Tqm

REPORT ON THE MANUFACTURING SECTOR AND HOW THE IMPLEMENTATION OF TQM HAS AFFECTED ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT

Total Quality Management (TQM)

Total = Quality involves everyone and all activities in the company.

Quality = Conformance to Requirements (Meeting Customer Requirements).

Management = Quality can and must be managed.

TQM = A process for managing quality; it must be a continuous way of life; a philosophy of perpetual improvement in everything we do.

THE NEED for TQM

" The customer is the king" is truer today than ever before. As the quality of life improves, demand for better quality services and products also increases. Customers all over the world now demand that they be assured and satisfied that the product or services for which they are paying will meet their specifications and expectations and will perform as anticipated.

In this changed environment of the economy and the industry driven by the customers, the business is open to competition worldwide. With the transformation of the entire world into a boundary less global village, echoing the new mantra of " World class Product/Services", the factors that contribute to competitiveness - quality, competitive pricing and timely delivery- play a primordial role.

This emphasis on quality in product and services is forcing the industries to adopt internationally recognized and proven quality management systems in their operations to stay in the business. This reminds us to the prediction of J.M. Juran, the quality Guru of the world, who said that business in 21st century shall be decided by " Quality " and industries ignoring this fact shall be wiped out. Internationally, there have been several authoritative studies to compute the cost of non-compliance and they point out that while manufacturing industries that don't adhere to the TQM precepts may lose around 25% on this account alone, the loss by way of cost in the service sector could be as high as 40-50%.

TQM as Large-Scale Systems Change

TQM is at first glance seen primarily as a change in an organization's technology, its way of doing work. In the human services, this means the way clients are processed, the service delivery methods applied to them, and ancillary organizational processes such as paperwork, procurement processes, and other procedures. But TQM is also a change in an organization's culture, its norms, values, and belief systems about how organizations function. And finally, it is a change in an organization's political system: decision making processes and power bases. For substantive change to occur, changes in these three dimensions must be aligned: TQM as a technological change will not be successful unless cultural and political dimensions are attended to as well (Tichey, 1983).

TQM results in a radical change in the culture and the way of work in an organization. A fundamental factor is leadership, including philosophy, style, and behavior. These must be congruent as a leader presents them. Many so-called enlightened leaders of today espouse a participative style, which is not, in fact, practiced to any appreciable degree. Any manager serious about embarking on a culture change such as TQM should reflect seriously on how she or he feels and behaves regarding these factors. For many managers, a personal program of leadership development and TQM training may be a prerequisite to effective functioning as an internal change agent advocating TQM.

Other key considerations have to do with alignment among various organizational systems. For example, human resource systems, including job design, selection processes, compensation and rewards, performance appraisal, and training and development must align with and support the new TQM culture. Less obvious, but no less important, will be changes required in other systems. Information systems will need to be redesigned to measure and track new things such as service quality. Financial management processes may also need attention through the realignment of budgeting and resource allocation systems. Organizational structure and design may become radically different under TQM: layers of management may be reduced and organizational roles will certainly change. In particular, middle management and first line supervisors will be operating in new ways. Instead of acting as monitors, order givers, and agents of control they will serve as boundary managers, coordinators, and servant-leaders who assist workers in getting their jobs done. To deal with fears of layoffs, all employees should be assured that no one will lose employment as a result of TQM changes: jobs may change, perhaps radically, but no one will be laid off. This no layoff principle has been a common one in joint labor/management change processes such as quality of working life projects for many years.

TQM is often proposed based on environmental conditions such as the need to cut costs or demands for increased responsiveness to stakeholders. A manager may also adopt TQM as a way of being seen at the proverbial cutting edge, because it is currently popular. This is not a good motivation to use TQM and will be likely to lead to a cosmetic or superficial application, resulting in failure and disappointment. TQM should be purpose oriented: it should be used because an organization's leaders feel a need to make the organization more effective. It should be driven by results and not be seen as an end in itself. If TQM is introduced without consideration of real organizational needs and conditions, it will be met by skepticism on the part of both managers and workers.

People's Expectations and Perceptions

Many employees and old-timers may see TQM as a fad, remembering past "fads" such as quality circles; management by objectives, and zero based budgeting. As was noted above, TQM must be used not just as a fad or new program, but must be related to key organizational problems, needs, and outcomes.

In another vein, workers may perceive management as concerned only about the product, not staff needs. Management initiatives focused on concerns, such as budget or cost, will have their priorities known by workers, but lose the heart of TQM. Furthermore, staff may see quality as not needing attention: they may believe that their services are already excellent or that quality is a peripheral concern in these days of cutbacks and multi-problem