Total Quality Management Paper
Total Quality Management Paper
Producing a quality product, whether a tangible item or a service, is the goal of all organizations, how this goal is achieved will be the challenge. Quality of the end product has been an obstacle in America for decades. In the post World War II era as production of products in America rose, the quality of those products diminished. At the same time other countries such as Japan were not experiencing the same quality issues.
The secret to successful quality control was in the method of product management the Japanese were using. The Japanese organizations used an approach, which motivated all employees and organizational functions to provide a consistently high quality product. America took some time in developing the same dedication to quality control. The slow response of American businesses was due to the initial excuse making phase, and the inability to clearly define what Total Quality Management (TQM) meant.
Until 1990 there was not a clear definition of what Total Quality Management (TQM) truly meant. In an effort to provide a single definition that would include the entire process of TQM the SEMATECH (Semiconductor Manufacturing Technology Consortium), developed a definition that cannot be challenged. The definition is represented as, "Total Quality Management is a business management methodology that aligns the activities of all employees in an organization with the common focus of customer satisfaction through continuous improvement in the quality of all activities, goods, and services", (Burrill & Ledolter, 1999).
The American Society for Quality (ASQ) has established another definition of TQM as a "term first coined by the Naval Air Command to describe the Japanese style of management to quality improvement" (AQS, 2006). A simplistic view of TQM is, "a management approach to long-term success through customer satisfaction, based upon the participation of all members of an organization in improving processes,
Producing a quality product, whether a tangible item or a service, is the goal of all organizations, how this goal is achieved will be the challenge. Quality of the end product has been an obstacle in America for decades. In the post World War II era as production of products in America rose, the quality of those products diminished. At the same time other countries such as Japan were not experiencing the same quality issues.
The secret to successful quality control was in the method of product management the Japanese were using. The Japanese organizations used an approach, which motivated all employees and organizational functions to provide a consistently high quality product. America took some time in developing the same dedication to quality control. The slow response of American businesses was due to the initial excuse making phase, and the inability to clearly define what Total Quality Management (TQM) meant.
Until 1990 there was not a clear definition of what Total Quality Management (TQM) truly meant. In an effort to provide a single definition that would include the entire process of TQM the SEMATECH (Semiconductor Manufacturing Technology Consortium), developed a definition that cannot be challenged. The definition is represented as, "Total Quality Management is a business management methodology that aligns the activities of all employees in an organization with the common focus of customer satisfaction through continuous improvement in the quality of all activities, goods, and services", (Burrill & Ledolter, 1999).
The American Society for Quality (ASQ) has established another definition of TQM as a "term first coined by the Naval Air Command to describe the Japanese style of management to quality improvement" (AQS, 2006). A simplistic view of TQM is, "a management approach to long-term success through customer satisfaction, based upon the participation of all members of an organization in improving processes,
References: American Society for Quality. Total Quality Management. Retrieved January 2, 2008 from http://www.asq.org. Burrill, C.W., & Ledolter, J. Achieving Quality Through Continual Improvement. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 1999. New York, NY. International Organization of Standardization. Quality Management Principles. Retrieved January 2, 2008 from http://www.iso.org.