What if you already have a quality process in place, albeit with results nowhere near what the consultant promised all those months--or years--ago? Has your process taken on a comfortable, low-level life of its own with no apparent hope for improvement? Then what good is advice? How can you possibly overcome the negatives? This column, the first of a two-part set, addresses those questions. We'll focus this month on rethinking efforts so change can be considered. Next month will examine the mechanics necessary to improve a struggling quality process. Both columns will offer ideas on what makes a successful quality pilot, one that prepares a company to operate on a more expansive, but less expensive, scale. Only then can something new and better be put in place. First, though, through informal conversations and formal presentations, do a companywide reality check. An organization's top management must maintain a unified vision of necessary and possible quality measures. This common wisdom includes the following basic points. * Quality is both rational and emotional. Rational efforts stress measurement, while emotional efforts concentrate on rallies and hoopla. A quality process needs a balance of both for a very simple reason: Quality processes depend on people, who are made up of both rational and emotional elements. * Quality won't go away. Despite all the disclaimers and naysaying, quality won't go away because good customers won't let it. In fact, they will punish any organization that tries to pull back by taking their business elsewhere and spreading the word. All of us helped create the quality revolution, and none of us can expect our customers to be indifferent to it. * The four essential reasons for "doing quality" drive every successful enterprise: Quality makes money, makes customers happy, makes employees happy and makes sense ethically. * The concept of quality is not complex. Implementing quality requires constant attention to details, but the average person can easily grasp the concept. * Service to external customers rarely exceeds service to internal customers. Concentrating quality efforts solely on front-line people will prove counterproductive. If employees aren't treated respectfully by an organization--if they don't receive quality service themselves--they won't treat their customers consistently well, either. That's true no matter how many smile classes they've sat through. * A quality effort should ask, "Who can we afford to exclude from our improvement?" The answer is, of course, no one. Unfortunately, most quality efforts ask instead, "Who should we include in the effort?" Down that path lies underachievement on a grand scale. Only 100-percent employee involvement offers the greatest success. * Companies must consistently pursue quality. Simply announcing, "We are a quality company" and making that part of an advertising campaign won't create a quality organization. Quality by proclamation doesn't work. * Executives must realize that their personnel departments hire adults--and they deserve to be trusted. Unless and until individuals demonstrate they aren't worthy of the trust, they should continue to take responsibility for their own work. * Each organization's quality effort differs in its details. A one-size-fits-all process doesn't exist, even though quality principles can be universally adopted. A company must adapt specific techniques, incorporating the best and most appropriate principles from others' efforts. A 100-percent employee participation level should be adopted upfront; exact techniques will vary. That's why hiring an outside consultant on a long-term basis invariably wastes money. * It shouldn't take forever to see results. The elapsed time between concluding a two-day quality workshop for senior executives and implementing an effective quality management system with 100-percent employee involvement should take six to eight months for an organization of 3,000 employees or fewer. Next month: Ideas on how to make that six- to eight-month transition from the current pilot program to a process with all the elements necessary for a complete quality management system. About the authors Pat Townsend and Joan Gebhardt have written more than 200 articles and four books: Commit to Quality (John Wiley & Sons, 1986); Quality in Action: 93 Lessons in Leadership, Participation, and Measurement (John Wiley & Sons, 1992); Five-Star Leadership: The Art and Strategy of Creating Leaders at Every Level (John Wiley & Sons, 1997); and Recognition, Gratitude & Celebration (Crisp Publications, 1997). E-mail them at ptownsend@qualitydigest.com. |
