Total Quality Management: Cut the Slack, Earn Employee Respect
Total Quality Management: Cut the Slack, Earn Employee Respect
Total Quality Management: Cut the Slack, Earn Employee Respect.
The operations of a business will help determine how efficiently a product reaches a consumer. That is a big focus for many companies, reducing the overall processing time of a supply chain. Many small businesses work on this, yet approach this unsuccessfully. Could it be possible that too many business owners are focussing their energy in the wrong direction? Forcing to improve technicalities, yet not contemplating on the key building blocks, the foundation of a company. Creating synergy that holds it together. It is important to illustrate the concept of Total Quality Management to every business, and explain how implementing this system can have positive long term effects.
Total Quality Management involves emphasizing on the quality of a product at every workstation. This means when any product is on a conveyor belt, and has to go to its next stage, both stages need to checked for quality. It could be a situation where a cap is being placed on a perfume bottle. A quality check needs to take place wherever possible. When a wrapper is being placed on a water bottle, the same check needs to happen. In other words, these quality checks have to happen every step of the way. There are two key questions here, how will it work? And what will a company get out of this? Lets explore this.
General workers have specific lines of work, you can have someone who is there to pull a lever when needed. A labourer could also be there to attach a component, there are many different examples of general labour work. When thinking about this, it is crucial to think about improving each task in the best way possible. However, its also important to think about the worker. How can the station be improved so that the worker feels involved with the team. While doing so, improving efficiency in the business cycle.
It was mentioned earlier that employees should receive satisfaction, it was also mentioned that quality should be focussed upon. Total quality management is the discovery of putting these two aspects together, and when this does occur, there is a great chance for increasing returns to scale. How can this be achieved? Well, if you have a worker, and you want to do a quality check, then why not train the labourer to do this? Training the worker to take samples for statistic scores, and use these statistics to create a data set. The data set can help determine if the product meets proper expectations. Empirical analysis will be needed in this process. When quality checks are done at every station, how does the worker benefit? Its simple, the worker is gaining more experience and there is bigger responsibility. There is a certain sense of satisfaction in this for the worker, and he or she is aware this would open new doors for him in the future.
When looking at the benefits, we have understood that there is the opportunity to improve worker self-esteem. We have also recognized that its important to have many different quality checks. But how does having more quality checks help? Increasing the frequency for inspections will allow less room for errors. Errors that can be avoided. This will happen when correct predictions are made. Statistics will be your information to support these predictions. Investing in the capability to produce this data will improve the quality of the company's inventory. So how does this lead to profit maximization? When there is improvement in the product, and high self-esteem in workers, the company will pull together using the natural force of synergy. There will be a certain sense of motivation for everyone in the company to do well, there will be a common purpose. This common purpose will blend with high quality tested products. When this is the case, customers will be happy. Customers will also refer the business to their friends and families.
Investment will be needed to improve the business structure. In fact, a lot of adjustments would need to be made. Employees will need time to get used to the new system. However, major companies like Dell and Ford took the initiative to research in Japan, and bring this concept to North America. Total Quality proves to be a costly investment in the short run, yet also an achievement that brings long term growth.
Written by Basim Mirza Sources Used: N. Gathier, G. Frazier. Operations Management (Ed 9). Thomson. Ohio, 2002. P. Callaghan. Acadia University. Class Lecture (Spring 2009).
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