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TQM is a set of management practices throughout the organization, geared to ensure the

organization consistently meets or exceeds customer requirements. TQM places strong focus on
process measurement and controls as means of continuous improvement.
Before reading more about TQM, it might be helpful to quickly review the major forms of quality
management in an organization. These are briefly described at the top of the Quality
Management topic.

7 Important Principles of Total Quality Management


Copyright Quin Harris
Total Quality Management (TQM) is an approach that organizations use to improve their internal
processes and increase customer satisfaction. When it is properly implemented, this style of
management can lead to decreased costs related to corrective or preventative maintenance,
better overall performance, and an increased number of happy and loyal customers.
However, TQM is not something that happens overnight. While there are a number of software
solutions that will help organizations quickly start to implement a quality management system,
there are some underlying philosophies that the company must integrate throughout every
department of the company and at every level of management. Whatever other resources you
use, you should adopt these seven important principles of Total Quality Management as a
foundation for all your activities.

1. Quality can and must be managed


Many companies have wallowed in a repetitive cycle of chaos and customer complaints. They
believe that their operations are simply too large to effectively manage the level of quality. The
first step in the TQM process, then, is to realize there is a problem and that it can be controlled.

2. Processes, not people, are the problem


If your process is causing problems, it wont matter how many times you hire new employees or
how many training sessions you put them through. Correct the process and then train your
people on these new procedures.

3. Dont treat symptoms, look for the cure


If you just patch over the underlying problems in the process, you will never be able to fully
reach your potential. If, for example, your shipping department is falling behind, you may find
that it is because of holdups in manufacturing. Go for the source to correct the problem.

4. Every employee is responsible for quality


Everyone in the company, from the workers on the line to the upper management, must realize
that they have an important part to play in ensuring high levels of quality in their products and

services. Everyone has a customer to delight, and they must all step up and take responsibility
for them.

5. Quality must be measurable


A quality management system is only effective when you can quantify the results. You need to
see how the process is implemented and if it is having the desired effect. This will help you set
your goals for the future and ensure that every department is working toward the same result.

6. Quality improvements must be continuous


Total Quality Management is not something that can be done once and then forgotten. Its not a
management phase that will end after a problem has been corrected. Real improvements must
occur frequently and continually in order to increase customer satisfaction and loyalty.

7. Quality is a long-term investment


Quality management is not a quick fix. You can purchase QMS software that will help you get
things started, but you should understand that real results wont occur immediately. TQM is a
long-term investment, and it is designed to help you find long-term success.
Before you start looking for any kind of quality management software, it is important to make
sure you are capable of implementing these fundamental principles throughout the company.
This kind of management style can be a huge culture change in some companies, and sometimes
the shift can come with some growing pains, but if you build on a foundation of quality principles,
you will be equipped to make this change and start working toward real long-term success.

What is Total Quality Management?


Why is online shopping a better experience on some sites than on others? Let's look at total quality
management (TQM) for the reasons.
Total quality management is an organization-wide philosophy with its core values centered on
continually improving the quality of its product and services, and the quality of its processes, to meet
and exceed customer expectations.
This means that everyone in the organization - from top management to the employees - plays a role
in providing quality products and services to customers. Even suppliers and the customers
themselves are part of the TQM.

Five Principles of TQM


In order to exceed customer expectations, an organization must embrace five principles:

Produce quality work the first time

Focus on the customer

Have a strategic approach to improvement

Improve continuously

Encourage mutual respect and teamwork

Let's see how Fun Time Travel, an online travel booking website, applies the five principles.

Information technology technicians monitor the website for


client activity.

Producing quality work (the first time) means quality is built into the processes for producing
products or providing services, and continual improvement measures are taken to ensure the
processes work every time. Employees are empowered to make decisions to improve a process and
are provided with continual training to develop their skills.
The purchasing department at Fun Time Travel evaluates data on client purchases to determine
which packages are most popular with clients. This helps them to determine what stays and what
goes. The information technology technicians monitor the website continually to assess whether
clients are just browsing or actually making purchases. The IT guys also evaluate how long a
booking takes to determine whether changes need to be made to the check-out process.
Focusing on the customer involves designing products or services that meet or exceed the
customer's expectations. This involves the product itself, its functionality, attributes, convenience and
even the means by which the information about a product is received by a client.
The marketing department is responsible to get the cyber-word out to potential clients. Marketers use
a wide variety of media sources, like social networking, email and even texting, to get the word out
about Fun Time's website. If they notice traffic is not moving toward the website or that clients are not

staying online long enough, they will make strong suggestions to the IT department and the research
and development department to make changes immediately.

Marketers use a wide variety of media sources, like social


networking, e-mail and texting.

By having a strategic approach to improvement, processes are developed and tested to ensure
the product or service's quality. This also involves making sure suppliers offer quality supplies
needed to produce products.
The purchasing department monitors client reviews to determine whether the ratings on the website
are similar to those of actual past customers. This makes it possible for purchasing to add more
travel packages to the company's inventory.
Improving continuously means always analyzing the way work is being performed to determine if
more effective or efficient ways are possible, making improvements and striving for excellence all the
time.
The human resources department is interested in making sure employees are qualified to perform
their jobs. By having qualified and trained employees on the team, the website will run effectively.
Calls to the travel desk will be handled efficiently. Any interruption to the booking process will be
quickly fixed, and improvements will be made.
Encouraging mutual respect and teamwork is important because it fosters a single-organizational
culture of excellence by knowing that every employee from top to bottom of the hierarchy holds the
same core principles at heart.
The entire team at Fun Time Travel work together to make viewing, planning and booking a vacation
on their website a pleasurable and easy experience. This requires an inter-departmental approach to
TQM.

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The Primary Elements of TQM
Total quality management can be summarized as a management system for a customer-focused organization that involves all employees in continual
improvement. It uses strategy, data, and effective communications to integrate the quality discipline into the culture and activities of the organization.

Customer-focused. The customer ultimately determines the level of quality. No matter what an organization
does to foster quality improvementtraining employees, integrating quality into the design process, upgrading
computers or software, or buying new measuring toolsthe customer determines whether the efforts were
worthwhile.

Total employee involvement. All employees participate in working toward common goals. Total employee
commitment can only be obtained after fear has been driven from the workplace, when empowerment has
occurred, and management has provided the proper environment. High-performance work systems integrate
continuous improvement efforts with normal business operations. Self-managed work teams are one form of
empowerment.

Process-centered. A fundamental part of TQM is a focus on process thinking. A process is a series of steps that
take inputs from suppliers (internal or external) and transforms them into outputs that are delivered to
customers (again, either internal or external). The steps required to carry out the process are defined, and
performance measures are continuously monitored in order to detect unexpected variation.

Integrated system. Although an organization may consist of many different functional specialties often
organized into vertically structured departments, it is the horizontal processes interconnecting these functions
that are the focus of TQM.
o

Micro-processes add up to larger processes, and all processes aggregate into the business processes
required for defining and implementing strategy. Everyone must understand the vision, mission, and
guiding principles as well as the quality policies, objectives, and critical processes of the
organization. Business performance must be monitored and communicated continuously.

An integrated business system may be modeled after the Baldrige National Quality Program criteria
and/or incorporate the ISO 9000 standards. Every organization has a unique work culture, and it is
virtually impossible to achieve excellence in its products and services unless a good quality culture
has been fostered. Thus, an integrated system connects business improvement elements in an
attempt to continually improve and exceed the expectations of customers, employees, and other
stakeholders.

Strategic and systematic approach. A critical part of the management of quality is the strategic and
systematic approach to achieving an organizations vision, mission, and goals. This process, called strategic
planning or strategic management, includes the formulation of a strategic plan that integrates quality as a core
component.

Continual improvement. A major thrust of TQM is continual process improvement. Continual improvement
drives an organization to be both analytical and creative in finding ways to become more competitive and more
effective at meeting stakeholder expectations.

Fact-based decision making. In order to know how well an organization is performing, data on performance
measures are necessary. TQM requires that an organization continually collect and analyze data in order to
improve decision making accuracy, achieve consensus, and allow prediction based on past history.

Communications. During times of organizational change, as well as part of day-to-day operation, effective
communications plays a large part in maintaining morale and in motivating employees at all levels.
Communications involve strategies, method, and timeliness.

These elements are considered so essential to TQM that many organizations define them, in some format, as a set of core values and principles on which
the organization is to operate.
Excerpted from The Certified Manager of Quality/Organizational Excellence Handbook, pages 291-292.

Check out Implementing Total Quality Management to learn how each of these essential Primary Elements come together to form the foundation of a
successful TQM implementation.

Total Quality Management (TQM) is an enhancement to the traditional way of doing business. It is
a proven technique to guarantee survival in world-class competition. Only by changing the
actions of management will the culture and actions of an entire organization be transformed.
TQM is for the most part common sense. Analyzing the three words, we have
Total

Quality-

Made up of the whole


Degree of excellence a product or service provides.

Management- Act, art, or manner of handling, controlling, directing, etc


Therefore, TQM is the art of managing the whole to achieve excellence. The Golden Rule is a
simple but effective way to explain it: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Basic Concepts of TQM


While there are significant differences among the theorists and their approaches to
implementation, they share basic concepts that are the foundation of TQM.
Continuous Improvement of Quality:
Fundamental to all TQM systems is improving the quality of the products and services provided
by an organization. Such quality improvement results in greater productivity and enhances the
ability of an organization to remain vital, employ people, and serve customers. A focus on
continuous quality improvement helps an organization do things right.
Central Focus on the Customer:
Also central to all TQM is a focus on the customer, the internal and external recipients of an
organizations products. Their needs and desires define quality for the producer whose job it is to
meet or exceed the customers needs and expectations. A focus on customers helps an
organization to do the right things.
Systematic Improvement of Operations:

All work occurs in processes that begin and end somewhere. These work processes account for
80- 85 percent of the quality of work and productivity of employees. Management is responsible
for systems within an organization; therefore, managers, not employees, must shoulder blame
when something goes wrong with the system.
TQM calls for studying work processes quantitatively, using individuals or teams, to find places
that breakdowns or unnecessary complexities occur in processes, and then to identify solutions
that prevent them in the future. Study of work processes helps to reduce costs while ensuring that
quality is built into a service or product since quality cannot be inspected into it at the end of the
processes.
Open Work Environments:
Continuous quality improvement requires an atmosphere for innovation where suggestions for
improvement are solicited and respected and where supervisors and managers are open to
disagreement, conflict, and challenge. Activities for the improvement of work processes,
especially when teams are involved, help to break down barriers that occur between departments
or between supervisors and those supervised.
Long- Term Thinking:
TQM is also characterized by long- term thinking which helps mold the future by understanding
the consequences of current actions. Such thinking requires decision making that is based on
data, both hard and soft, and related to real problems, not symptoms. It requires time. It shies
away from quick fixes arrived at by discussion and intuition. Long- term thinking works best in
organizations where managers plan to stay, and thus have a stake in the consequences of their
decisions.
Development of Human Resources:
Organizations that follow TQM principles are organized to help people do their jobs; they are
seriously committed to employee learning and development. Such development begins with a
thorough orientation to the organization, including its mission, values, and information about
where the job fits into the organization. It involves educating people to perform to the quality
standards of a specific job before requiring them to work independently.

TQM expects managers to respect the ability of well trained employees to know the work they do
better than anyone, and therefore, to be the best at improving it. Human resource development
includes providing the training to learn the communication, quantitative, and team- participation
skills required in an open, quality improvement work environment. Development programs
provide extensive education to help individuals keep up- to- date on their jobs and to prepare
themselves for new responsibilities.
Management Responsibility for TQM Leadership:
Managers need to lead the transformation of the organization to the new culture of continuous
quality improvement. They must accept personal responsibility for continuous quality
improvement and be dedicated to empowering others in the organization to accept personal
responsibility for it, too. This approach taps the collective genius of the organization to identify
and solve problems. The leaders focus is on policy, structure, and systems to sustain continuous
quality improvement. Within this context, quality is the first among equals of the organizations
functions. Quality is at the top of the agenda for every meeting, every communication. The
leaders goal is to help people, things, and machines do a better job; the leaders role is that of
facilitator, catalyst, and coach.
As previously stated, TQM requires a cultural change. The TQM state for typical quality
elements. This change is substantial and will not be accomplished in a short period of time. Small
organizations will be able to make the transformation much faster than large organizations.

Principles Of TQM

1- Be Customer focused: Whatever you do for quality improvement,


remember that ONLY customers determine the level of quality. Whatever you
do to foster quality improvement, training employees, integrating quality
into processes management, ONLY customers determine whether your
efforts were worthwhile.

2-Insure Total Employee Involvement: You must remove fear from work
place, then empower employee... you provide the proper environment.

3- Process Centered: Fundamental part of TQM is to focus on process


thinking.

4- Integrated system: All employee must know the business mission and
vision. An integrated business system may be modeled by MBNQA or ISO
9000

5- Strategic and systematic approach: Strategic plan must integrate


quality as core component.

6- Continual Improvement: Using analytical, quality tools, and creative


thinking to become more efficient and effective.

7- Fact Based Decision Making: Decision making must be ONLY on data,


not personal or situational thinking.

8- Communication: Communication strategy, method and timeliness must


be well defined.
TQM Implementation Approaches
You can't implement just one effective solution for planning and
implementing TQM concepts in all situations. Below we list generic models
for implementing total quality management theory:
1- Train top management on TQM principles.

2- Assess the current: Culture, customer satisfaction, and quality


management system.

3- Top management determines the core values and principles and


communicates them.

4- Develop a TQM master plan based on steps 1,2,3.

5- Identify and prioritize customer needs and determine products or service


to meet those needs.

6- Determine the critical processes that produces those products or services.

7- Create process improvement teams.

8- Managers supports the efforts by planning, training, and providing


resources to the team.

9- Management integrates changes for improvement in daily process


management. After improvements standardization takes place.

10- Evaluate progress against plan and adjust as needed.

11- Provide constant employee awareness and feedback. Establish an


employee reward/ recognition process.

Strategies to develop TQM


1-TQM elements approach: Take key business process and use TQM
Tools to foster improvement. Use quality circles, statistical process control,
taguchi method, and quality function deployment.

2 - The guru approach: Use the guides of one of the leading quality
thinker.

3- Organization model approach: The organization use benchmarking


or MBNQA as model for excellence.

4- Japanese total quality approach: Companies pursue the deming prize


use deming principles
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