Total Quality Management

Total quality management is an intensive long-term effort to transform all parts of the organization in order to produce the best product and service possible to meet  customer  needs.  TQM  is  a  business management  philosophy,  which  recognizes  that customer needs and business goals are inseparable.TQM is an intensive, long-term effort directed at creation and maintenance of high standard of product quality and services expected by customers. As such, it can operate as a major influence in developing the culture and processes of the organization. The object is significantly  to  increase  the  awareness  of  all employees that quality is vital to the organization’s success and their future. The business must be transformed into an entity that exists to deliver value to customers by satisfying their needs.

Elements of TQM

• Commitment and leadership of senior management.
• Focus on the customer.
• Planning and organization
• Prevention rather than detection of defects.
• Quality measurement 
• Using quality management tools and techniques.
• Bench marking
• Education and training.
• Involvement----workers participation in management.
• Synergy of teams
• Quality measurement and feedback.

Need & Importance/ Advantages of TQM

• Improving customer satisfaction
• Enhancing quality
• Reduction in waste
• Reduction in inventory
• Improving productivity
• Reducing product development time.
• Flexibility
• Motivates human resource
• Enhances competitiveness.

The Six Steps to TQM

1. Demonstrate top management commitment
2. Establish the current state of quality
3. Determine the quality strategies
4. Educate management in TQM
5. Raise quality awareness everywhere 
6. Institute never-ending improvement

Quality Circles

Quality circle is technique for improving quality based on Japanese  quality  control  method.  Quality  circle  is  the management style that involves workers in quality analysis and quality improvement. The concept of this is originated in Japan in the early 1960.
Quality circle is a voluntary group of workers who have a shared area of responsibility. They meet together weekly to discuss, analyze and propose solutions to quality problems. They  are  taught  group  communication  process,  quality strategies and measurement and problem-analysis technique. They  are  encouraged  to  draw  on the  resources  of the company’s management and technical personnel to help them to solve problems. In fact they take responsibility for solve quality problems and they generate and evaluate their own feedback. In this way they are also responsible for quality of communication. The supervisor becomes the leader in the circle and is trained to work as a group member and not as a boss.
In short, Quality Circle is a small group of employees doing the similar work, voluntarily meet for an hour each week to discuss their quality problems, investigate causes, recommend solutions and take corrective actions.

Steps in Quality Circle

1. Identification of problems
2. Prioritization
3. Discussion and investigation
4. Solution
5. Action if authorized
6. Presentation to manager
7. Decision and implementation

KAIZEN   ( P-D-C-A ) 

Kaizen is a form of quality circle based on the cycle of planning, doing, checking and actioning.
The concept of continuous improvement is based on the assumption that continually striving to reach higher and higher standard in every part of organization will provide a series of incremental gains that will build a superior performance. In Japan, this process is called KAIZEN, kai means change and zen means good or for better i.e. change for better.

KAIZEN Principles

• Focus on customer
• Make improvement continuously
• Acknowledge problems openly
• Promote openness
• Create work team
• Manage projects through cross-functional teams
• Maintain right relationship process
• Develop self-discipline
• Inform every employee.
• Enable every employee.

Quality Control

Quality control is the continuing process of evaluating performance, comparing the performance with the laid down standard and taking corrective action when necessary.

Two types of quality control

1. On-line quality control-----during the production cycle of a product.
2.  Off-line quality control-----conducting externally to the production process i.e. improving the product design, control on incoming materials and special process studies.

Objectives of Quality Control

• To assess the quality at various stages of the production process.
• It helps in ensuring that production process operates by desired standards.
• To increase the standard of the goods.
• To reduce the cost of inspection.
• To minimize the waste.
• Customer satisfaction.

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