Total Quality Management

Total Quality Management

 

Introduction

            The development of science and technology nowadays has lead to the improvement of many companies, in terms of product development and research and in the rendering of service. The use of technology has become an essential part of the strategies of companies to increase production and to check the quality of the product. Similarly, with the role of technology in their development, companies can properly evaluate the performance of their employees and at the same time, evaluate the opinions of their consumers regarding their products and services. With the utilization of the Internet, companies and their consumers can properly interact to discuss and comment on different aspects of the business, and help improve the performance of the company.

            From these, customer satisfaction becomes the primary goal of many companies. Customer satisfaction is important for companies for retention of costumers and for expansion of business and profit from the trade. This will not only maintain the society’s social order, but also results to economic growth and gain of many industries, which would in turn give economic stability to the country or nation. In this light, the concept of total quality management becomes essential and crucial to any company. This concept focuses on customer satisfaction, which when applied and implemented in a company, would give positive results for the whole company and for the employees as well.

            This paper discusses the concept of total quality management and other related concepts being covered by it. It emphasizes on the benefits of total quality management, as being applied and implemented by a wine company. This paper also includes a project plan, for the implementation of the concept of total quality management as applied in a particular company.

 

Total Quality Management (TQM)

              It has been reported that the term total quality management or TQM was a term coined by the U.S. Naval Air Systems Command to describe its Japanese-style management approach in terms of quality improvement (2006a). In the concept of the Japanese, total quality management comprises four process steps. These steps are namely, Kaizen, which focuses on continuous process improvement, to make processes visible, repeatable, and measurable; Atarimae Hinshitsu, which focuses on intangible effects on processes and ways to optimize and reduce their effects; Kansei, or examining the way the user applies the product, leading to improvement in the product itself; and Miryokuteki Hinshitsu, which broadens management concern beyond the immediate product (2006b). Due to the fact that total quality management has taken on many meanings (2006a, in general, it is defined as a management approach for an organization, centered on quality, based on the participation of all its members and aiming at long-term success through customer satisfaction, and benefits to all members of the organization and to society (2006b). Furthermore, it is a management strategy aimed at embedding awareness of quality in all organizational processes, and has been widely used in manufacturing, education, government, and service industries, as well as NASA space and science programs (2006b).

            In relation to this, a wine company must give importance to the concept of total quality management for their aim is connected to this concept, which is customer satisfaction to maintain customers and gain profit from the trade. Wine companies devote much of their time and resources in improving their wines by continuous research. This is to make sure that their wines will taste good and will possess the quality, which would give satisfaction to their customers. Aside from improving their techniques in winemaking, wine companies also aim to attract the best possible suppliers and partners to achieve the best possible product in terms of taste and market presentation. These in turn will make the wine company permanently established in the market scene and build up its reputation as an outstanding company. These give many companies to acknowledge the benefits of total quality management, as being implemented in their system.  

 

Benefits of Total Quality Management

            According to  (1995), through the application of total quality management in a company, the senior management will empower all levels of management, including self-management of the employees to manage quality systems. These benefits are grouped into five key areas, namely, continuous improvement, multifunctional teams, reduction in variation, supplier integration, and education and training.

Continuous Improvement – It is very true that employees desire to be more developed in terms of work performance to get a higher paying job and a better future. (1995) reports that if the desire for individual improvement is transferred to systems within the workplace, then these systems will improve. In addition, the continuous improvement of the system management and its employees, increase in productivity will be achieved by the whole company, which will make the company more stable in terms of sales and profit. Through total quality management, the employees will be more improved in terms of skills and knowledge regarding their work in the field. Improvement will give them the advantage of possessing an important and highly effective skill, which they could use in their edge. Improvement in performance covers development in work ethics, improvement in quality of product, creating an environment encouraging teamwork, and respect for one’s abilities.

 

Multifunctional Teams – In a system, it is very important that the concept of division of labor will be implemented. In this way, it will be easier for the company to keep track of all its activities and monitor its production and services. The division of labor in the company will be very helpful also in solving conflicts and problems in terms of production, human resources and other aspects of the system. In addition, multifunctional teamwork allows the problems and requirements of each component to be passed on at worker level, throughout the company, and lead a better understanding of the employees how the system works (1995). It will also make individuals work with each other by identifying causes of the problems rather than blaming each other for the results of the problem, which in turn remove the blame culture within the system ( 1995). In a wine company, it is important that division of labor exists, for it hastens production. However, it must be remembered that hastening production should not compensate the quality of the product. 

 

Reduction in Variation – The difference in the approach of employees in the system in relation to different problems and to customers may also affect the performance of the company as a whole. According to (1995), the change in the service and product provided by the company must be minimized to maintain the standards of the system. This can be achieved by documenting systems, and giving the employees the opportunity to own processes by allowing them to try on doing the process ( 1995). In this way, the employees can get the feel of doing the job and maintain the standards of the system of the company as well. In relation, a wine company must be able to control this variation also so as not to affect the product of the company, and not change the quality of the workload and the products and services the company renders. 

 

Supplier Integration – Suppliers are one of the crucial elements in the production of a wine company. With the help of suppliers, the needs of the wine company will be continuously provided and the problems of the wine company will be lessened with the help of its partners. Wilson (1995) reports that by involving suppliers directly with the employees of the wine company, two-way communication can be established. Furthermore, any problems that arise can be solved jointly, by using their knowledge and expertise, and their involvement prevents waste through returned goods for the supplier ( 1995).

 

Education and Training – Through education, management and employees are given the tools to achieve all of the mentioned benefits ( 1995). Education provides for guided innovation from all levels, while training, which is a cost, shows a commitment by management individual employee self-improvement, and total quality management (1995). With education and training, it will ensure the improvement of the wine company, in terms of research and employee management. The benefits of education and training would be the dissemination of proper information and the exposure of the employees with the whole system. This would maintain the standard of the company and in turn, still uphold its values and goals in customer satisfaction and service.

 

Elements of Total Quality Management

            It has been reported that total quality is a description of the culture, attitude and organization of a company that strives to provide customers with products and services that satisfy their needs (2000). In addition, the author reports that to be successful in implementing total quality management, an organization must concentrate on the eight key elements, namely, ethics, integrity, trust, training, teamwork, leadership, recognition, and communication.

 

Ethics – It has been reported that this is the discipline concerned with good and bad in any situation, which is a two-faceted subject represented by organizational and individual ethics (2000). Ethics must be inculcated in every employee to improve their work and in turn improve the production of the company. This includes the choice of the employee between doing right from wrong, and the adherence of the employees to their performance and individual ethics ( 2000).

 

Integrity – This implies honesty, morals, values, fairness, and adherence to the facts and sincerity ( 2000). Without integrity, customer satisfaction will not be achieved fully, for many customers rely on the fact that a company exhibits a good reputation in the market. The image of the wine company and its employees matters to every customer.

 

Trust – It has been reported that trust is a by-product of integrity and ethical conduct, and without trust, the framework of total quality management cannot be built (2000). Trust fosters full participation of all members, and allows empowerment that encourages pride ownership and encourages commitment (2000). Furthermore, it allows decision making at appropriate levels in the organization, fosters individual risk-taking for continuous improvement and helps to ensure that measurements focus on improvement of process and are not used to contend people ( 2000). Trust is very important, as it fosters a pleasant environment between the company and its consumers.

            These three elements can be grouped under the term Foundation, which collectively fosters openness, fairness and sincerity and allows involvement by everyone, and is the key to unlocking the ultimate potential of total quality management (2000). Similarly, the next three elements can be grouped under the term Bricks, as bricks are placed to reach the roof of recognition (2000).

 

Training – As mentioned, training is important in total quality management because it helps maintain the standard of the company and the quality of the product. Training helps employees to achieve and improve their interpersonal skills, the ability to function within teams, problem solving, decision-making, job management performance analysis and improvement, business economics and technical skills ( 2000).

 

Teamwork – With the use of teams, the business will receive quicker and better solutions to problems, provide more permanent improvements in processes and operations (2000). In addition, in teams, people feel more comfortable bringing up problems that may occur, and can get help from other workers to find a solution and put into place (2000). Being involved in a team would boost the morale of employees and make them explore possibilities of gaining friends in the workplace. These would also be healthy for the company, when each member treats each other as family.

 

Leadership – This is possibly the most important element in total quality management, as it appears everywhere in the organization ( 2000). Leadership requires to provide an inspiring vision, make strategic directions that are understood by all and to instill values that guide subordinates ( 2000). Moreover, leadership is an essential element for it is responsible for making the employees maintain their work ethics, as a more effective leadership style can increase the productivity of the company.

 

Communication – This element has been grouped separately, being the Binding Mortar group, as it binds everything together, and starting from foundation to roof of the total quality management house, everything is bound by strong mortar of communication (2000). It acts as a vital link between all elements of total quality management, for communication means a common understanding of ideas between the sender and the receiver (2000). The success of the concept demands communication with and among all the organization members, suppliers and customers, coupled with the sharing of correct information is vital (2000). Furthermore, effective communication is essential for knowledge dissipation and information dissemination. Without communication, it would be hard for the company to maintain its business.  

 

            The last group under Roof covers the element of Recognition, which is the last and final element in the entire system ( 2000). It should be provided for both suggestions and achievements for teams as well as individuals (2000). Employees should strive to receive recognition for themselves and for their teams (2000), not only to receive incentives or awards, but also to use this recognition as motivation to work more productively.

 

Project Plan

            It has been reported that a project plan is a formal, approved document used to guide both project execution and project control, and are used to document planning assumptions and decisions, facilitate communication among stakeholders, and document approved scope, cost, and schedule baselines (2006).

            In implementing the concept of total quality management in a wine company, a certain methodology can be adopted. This methodology includes planning the project, organizing the stakeholders, communicating during the project, and monitoring the status of the project, including quality and risk management (2006).

 

1. Plan the Project

            This is the most important aspect in the project plan and defines questions, such as, what will be delivered precisely during the project, how it will be delivered and who will be in charge, and when this will be done (project schedule) (2006). This part includes a strong analysis phase allowing to progressively reach a good understanding of the different axes necessary to implement total quality management, the development phase, which is the core of the project itself, the test and acceptance phase itself, guided through a test plan and the necessary test cases, and the closing and maintenance phase, which will enable the customer to take over the project and use it as intended (2006). This part must include taking down notes and scheduling to guarantee an efficient workflow of the project and proper execution of actions. In paper, this could be in form of a list or a table or work sheet for a more organized presentation. It will also be good if the number of hours allotted for every task will be indicated to monitor how many hours was spent in every task and to assess when the project will be accomplished. (See Figure 1).

            Furthermore, this part includes checking the resources of the company in relation to budget, and the materials needed in accomplishing the project. It would also be helpful if all the materials needed, will be listed for proper monitoring. A good list or table will be useful for this situation (See Figure 2 and Figure 3).

 

2. Organize the stakeholders.

            A big and effective project for involves many professionals with different competencies and backgrounds in extending a project team organization (2006). Stakeholders include international or local clients, who could be helpful in generating funds, and ideas to improve the project. They could also contribute to the motivation of employees to work harder and better for the project. Organizing the stakeholders will be successful by encouraging them to participate in effective projects and by conceptualizing a project, which would benefit the whole company and the stakeholders as well.

            Moreover, having more stakeholders will be beneficial to the implementation of the project. This is because having more stakeholders would mean the project would have a number of supporters that would create a good relationship between the company and the stakeholders.

 

3. Communicate during the project

            An efficient communication is surely one of the key success factors in the implementation of total quality management in a company (2006). Communication is essential for it enables each employee to express his or her opinions regarding the project. This is an important aspect because with communication, better ideas can be conveyed, and more coordination can be achieved.

            Through effective communication, more employees will be participating in the project and more stakeholders will be informed regarding its implementation. This also involves proper negotiations in terms of answering expenses for the project and the distribution of the profit. With constant communication, good relationships can be created among the employees and the stakeholders as well. This would foster a pleasant working environment and in turn, give each member of the organization a chance or opportunity to interact with one another. Thus, making constant and efficient communication a crucial element in maintaining and creating well and lasting relationships within the system or organization.

 

4. Monitor the status of the project (including quality and risk management)

            It is mandatory to monitor the project progress to detect any issue and to accompany the needed changes in the project itself (2006). The monitoring of the project involves different aspects. These aspects include the regular monitoring of the work realized by the team members, such as on a daily basis (2006). In regular monitoring, the project manager can monitor its team, can test the development of the project and can update the project progress (2006). This would be useful in order to correct the mistakes in the process of doing the project, and accomplish changes while the project is yet to be completed.

            Another aspect is the accomplishment of progress reports on a weekly to a monthly basis (2006). This involves the documents being evaluated by the project manager and is keeping the customer informed regarding the summary progress reports (2006). This aspect will be helpful for the project as it enables the members to keep track on the changes and on the partial accomplishments of the project. This would help the company assess the remaining time to accomplish the project in accordance to the set period or time frame.

            Another aspect is the customer review procedure (2006), which involves asking the opinion of the client regarding the project. Those reviews guarantee the quality of the project and from the interviews conducted, the client produces test reports, which will serve as a basis for corrections (2006). In this way, customers can comment on the taste of the wine and can give suggestions on how to improve its taste. This would be a useful tool in assessing the effectiveness of the project. In generating the opinion of the customers, the company can evaluate its success if it will be launched in the market.

            The last aspect is change management (2006). This aspect entails the preparation of the members of the organization, as the management may decide at any moment to change the project. Certain parts of the project can be changed or the entire project could be changed. In the event of changing the whole project, its conceptualization must be repeated, certain aspects must be modified and materials to be used will be increased or decreased depending on the project. Similarly, if parts of the project will be changed, certain aspects will be modified. With these changes, the project will be improved further as mistakes will be corrected. Changes in this aspect could be the changes in the presentation of the wine in the public, or changes in the appearance of the wine bottle. In this way, total quality management will be implemented in such a proper manner and give the company its full advantage. With the implementation of total quality management in the company’s system, more projects can be conceptualized, which would lure customers to buy their products. Through projects, customers could realize that the company aims to improve and develop their products for the benefit of the consumers.

 

Conclusion

            In essence, total quality management is a concept in management, which when implemented in a system, aims at customer satisfaction. There are many benefits in implementing total quality management, and these benefits can give the company its full advantage in terms of trade and sales. These benefits include the continuous improvement of the employees, which in turn lead to the development of the company as a whole. It also includes the concept of division of labor, which is a very useful approach to hasten production of the company. Another benefit would be reduction in variation, which maintains the standard of the system of the company. Supplier integration is also one of the benefits, for through total quality management, suppliers can interact effectively with the company and vice versa. Furthermore, with education and training, proper information will be distributed and right knowledge will be dissipated among the employees regarding the system of the company. In this way, the standards and the reputation of the company will be highly maintained.        

The suggested steps in producing an effective project plan can be useful in implementing total quality management in a wine company. In this way, majority of the employees can participate in developing the project and in the company’s goal for customer satisfaction. By developing specific projects, more customers will be more interested in buying the product and patronizing it.   

Appendices

 

Figure 1. Project plan: Activities and Time Frame

Step	Description	Estimate
1.	Preparation
1.1.	Developer training	30h
2.	Inception
2.1.	Requirements gathering	30h
2.2.	Requirements specification	20h
2.3.	Requirements validation	10h
3.	Elaboration
3.1.	High-level design	5h
3.2.	Low-level design (break down by component)
3.2.A.	Object design	10h
3.2.B.	User interface design	10h
3.2.C.	Database design	3h
3.3.	Design review and evaluation	5h
4.	Construction
4.1.A.	System implementation
4.1.A.1.	Implement COMPONENT-NAME 1	25h
4.1.A.2.	Implement COMPONENT-NAME 2	25h
4.1.A.3.	Implement COMPONENT-NAME 3	25h
4.1.A.4.	Implement COMPONENT-NAME 4	25h
4.1.A.5.	Integrate Components (mostly done during component implementation)	5h
4.1.B.	Technical documentation (break down by component)	10h
4.1.C.	User documentation (break down by component)	10h
4.1.D.	Testing
4.1.D.1.	Test planning	10h
4.1.D.2.	Test code implementation (break down by component)	30h
4.1.D.3.	Test execution	10h
4.2.	Implementation review and evaluation	15h
5.	Transition
5.A.	Release packaging	3h
5.B.	Documentation for other groups	3h
6.	Reflection
6.1.	Postmortem report	10h
	Total	329 hours

 

From ‘Project Plan’ 2006

 

Figure 2. Inspection/Acceptance Testing Requirements for Consumables and Supplies

Critical Supplies/Consumables	Inspection/Acceptance Specification	Acceptance Criteria	Testing Method	Frequency	Responsible Individual	Handling/Storage Conditions

 

2002

 

 

Figure 3. Equipment and Instrumentation Calibration

Equipment/Instrument	Procedure	Frequency of Calibration	Acceptance Criteria	Corrective Action (CA)	Person Responsible for CA	SOP Reference

 

2002