Ishikawa

Quality can be greatly affected internally within an organization. Considering that internal factors can be monitored and controlled mainly from within, it is considerably easier to manage, though these factors have a much more direct and immediate effect on the organization where the management responsibility lies. Internal contributors that factor into quality outcomes include leadership styles, administrative policies, and organizational culture. These factors, if not performed to standard or with minimal empathy can cause stress among staff indirectly affecting the consumers. An unpleasant environment may lead to a low morale and dissatisfaction throughout the organization. (Suchman, A., 2001)

Concerning the quality of education offered and the employee’s needs to be an active participant in the quality improvement process, and thus they should feel that they are responsible for the quality provided. This implies that the employees should be encouraged to make suggestions that are geared towards improving the quality offered through airing their opinions without fearing the unknown circumstances that may arise such as reprisal. Moreover, there is the need for a systematic procedure that will help to will not only help to involve the workers but also will be keen towards soliciting their input. This is because the endeavor to improve the product quality is far much better compared to the cost of poor quality which exceeds the cost of attaining the best quality.

Given the highly competitive nature of today’s markets we as a company must provide high quality products to survive. Quality itself has become a major competitive factor and in many ways is a contributing factor in success or failure. The intent of this memo is to identify, explain and evaluate the three types of cost associated with quality.

As the Operation and Production Department we strive for excellence by providing superior quality products in an efficient manner in order to guarantee customer satisfaction.

I am familiar with the first three measures because of my exposure in a multi-national corporation that incorporates the standards set by Japan hence I was involve in collaborating with key individuals with respect to ensuring a laborious process of quality improvement especially with the exportation of the produce. The case studies she presented on Baylor Health Care System as well as identifying the initiatives of Florida Hospital has allowed an illumination of the issues as hand as well as learning from the theories that they have applied that made the organization to this date fluid and competitive despite the many challenges. Albeit not being able to see her present the concept in class, she has in one way or the other involved me, the audience in the presentation that has steadily kept my attention all

Project Quality Management| -Cost Benefit Analysis -Cost of Quality -Control Charts -Benchmarking -Design of Experiments -Statistical Sampling -Flowcharting -Proprietary quality manage- ment methodologies -Additional quality planning tools (Brainstorming, Affinity Diagrams, Nominal Group Technique)| -Cost benefit: Looking at how much your quality activities will cost. -Benchmarking: means using the results of quality planning on other projects to set goals for your own. -Design of experiments: is the list of all the kinds of tests you are going to run on your product. -Total Quality Management (TQM): Everyone in the company is responsible for quality and is able to make a difference -Continuous Improvement (Kaizen): constant process improvement in the form of small changes -Just-In-Time(JIT) -ISO 9000: Companies document what they do and they do what they document

The evolution of quality management first evolved through the works of six philosophers; Shewhart (1924), Feigenbaum (1951), Crosby (1979), Ishikawa (1972), Deming (1982), and Juran (1986). Shewhart was most known for his invention the control chart. Feigenbaum is known for having introduced the concept of total quality control. Ishikawa best known for associating quality circles as a way to achieve continuous improvement and using cause and effect diagrams to solve problems. Crosby is known for defining the 14 steps for quality improvement and introducing the plan-do-check-action cycle. Juran is best known for identifying the three basic functions of the quality management process: quality planning, quality control, and quality improvement.

Yasin and Alavi (1999) conducted a quantitative study to determine if Total Quality Management (TQM) can produce quality improvement

The President Ralph Larsen has realized that Wengart has some major problems with the quality however he is focusing on the profitability instead of the longevity of the company. He needs to have the team focus on improving the quality problem or the company’s profits will continue to decrease. Larsen in the effort to improve the quality has decided to seek out help from an OD practitioner who suggests to Ralph to implement Top Quality Management (TQM). Larsen feels that this should be easy to implement and hands it off to Kent Kelly the Vice President. He feels that the TQM program was a matter of common sense (Brown, 2011, p. 365).

Ishikawa was constantly mindful of the significance of top administration help, the kind of help from the top management is a key component in Japan's all-enveloping quality technique that Dr. Ishikawa named, "broad quality control", Dr. Ishikawa has worked with all top management and the lower management and including the whole administration team to teach quality control to secure they were able to give the best customer service as possible to their customers, and in the late 50's and in the early 60's, he created quality control courses for executives and for top directors, he additionally helped launch the Annual Quality Control Conference for top administration in 1963. As a part of the panel for the Deming Prize, Dr. Ishikawa created the thorough review framework that figures out if organizations meet all requirements for the prize, that review requires the interest of the organization's top executives, as stated by Dr. Ishikawa, that animated obvious support as opposed to the praise that runs with the prize is the greatest profit a champ gets.

Within every company there is a customer, regardless of what your line of business is it is being done for the consumer albeit an external consumer or the internal consumer. The customer’s needs and expectations should be the driving force behind the decisions we make and the problems we solve…the customer, not our own personal or monetary gain. As quality improves we have to make sure that we are improving what matters to our customers not want we want to improve upon for own sake.

Edward Deming is regarded as one of the pioneers in Quality. His contribution to the field was instrumental in forming a basis for the principles in quality that are followed worldwide even today. Deming suggested 14 points that help to shape a quality culture in a company. In this article, the writer, Kosaku Yoshida, focuses on how Deming’s 14 points resonate with Japanese business practices. He also talks about how these practices all share common underlying principles of holistic learning, cooperation and desirability.

Our company should make sure that manufacturers deliver products with the highest design specification, in order to be order-winner quality conformance, by delivering products with no defects (Hill and Hill, 2012). Furthermore, improvements in quality lead to a decrease in cost for the company. According to (Evans, 1997) higher quality products lead to a decrease in costs for the company through higher productivity: ‘improvements in quality leads to lower cost because of less re-work, fewer mistakes, fewer delays and snags’ (Evans 1997, P.55).

Even though Deming, Juran, and Crosby all have similarities between their key principles in quality management there are several aspects that are different to the approaches. They all recognize the importance of measurement to improve quality; however, the level of importance each emphasizes is different. Crosby and Juran view the cost of quality as the focus of measurement whereas Deming does not use the cost of quality as a focus (Suarez, 1992, p.18). To Deming, meeting the customers’ needs and expectations about a product or service is of higher importance to quality. He also considers unknown costs such as the impact of lost customers to be more significant than visible costs (Suarez, 1992, p.18).

Quality is never an accident it is always the results of high intention, sincere efforts, intelligent directions and skillful execution, it represents the wise choice of many alternatives.