Importance of quality management

The success of any organization greatly relies on its ability to maintain quality of production. As well as the relationship established among the organization, its employees and customers.  Through quality management, the company is able to design well-structured procedures and processes that should be followed if the company is to meet its overall objectives.  In the first stages of design and implementation, the company should start by setting up quality targets that will help satisfy customer wants and needs.  The company can then move on to the quality assurance and control process as a way of assessing whether the organization has enough resources to deliver the expected level of quality through its products and services.  When well designed and implemented, quality management ensures that the output delivered by the company and its employees meets the customers' expectations.  It also helps in resolving issues related to the quality of products and services as it makes it easier to identify these challenges before they can cause serious problems for the company.

As part of the company's quality management, the organization will employ the use of the Total Quality Management approach which operates by ensuring that all functions undertaken within the company and its immediate external environment are focused on ensuring that customer needs and wants are met and that all objectives set by the company are fulfilled (Dabal, 2001).  Through total quality management, various departments such as marketing, engineering, customer care and production work together towards satisfying customer needs and wants in line with the company's goals and objectives.

The reason for choosing total quality management is because of the long term effect that the approach has on an organization even after the implementation phase and the overall quality management has been introduced in an organization.  This is especially because the approach views an organization as a collection of processes that work together towards meeting a specific goal (Kiran, 2017).  It is based on the assumption that, companies should aim to continuously improve the processes that are involved from the point a customer need is identified to the point where a product or service is made available to the customer and cannot be used to satisfy the identified need or want (Kiran, 2017).  Companies are therefore required to constantly increase the knowledge and skills that their employees possess so as to make them better equipped at performing tasks and satisfying the objectives set by the company. 

Rather than waiting for a problem to arise and then discussing ways to resolve the problem and any challenges it may create, total quality management ensures that a company has the means to prevent various challenges from affecting operations (Charantimath, 2012).  The approach teaches employees to not only do the right things, but also to do them the first time and also all other times they work on similar or unrelated duties. Since the approach places emphasis on the importance of fulfilling tasks as expected every time employees perform their duties,  it ensure that any positive impact that the quality management has on the company is maintained for a long duration of time and therefore benefiting the organization in the long run.

Through total quality management, the company will be able to continuously improve the quality of performance in most, if not all departments.  Since it targets all processes that go on within the organization, total quality management will have a direct impact on areas responsible for strategic planning, decision making, assignment and implementation of tasks and responsibilities, and overall communication within the organization among others (Sallis, 2014).  Since total quality management is based on the idea that mistakes,  although unavoidable,  can be avoided,  it better prepares the company to prepare for any mistakes or defects that may occur and helps to design approaches to take in order to resolve issues related to mistakes and defects before they have a major impact on the company.  Knowing that mistakes are likely to occur also helps to determine the level of training,  need for advanced technology and the importance of training employees to cope with outcomes that may negatively impact the company and how to overcome them with the least disruption to normal operations (Kaynak & Rogers, 2013). It is however important to ensure that the approaches introduced through total quality management not only improve the company's position in the market,  but also improves the company's ability to maintain the achieved level of performance and even improve the quality of production in future.  The goal should therefore be to improve the quality levels at the company not only in the present but also for years to come. 

The implementation of the quality management approach will follow three major guidelines aimed at improving the effectiveness of the processes within the organization. Mistakes that occur within the company are as a result of either human error or faults in the systems used in the company (Kaynak & Rogers, 2013). It is therefore possible to identify the cause of these mistakes as well as setting up measures to ensure that the mistakes do not keep recurring. The first stage in quality management will focus on preventing mistakes from occurring in any of the processes undertaken within the organization. While mistakes and challenges can be overcome, the goal should be to have the least, or no mistakes at all (Kaynak & Rogers, 2013). Since resolving the mistakes takes time, energy and may even consume resources, the company is better suited not dealing with errors and rectifying mistakes caused by employees or from the machines used.

            Despite the effectiveness of most prevention measures taken by the company, there is the likelihood that some mistakes will occur. The next step will therefore focus on early detection of mistakes and errors in the operations undertaken by the organization. Rather than waiting for a problem to occur, the approach will try to anticipate these problems and identify areas where they are likely to occur and then design solutions that will ensure that the mistakes do not affect the quality of production (Kiran, 2017). Anticipating problems is crucial as it ensures that the same errors do not make their way down the production line and affect the quality of other products and services offered by the company. Lastly, the approach will also focus on ensuring that the same problems do not keep reoccurring (Kiran, 2017). Rather than fixing one problem over and over again, the quality management approach will ensure that once a problem has been dealt with, there is little chance that the same problem will reoccur. The goal should not be to maintain quality by overcoming problems but rather by ensuring that there are as little mistakes as possible.

Implementation

            Total quality management will be implemented in different stages. The first stage will focus on identifying tasks that need to be accomplished for quality management to be successful. The identification stage will involve an assessment of the company’s present condition and its readiness for change. Once the tasks have been identified, the next step will be to create management structures and this will require contribution from top management (Hill, 2018). Managers are in a better position to pass down the information to their respective teams and this will increase the likelihood of the changes introduced being successful.  The next step will be to communicate the need for change within the organization and what is expected of all employees (Hill, 2018). A communications memorandum will be made available to all employees informing them of the introduction of a new quality management approach and what will be needed from them to make the move successful. Lastly, the company needs to maintain proper lines of communication throughout the entire process. Employees must be made part of the process to ensure that they understand the role that total quality management aims to achieve and what needs to be done in order to make the project successful.

Conclusion

            Total quality management is likely to have the best results in improving the quality for the company. Rather than focusing on one area that could be affecting the quality of production, total quality management assess all processes to determine where a problem is likely to occur. The approach not only helps to resolve challenges, it also identifies areas where problems might affect the quality of production and thus allows them to be resolved before they can cause any real damage. If well implemented, total quality management will not only improve the current level of production but also ensure that the level of quality achieved is maintained in future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Memorandum on the need for quality management

Date:

To: All personnel

 

From: Human resource

Subject: how to improve quality of production within the organization.

The company has made a name for itself through the quality of its products and services. For this purpose, the total quality management approach will be introduced as part of the operations carried out within the company. The goal is to equip all employees with the skills and competence needed to reduce mistakes in operations and to increase the quality of production. The success of the quality management approach introduce will lie heavily on the contribution and willingness of all employees to take on the new tasks and responsibilities brought by the quality management approach used. Other than learning the new skills, employees are encouraged to maintain a positive attitude despite the disruptions caused to normal work routines.

Since total quality management is a continuous process, all employees are encouraged to keep practicing the new skills taught to ensure that they stick. In order to maintain the team spirit, employees will also help those that have a difficult time keeping up with the new requirements needed to maintain the desirable level of quality within the organization. Since the training will be carried out during working hours, teams will bear the responsibility of ensuring that there are little disruptions to business activities as possible. The goal is to equip all employees with the skills and knowledge needed to improve the quality of production and all members of staff are expected to participate in the quality management approach.

 

Sincerely,

Management

References

Charantimath, P. M. (2012). Total quality management. Delhi: Pearson.

Dabal J, (2001) “Is total quality management enough for competitive advantage?” Universal        Publishers

Hill B, (2018) “Principles of quality management” Willford press

Kaynak E and Rogers R, (2013) “Implementation of total quality management: A comprehensive             training program” Routledge

Kiran, D. R. (2017). Total quality management: Key concepts and case studies.

Sallis E, (2014) “Total quality management in education” Routledge