Implementation of Total Quality Management

A Comprehensive Training Program

Erdener Kaynak, Rolf E Rogers

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781317952435
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

Here is a comprehensive guide for training a workforce in Total Quality Management (TQM). An ideal resource for trainers, Total Quality Management Implementation contains a complete presentation of all relevant aspects of TQM. It provides a ready-made training format that can be used in all operational seminar/workshop contexts and includes a full set of charts for use by trainers in their presentations of TQM. The book assumes the trainer has a basic understanding of quality management, and it does not repeat the numerous discussions of TQM concepts readily available in other works.Total Quality Management Implementation begins with an overview of the current status of TQM in the United States. It then presents W. Edward Deming's 14 point TQM philosophy, the core of his recommendations for achieving quality excellence through continuous improvement, along with a discussion of each point. The presentation charts have been designed to allow the trainer to adapt them to a particular organization's unique characteristics and to supplement or add to them as necessary to fully explain each point to a particular audience. The charts are arranged in sequential order and follow the approach used by the author in training seminars around the world. Trainers can easily manipulate the length of the presentation for different audiences and purposes. A reference section lists many books on TQM principles which provide a helpful refresher.Total Quality Management Implementation is a unique and helpful guide for trainers with a basic knowledge of TQM, college or university faculty teaching TQM seminars or courses, and consultants and quality professionals who could use a reference and checklist of TQM principles.

Chapter One

TQM in America—A Review

INTRODUCTION

The legendary American quality consultant W. Edwards Deming, to whom the Japanese give credit for much of their success, was asked in a 1990 Wall Street Journal interview about the future of the American workplace. His answer: “What future?”¹

Deming may or may not be a pessimist. In the last two years Japan has surpassed the United States manufacturing industry in productivity (output-per-man-hour). Japan’s overhead as a percent of manufacturing cost remains the lowest of all industrialized nations. Japan’s manufacturing overhead is nearly one-half that of the United States. Germany’s overhead averages two-thirds that of the United States.²

These are just a few of the many reasons why America’s manufacturing industry is finally waking up to the fact that their current managing techniques must change. Many American companies are starting to implement quality improvement programs as a way to ensure global competitiveness in the future.

It is no longer a matter of producing just “good” products and to compete only with American companies. To compete globally, our firms must produce quality products, using refined processes, managed by quality-conscious managers with quality principles. Increasing the focus on quality requires a long-term commitment and attention to detail. The result is a company that will be more responsive to customer’s requirements, better able to sustain market share, and that will become more profitable.

The following text presents examples of how some American companies in both the manufacturing and service industries are currently implementing quality-improvement programs. Using Deming’s 14 points as a prescription and incorporating more frequent use of workteams and flexible production throughout the company, remarkable results can be achieved. (See Chapter Two.)

MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY

One quality implementation principle professed by W. E. Deming—his point number nine—is the need to break down barriers between staff and departmental employees. The objective is to integrate all departments of the firm. Barriers impede the smooth flow of processes. Defects and costs increase, and the customers (internal and external) are usually the ones to suffer.³

• This breakdown in barriers was one of the many techniques implemented by 3M in its St. Paul, Minnesota plant which helped to increase their profits. This same 3M plant also cut waste by 64 percent, customer’s complaints by 90 percent, and increased production by 57 percent.

• Kodak has a quality program which enabled the company in one case to cut the defects in the plastic tips for its blood-analysis machines from 2,700 per million ten years ago to just two of the 600 million produced in the last four years.

• R. Heinz’ Fremont plant implemented a quality program and with additional automation has received huge results in correcting the consistency of flavor and color in their catsup.⁴

Another positive technique to add to the quality-improvement program is that of workteams, both interdepartmental and intra-departmental. Communication throughout the company can be enhanced, resulting in process improvement. More important, however, is the fact that workteams are better able to break through creative blocks and achieve quality objectives at a faster rate with the company’s best interest in mind. By empowering all workers and workteams to make decisions, not only can a firm eliminate unneeded middle managers and supervisors, but there is also the benefit of improved worker moral that results from the participation. This translates into more attention paid to the process, which yields more quality, increased production at less cost, and in turn, higher profits.

• Colgate-Palmolive Company’s Hill Pet Products Inc. reduced cost and increased sales using flexible production and workteams at its Richmond, Indiana plant.⁵

With management and workers paying attention to quality at all levels of the production process, there is less need for quality inspection (control) at the final production steps. This is the essence of TQM. The seeds of quality are planted at the beginning of a product’s life cycle and nurtured throughout the life span. Using this mind-set and employing necessary disciplines, a firm can better produce products that will compete in global markets.

AUTO INDUSTRY

Our nation’s largest manufacturing employer, the auto industry, has been working to make improvements in the quality of its products over the last ten years. As is the case for companies in all industries, the total quality commitment must be incorporated into each firm’s culture and ideology. The company must spread that obsession with total quality by making every manager, employee, supplier, distributor, and customer aware of the central position of quality in the product or service. Deming’s point number one states, “Create a constancy of purpose for improvement of product and service.”⁶ The firm reiterates this commitment in its mission statement, short-term goals and strategies, and also with its long-term strategic goals and objectives. It is essential that top management make a total quality commitment.

• In 1980 Ford, GM, and Chrysler produced cars with three times the defect rate of Japanese cars. Defects here are defined as problems in the car’s first 90 days out of the showroom. By 1990 they reduced this figure to reflect only 25 percent more defects than Japan.⁷

Cadillac Motor Division made dramatic reductions in their number of defects. This was undoubtedly one of the major reasons for winning the Commerce Department’s Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award in 1990.

• According to J. D. Powers and Associates, the California Market Researchers, the average car produced by the Big Three automakers has a 1.5 (per 1000) defect rate. That is down from a rate of 7 per 100 in 1981. Japan comes in with a 1.1 defect rate. In 1991 Ford Motor Company models actually averaged fewer defects than the Nissans, Mazdas, and Mitsubishis, but still lagged behind Japan’s leaders Toyota and Honda.⁸

Teamwork in the Auto Industry

The auto industry, like other manufacturing industries, is using the team approach. Teams get involved in problem detection as well as making the decisions necessary to solve the problems and/or improve production processes.

There is a basic six-step problem-solving technique that can be adopted by worker teams:

1. Identify the problem and set a goal.

2. Analyze the problem.

3. Come up with as many potential solutions as possible.

4. Select what seems to be the best solution.

5. Implement the solution.

6. Try the solution for seven weeks. If it works, the problem is solved. If problems remain, go back to step 1.

• By adopting these exact techniques, GM turned its worst manufacturing plant in Buick City, Flint, Michigan, into its best. This plant makes the top-rated cars for quality of any U.S. manufacturer.⁹

• Teams of assemblers at Cadillac’s Hamtramck plant in Michigan identified 300 problem areas on the 1992 Cadillac Seville. Teams of assemblers on one problem solution assignment were able to eliminate seven pounds of wiring.¹⁰

Simplicity

The Big Three are getting results in many ways. One is by just simplifying the operations at most plants. They use just-in-time systems, concurrent engineering, and thin-out technology-crammed operations to achieve the goal of creating lean and smooth-running processing plants. Simpler procedures leave less room for error.

A prime goal in all manufacturing plants is to reduce the cycle-time, or total time to produce one unit of a product.

• A team of metal-stamp press operators at GM’s Grand Blanc, Michigan plant were able to cut the time it took to change the dies on certain presses from twelve hours to four and one-half minutes. This implementation also led to cost cuts by reducing inventory levels.¹¹

The lack of concurrent engineering systems has perhaps been the American auto industry’s costliest oversight problem. Using Deming’s point number nine, “breaking down the barriers among departments” can result in numerous benefits for manufacturers.

The Japanese have been involved in concurrent engineering for 40 years. In concurrent engineering a team is developed from members of the supplier’s marketers, engineers, and assemblers. This team gets involved in the project from the start, and by working together is able to save production time which in turn lowers cost.

The designs for manufacturing technique simplifies designs which in turn simplifies production. Quality design is the key to cutting product costs. While the cost of design represents only 5 percent of the average manufactured product’s total cost, it affects 70 percent of total costs.

Design affects the material that may be used, the amount of labor needed for assembly, the complexity o...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• CONTENTS
• Preface
• Chapter One: TQM in America–A Review
• Chapter Two: Deming’s 14 Points for TQM Implementation
• Chapter Three: TQM–Basic Concepts
• Chapter Four: Planned Organizational Change
• Chapter Five: A Management Structure for TQM
• Chapter Six: TQM Education and Training
• Chapter Seven: Organization Assessment
• Chapter Eight: TQM Implementation Guidelines
• Chapter Nine: A Total Quality Management Process Improvement Model
• Suggested Books and Monographs
• Selected Quality Management Journals
• Index