Organizing for Total Quality Management

• Chapter Two studies organizing for TQM, including requirements and teams for TQM implementation.
• Learning Outcome 2 involves analyzing the requirements of TQM in an organization and forming teams for implementations.

Organizing for TQM - Introduction

• Organizing is defined as the process of creating a structure for the organization that will enable its people to work together effectively toward its objectives.
• Organizing for total quality management has two dimensions
• Macro dimension is concerned with the overall approach the company might take to establish a quality infrastructure.
• Micro dimension is concerned with organizing the quality department and designing the duties and responsibilities of the "top quality manager."

Today's Requirements for Organizing Quality

• Two pre-requisites for TQM organization are a quality attitude and an organizational structure.
• A quality attitude pervades the entire organization, not just a special activity supervised by a high-ranking quality director.
• Developing a quality attitude, vision, and culture is a significant challenge for top management.
• An organizational structure supports the pervasive attitude.
• With it, companies can set goals, assign them to people, and convert them into action plans.

Transition from a Traditional to a TQM Organization

• Modern markets and technological, as well as economic factors, have established new requirements for organizing quality.
• Traditional quality programs thought of quality as a single function within the company.
• In a TQM organization, quality is recognized as a systematic group of quality disciplines, applied on a coordinated basis by all functions within the company.
• Traditional quality programs were separated from direct, ongoing contact with buyers and customers.
• A TQM organization must be continuously coupled with the buyer and customer on both a feed-forward and feedback basis.
• In tradition businesses, quality problems transcend and do not respect individual functional organizational boundaries within companies.
• A quality program must be organized accordingly if it is to be realistic in a TQM organisation.
• Quality-related operations have become extended, and high-level control is of primary importance.
• This assures orientation to the real facts of new product quality, which allows for early warning of impending production quality problems.

Roles in Organizational Transition to TQM

• Members of an organization need a sound understanding of their roles during the transition to a TQM program.
• A part of top management is establishing and serving in a quality council, creating quality policies, establishing and deploying quality goals, providing the resources, as well as problem-oriented training, stimulating improvements, and providing the reward and recognition.
• Middle managers, executives, supervisors, functional specialists, and the work force are the people who execute the quality strategy developed by the top management.
• The responsibilities of middle management are to nominate quality problems for finding solutions, serve as leaders or members of quality teams, assist the Quality Councils in developing quality strategies, lead quality activities within their area, and identify as well as meet with customers and suppliers to address their needs.
• Part of the Work Force includes nominating quality problems for solutions, serving as members of quality teams, identifying elements of their jobs that do not meet the criteria of self-control, and becoming knowledgeable as to the needs of their customers.

Role of Teams

• The "organization of the future" will be viewed as a "socio-technical system" encompassing a technical system (equipment, processes, technology etc.) and a social system (people, roles etc.).
• The organization is influenced by the interaction of these two systems
• Research focuses on new ways of organizing work, especially at the workforce level where, "Team" concepts play an important role in these new approaches.

Teams for Total Quality Management

• The critical factor in organizing for total quality is "employee involvement" around which the management system of TQM should be based.
• Only 10 percent is top management which is visible in the organization chart, while 90 percent comprises front-line supervisors and non-managerial employees, creating the true potential for quality.
• Tapping into the 90 percent represents a reservoir of ideas for quality and productivity improvement by means of teams.

The Role of Teams in Continuous Improvement

• Teams aid people's commitment to the principles of TQM.
• They improve communication within functions and with customers as well as suppliers.
• They help to encourage leadership traits, as well as developing awareness of quality improvement potential and building collective responsibility.

Types of Teams

• Quality project teams solve cross-sectional quality problems, while often including a combination of managers, professionals, and workforce, and are mandatory 4 to 8 members. After the project is completed, the team disbands, and are otherwise known a quality improvement team.
• A quality circle solves problems within a department, with a workforce from one department composed of 6 to 12 members. The team remains intact after the project and can be known as an employee improvement group.
• A business process quality team plans, controls, and implements the quality of a key functional process, composed of managers and professionals often from multiple departments often with 4 to 6 members. The team is permanent, and can be known as a business process management team, as well as a process team.

Quality Circles - Definition

• A quality circle is a small group of employees who voluntarily meet regularly for about an hour every week to identify, analyze, and resolve work-related problems, leading to improvement in their total performance and work life.

Significant Characteristics of Quality Circles

• They are a small group of employees from the same work area.
• Membership is voluntary.
• Members meet regularly for about an hour every week to resolve work-related problems and enrich their work life.

Basic Philosophy of Quality Circle

• Contributing towards the improvement and development of the organization or a department, respecting humanity, building a happy work place, and satisfying self-development/high human needs are all aspects of quality circles

Impact of Quality Circles

• Impacts are improvement of human relations, promotion of participative culture, and improvement of work-place morale.
• Additional impacts of quality circles are enhancement of job interest, more effective teamwork, reducing defects, and cost effectiveness.
• Quality circles also improve communication as well as interaction by encouraging an attitude for prevention.

Structure of Quality Circle

• (From Top to Bottom): Top Management Steering Committee, Coordinator, Facilitator, Leaders, Members, and Non-QC Members.
• The top management heads the structure of quality circle and forms a steering committee known as the Quality Council. The Council has all the heads of the functions as its member.
• The co-ordinator may be a Personnel or Administrative officer who co-ordinates and supervises the work of the facilitators. The facilitator oversees the quality circle activities.
• A facilitator is a combination of a coach, communicator, innovator, promoter, teacher, statistician and catalyst.
• The facilitator should be selected by the steering committee immediately after taking a definite decision to implement quality circle.
• The first task of the steering committee is to select the facilitator. The leader of the quality circle is chosen by the members.