STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK

BINGHAMTON UNIVERSITY

SSIE 561
QUALITY ASSURANCE FOR ENGINEERS



HOMEWORK # 1

SUBMITTED BY

PUNIT SHETTY

Feb 17
th
, 2014






Total Quality Management (TQM): Past, Present and Future
Westcott, R. (2005), in his theory have traced the existence of Total Quality Management (TQM) back to
1920s. The quality management seeds were first sown as principles of scientific management which had
become famous in the US industry. Followed by these principles were the studies conducted by Hawthrone
in the year 1924 (Wickstrm, G., & Bendix, T., 2000). The experiments related the working conditions with
the worker productivity. These were the early stages of quality improvement. At the same time in 1924
Shewhart developed the Statistical Process Control which was important for data analysis and quality
control. W. Edwards Deming and Joseph M. Juran visited Japan during the 1950s to teach the Japanese
about the statistical methods and quality control respectively. Also in the same decade the book, Total
Quality Control was written by Armand V. Feigenbaum, which was the forerunner for the current TQM. He
defines TQC as an effective system for integrating the quality development, maintenance and
improvement efforts of the various groups in an organization so as to enable production and service at the
most economical levels which allow for full customer satisfaction (Lorente, Dewhurst, & Dale, 1998). Zero
defects promoted by Philip B. Crosby in 1950s have opened the roads to quality improvement by many
companies. During 1958 the approach to total quality was named as companywide quality control by the
Japanese. Also Kaoru Ishikawas work of developing 7 tools of quality helped Japanese companies to
ascend in their work towards TQM. The idea of Quality circles started to revolve around the Japanese
industrial culture when it first appeared in a journal Quality Control of the Foreman. Around 1960s and
1970s Japanese started to produce high quality products and at competitive prices. The pressure of high
quality and competitive prices was felt by the rest of the world including US and UK. It was in this economic
turmoil when the concept of TQM is supposed to have taken root.

During spring (1984), The Navy Personnel Research and Development Center (NPRDC) of United States
(US) were assigned a task to improve mission performance using the statistical Process Control (SPC) and
the Quality Management Method. The research was carried out by NPRDC by doing literature reviews and
performing site visits to different organizations already using SPC, following the various approaches by
Crosby and Deming in SPC, studying the use of commercially available programs for SPC in Navy and also
studying the conditions required to maintain the Quality management and SPC in the Navy. They
concluded that the Quality Management integrated with the SPC was well feasible in naval applications, the
senior management were critical and the changes have to be made in the organization for bringing about
improvement. These findings were used by the Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) leaders to decide
on testing the approach, which proved to be successful and later was expanded to other areas such as
depots, shipyards and supply centers. This led to the generation of the label Total Quality Management
(TQM) in 1985. Later the label was removed by the chief of naval operations and a new label was
assigned as Total Quality Leadership (TQL) to emphasize on the criticality of the leadership in deployment
of total Quality. They adopted the practices and methods which were based on Demings concepts. Some
of those are:

Quality is defined by customers' requirements
Top management has direct responsibility for quality improvement
Increased quality comes from systematic analysis and improvement of work processes
Quality improvement is a continuous effort and conducted throughout the organization
(Houston A. & Dockstader S. L., 1988).

Following tools were used by Navy during their exercise for TQM:
They used the PDCA cycle to resolve certain critical issues towards process improvement and followed
a certain process flow. (Figure 1)
Developments of teams involving all the employees for quality control including Executive steering
committee consisting of top management, Quality Management Board consisting of top and mid-level
employees and the Process Action teams involving floor level people and workers for effective
management and quality control.
Use of the Seven Basic Tools of Quality to analyze quality-related issues including fish bone diagram,
pareto chart, run charts, histogram, check lists, scatter diagrams and flow chart.
These ideas give us the idea of what TQM is and also about the birth and evolution of TQM. The Evolution
of TQM has led to development of many standards as of today (i.e. 2014). The ISO 9000 series and the
Malcolm Bridge National Quality Award (MBNQA) are the developments to define the TQM. In the United
States, the Baldridge Award which is created by Public Law 100-107, annually recognizes high-quality
operations in American businesses, educational institutions and healthcare organizations. Organizations
are judged on the following 7 criteria such as Leadership involving the vision in the top management,
Workforce focus including the skills and the dedication (attitude) of the floor level people, operations focus
describing the efficiency of the processes, strategic planning as part of the planning phase considering the
mission and vision of the organization, customer focus i.e. being customer centric and striving for optimum
quality, measurement, analysis, and knowledge management showing effective utilization of various
available resources, results showing the profitability, employability, figures and other attributes measuring
the company.
Juran believed that MBNQA was perfect for judging the company for the TQM adoption. Barney (2002)
from Motorola has an opinion that the Six Sigma developed by Motorola can easily overcome the TQM. He
also predicts Six Sigma to be a quantitative alternative to TQM. Also it says that Six Sigma has moved
ahead of just Quality improvement and reducing cost. It concentrates on the entire market rather taking
feedback from less potential customers. Also unlike TQM, Six Sigma doesnt try to introduce continuous
improvement for its own sake. Modern Six Sigma makes use of various tools to bring about improvement in
business as required by the business strategy.
Conclusion: The roots of TQM can be tracked down to as old as 1920 and evolving throughout through
inputs from various statisticians and scientists broadening the area of application of the TQM and also the
widening the scope by increased number of tools and criteria, including the MBNQA and ISO series. Major
developments in the TQM concepts occurred in the USA whereas Japan couldnt be ignored as it held the
key for initiating in terms of application. Today TQM has equally been criticized against the Six Sigma and
lean methodologies but is also adopted worldwide in companies in the form of ISO and MBNQA awards.
The application of TQM and also the definition differs to a small extent in different countries and also
different companies, depending on the culture. However as of today due to widening and broadening of
concepts, the differences are diminishing and the TQM is getting standardized.


References:
1. Westcott, R., 2005, The certified manager of quality/organizational excellence handbook, ASQ Quality Press, page
303-304, https://asq.org/learn-about-quality/total-quality-management/overview/tqm-history.html, accessed on
February 6
th
, 2014
2. Martinez-Lorente, A. R., Dewhurst, F., & Dale, B. G., 1998, Total quality management: origins and evolution of the
term, The TQM Magazine, 10(5), 378-386
3. Wickstrm, G., & Bendix, T., 2000, The" Hawthorne effect"what did the original Hawthorne studies actually
show?, Scandinavian journal of work, environment & health, 363-367
4. Houston, A., & Dockstader, S. L., 1998, Total Quality Leadership: A Primer. Department of the Navy, Total Quality
Leadership Office.
5. Houston, A., & Dockstader, S. L., 1988, A Total Quality Management process improvement model (No. NPRDC-TR-
89-3). NAVY PERSONNEL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENTCENTER SAN DIEGO CA.
6. Juran, J. M., 1995, A history of managing for quality: The evolution, trends, and future directions of managing for
quality. Milwaukee, WI: ASQC Quality Press
7. Barney, M., 2002, Six Sigma, The Industrial-Organizational Psychologist,39(4), 104-107



Figure 1. The Process improvement model for TQM developed by NPRDC
(Houston A. & Dockstader S. L., 1988).