TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT : CUSTOMER FOCUS

Total Quality Management is defined as a strategy for improving business performance through
the commitment and involvement of all employees to fully satisfying agreed customer
requirements, at the optimum overall costs, through the continuous improvement of the
products and services, business processes and people involved.

The concept of Total Quality Management can be expressed as “Achieving success through
delighting the customers”. Customers here may include the internal user, the external
customer or end-user, together with the other stakeholders, i.e.

 shareholders
 employees
 suppliers

Every effort in organization must lead to satisfy customer needs as in a competitive

environment the satisfying of customer's needs is not only the main condition for the survival
of any organization but also a prerequisite for long-term success. Characteristics of a successful
business are given by the ability to consistently exceed the expectations of customers. To meet
the expectations of customers only means to satisfy them, to overcome their expectations
means to please them. Many of toady's customers want the highest quality, additional services,
great user convenience, individual adjustment, the possibility of returning unsatisfactory goods,
warranty and all these for the lowest price.

Customer satisfaction refers to a situation where the customer's needs are met in a manner
that is way beyond his specifications. It implies that a company or organization has got to go an
extra mile to please the customer. In any competitive market customer satisfaction is a key
differentiator and is a crucial component of business strategy.

Principles of Customer Focus:

Customer focus is one of the fundamental principles of quality management on these principles
are based international standards for quality management systems but also the concept of
Total Quality Management . The realization of this principle means that "the organizations
depend on their customers and therefore should understand their current and future needs,
should meet customers' requirements and strive to exceed their expectations."

The standards strongly encourage focus on defining the needs of all stakeholders, who are
internal customers, agents, external customers and end-users.

Quality for customer satisfaction means:

 Using customer’s perspective

 Meeting or exceeding customer expectations
 Anticipating future needs of the customer

DETERMINANTS OF CUSTOMER SATISFACTION

Key Indicators for Physical Products

 Reliability
 Aesthetics
 Adaptability
 Usability
 Functionality
 Appropriateness
Applying the principle of customer focus in the organization leads to the following activities:

--Examining and understanding the needs and requirements of customers

--Harmonizing the goals of organization with the requirements and expectations of customers
--Customer satisfaction measurement and action on the basis of the results
--Systematically management of relationship with customers
--Ensuring a balanced relationship between customers and participated sides (owners,
employees, suppliers, region)

Customer's orientation is the first level of programming quality. It focuses on knowing the
customer, his requirements and understanding these requirements. Customer orientation,
therefore, begins by clarifying customer requirements, assessing the current level of processes
with regard to these requirements, by assessment of planning steps to meet customer
requirements and ends with creating action plan which contains a definition of the individual
time steps aimed at improving of processes. To meet the needs and expectations of customers
and end-user management of the organization has to:

--understand the needs and expectations of their customers, including potential customers,
--identify the key characteristics of product for their customers and end users,
--identify and assess the competition on the market,
--identify the market opportunities, weaknesses and future competitive advantages.

TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT : WORKFORCE FOCUS

Workforce engagement refers as in which people are motivated to do their utmost for the
benefits of their customers and for the success of the organization. Motivation is an art of
creating conditions that allow every one done their work at peak level of efficiency. The
Objective of an effective workforce management system is to build a high performance work
place for quality excellence

Workforce Management:

Giving people authority to make decisions based on what they feel is right, as a leader you
should sincerely belief and trust in your own people. Provide education, resource and
encouragement remove restrictive policies foster the atmosphere of trust , share information
freely, train hand on tasks

Engaging the Workforce in Process: Skills for Team Leaders

1.Conflict Management and resolution

2.Team management

3. Leaderships skills

4. Decision making

5.Communication

6.Negotiation

7.Cross cultural training

The workforce focus investigates the effectiveness of an organization in terms of its use,
development and management of the workforce in order to fulfill their potential and create a
TQM product. The workforce environment can encompass a variety of factors such as the
structure of work, the physical environment, and services and rights available to employees.
The workforce environment in TQM encourages the need for employee fulfillment in their job.

It is often argued that a positive impact on customer satisfaction can be achieved by treating
employees as internal customers and can often result in greater loyalty. It is further argued that
it is imperative to establish a high degree of employee well-being and satisfaction in order to
establish effectiveness within the organization. The Baldrige Award encourages employee
engagement advocates for greater employee autonomy and skill variety. The major methods to
establish employee empowerment requires an organization to focus on open communication,
team orientation and cooperation.

TQM WORKFORCE FACTORS

A significant portion of the TQM philosophy focuses on the human resource environment. TQM
implementation relies heavily on the brawn and brain of front-line workers. Workers set the
pace for quality within a TQM system. Thus, it is imperative that employees are treated in such
a manner that they can become involved and enact the tools of quality. Therefore, in the
following paragraphs we present arguments to describe the relationships of TQM workforce
factors.

EMPLOYEE INVOLVEMENT

Employee involvement can take on a number of varieties, such as:

(1) downward communications, including EI practices such as a house journal/company

newspaper, employee report and regular briefing session,

(2) upward problem solving, such as suggestions schemes, attitude surveys, quality circles, and
total quality/customer care programs

(3) financial EI, including profit sharing, employee share ownership, and value-added or
establishment-wide bonus arrangements, and
(4) representative participation, such as joint consultative committees/advisory councils and
collective bargaining. Therefore, it is apparent that EI efforts cover a broad spectrum of
employee issues and as such may be critical not only to productivity but also employee
attitudes regarding the organization.

TEAMWORK

A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a
common purpose, set of performance goals, and they are mutually accountable

Types of TEAMS:

 Management Teams
 Natural work teams
 Self manage teams
 Virtual Teams
 Quality circles
 Project Teams