life and of the interdependence of all forms of life so vital for survival of all species.
TQM promotes the ability of any organisation to generate wealth in the long-term for the betterment of everyone concerned, seeking to provide the means of achieving increased productivity. A basic tenet of TQM is that wealth can only be derived, in the long term, from satisfied customers. Thus the main function of any business engaged in TQM is the generation of wealth via, customer satisfaction.

Focus on Quality and Prevention of Problems

Many definitions of quality exist. I define quality as consistently producing what the customer wants while reducing errors before and after delivery to the customer. More importantly, however, quality is not so much an outcome as a never ending process of continually improving the quality of what your company, organization or family produces.
TQM emphasizes detecting potential problems before they occur. A defect for this definition can be an imperfect product or one that just doesn't live up to customer expectation. Failure to prevent defects has several consequences:

1. The need to inspect other people finished work, rather than relying on the worker's own motivation and skill. This inspection requires extra people and resources.
2. If another employee (a supervisor or perhaps a "checker") finds errors, someone must fix the error, causing extra time and workload, or scrap it with all the accompanying waste;
3. If customers find the errors, this can cause dissatisfaction, loss of customer confidence, and perhaps loss of customers themselves.
   

How Workflow help in Quality Management System

Workflow is a modern method for passing information from source to user in a continuous stream of data. It is analogous to passing paper from one person to another to get opinions, reviews, comments, authorization and signing off on the information contained on that paper. This 'paper' is passed around by means of network systems and not interoffice envelopes.
Additionally workflow is not only meant for passing document throughout the company electronically but also actual tasks routing. Workflow incorporates the mapping and controlling of business processes knowledge governed by set of predefined rules and procedures so that it is intelligent to pass information within organizations.
By implementing workflow in QMS, it could help improve efficiency by automating many business processes and eliminating unnecessary steps, and improve control over the processes by standardizing the work methods. By making the processing information more consistent, it improves customers service because there are now more predictable levels of response to customers.

IMPLEMENTATION & TRACKING

When the organized teams demonstrate effective functioning in problem solving situations, they select the problems to work on, as quality initiatives, that directly impact the designated objectives. As selected problems are resolved, summary reports to executive management are presented, highlighting the improvement in the designated quality objectives. Once in place, the process continues indefinitely as Continuous Improvement.

Total quality management: origins and evolution of the term

The focus of this paper is to trace the origins of the term TQM and clarify the different definitions employed by academics and practitioners. Feigenbaum and Ishikawa are perhaps the greatest contributors to the development of the term. The other recognized quality management gurus such as Crosby, Deming and Juran have shaped the dimensions, practices and mechanism which underpin the concept, but it is noted that none of these three actually uses the TQM term. TQM started to be used in the mid-1980s and only became a recognized part of the quality-related language in the late 1980s. The paper also analyses the key dimensions of TQM and traces their origins.
The focus of this paper is to trace the origins of the term TQM and clarify the different definitions employed by academics and practitioners. Feigenbaum and Ishikawa are perhaps the greatest contributors to the development of the term. The other recognized quality management gurus such as Crosby, Deming and Juran have shaped the dimensions, practices and mechanism which underpin the concept, but it is noted that none of these three actually uses the TQM term. TQM started to be used in the mid-1980s and only became a recognized part of the quality-related language in the late 1980s. The paper also analyses the key dimensions of TQM and traces their origins.

Institutionalization of TQM

These processes are concerned with congruence among these variables:
1) the change with the organization,
2) the change with other changes initiated at the time,
3) the change with environmental demands, and
4) with the level of slack resources in the organization.
TQM needs to be congruent with the organization's current culture, and with other changes occurring in the organization. In a period of diminishing resources, organizations are likely to be trying to cope, by downsizing or other methods. In some organizations there are increasing demands for quality or client service improvements. Many such changes are likely to be driven by external demands, and TQM may be more likely to be successful than at times of less environmental pressure. Unfortunately, the fourth element, slack resources, is likely to be present: under current conditions, extra resources (money and staff time) are less likely to be easily available. The challenge is to find a way to make the initial investment outlay to start a process which will pay off in the long term.
Institutionalization may also be enhanced by overlaying another, but compatible, change model: the learning organization. This involves, at both the micro and systems levels, staff always learning how to do better and management learning how to be more responsive to staff and the community. Leaders help staff develop their own visions and align these with the organization's vision of quality. This is a very comforting model for leaders and or organizations who like or need change more slowly.

Education and communication

Education and communication Each of our case study companies had placed great emphasis on this; through a variety of vehicles — videos, briefing, magazines, newsletters and notice boards, etc. so as to promulgate and reinforce the quality message. As Ishikawa (1985) says — “Quality begins and ends with education”.However, the evidence suggests that it is inadequate for senior management to express their commitment solely through communicating vision and mission statements. The “levers” at the disposal of the Personnel Department may be more powerful in providing clear messages of change and taking this message beyond the talking stage. We find our companies supporting the quality message through the adaptation of personnel practices arid the development of new communications channels between management and non-managerial employees.

Concept of Control in Total Quality Management

The essence of control is actions which adjust operation’s predetermined standards, and its basis is information in the hands of managers. Usually whenever we think of term control, we imply that we are talking about controls in place in industrial or technical setup. However, control, including quality control, also involves office productivity, such as improved customer service, elimination of bottlenecks and reduction in paperwork mistakes.
Control can focus on events before, during or after a process. For example, a local car dealer can focus on activities before, during or after sales of new cars. Careful inspection of new cars and cautious selection of sales employees are ways to ensure high quality profitable sales even before those sales take place.
Monitoring the way sales people act with customers would be considered control during the sales task. Counting the number new cars sold during the month or telephone buyers about their dissatisfaction with the sale transactions would control after sales have occurred