newsdigest


Registrar Forced to Change Ads
ISO 9000 Grows Globally
Four Companies Win 1996 Baldrige Award
Geon's In Control
Conference Attendees Say "No" to OH&S Standard
Employees Want More Quality Time
Which Directive Do You Choose?
Understand Those Critical Incidents
Four Steps for Peer Coaching
ISO 14001 Aspects and Impacts
Women Manage Better Than Men

Registrar Forced to Change Ads

One of the world's largest registrars, BSI Quality Assurance, got the word this September that it must amend its latest series of U.K. advertisements to avoid the implication that, in BSI's words, ISO 9000 certification would "almost always" bring about improved productivity, efficiency and profitability, according to the Advertising Standards Authority.

The ASA's adjudication was the result of a complaint lodged with the U.K.'s advertising watchdog group by John Seddon of Vanguard Consulting, a U.K. management consulting firm, and others. Although BSI provided independent research information that supported the ad's claims, the ASA ruled that it was not possible to support those claims when applied to small companies. Therefore, the advertisement would have to avoid that implication. The ruling affects only U.K. advertising.

Putting a positive spin on the ruling, a BSI spokesperson said that the company welcomed the "minor clarification offered by the ASA adjudication." BSI will change a phrase in the advertisement regarding ISO 9000 registration from "It improves productivity" to "It can improve productivity," according to BSI. The judgment also asks BSI to make it clear that small companies may not find registration beneficial. BSI agreed to take this into account.

Vanguard first complained to the ASA in March. "I firmly believe ISO 9000 registration to cause suboptimization of performance; it cannot be claimed to improve productivity," says Seddon, an occupational psychologist and long-time opponent of ISO 9000. Seddon has published a study which claims that ISO 9000 does not improve productivity, even in those companies claiming success with the standards.

Although the ASA's judgment could be seen as minor, Reg Blake, BSI's North American director of sales and marketing, fears that some may construe ASA's judgment as implying that there are no productivity gains with ISO 9000. "And that simply is not the case," says Blake. "There are enough companies which demonstrate that you can improve productivity."

At the same time BSI was fighting off Seddon's attack, one of BSI's competitors, National Quality Assurance, also complained to the ASA disputing BSI's claims in the same ad that "BSI 'wrote the book' when they published BS 5750" (a forerunner to ISO 9000) and the ad's implications that BSI registration was of greater value than that of any other accredited certification body. The ASA ruled in favor of BSI in both cases.

ISO 9000 Grows Globally

At least 127,389 ISO 9000 certificates have been awarded in 99 countries worldwide-an increase of 34 percent from the March 1995 total. The United Kingdom and Europe continue to lead the world in the number of certificates, with the United Kingdom holding 41.3 percent of all certificates and the rest of Europe with 31.4 percent.

Source: John Symonds, Mobil Europe Ltd., London, telephone 44-171-412-4897 or fax 44-171-412-2549.

Four Companies Win 1996 Baldrige Award

resident Clinton and Commerce Secretary Mickey Kantor have announced the winners of the 1996 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. The awards are presented in recognition of a company's achievements in quality and business performance. This year's winners are:
ADAC Laboratories of Milpitas, California (manufacturing category)
Dana Commercial Credit Corp. of Toledo, Ohio (service category)
Custom Research Inc. of Minneapolis (small business category)
Trident Precision Manufacturing Inc. of Webster, New York (small business category)

The Baldrige Award is presented each year to a maximum of two companies in each of three categories: manufacturing, service and small business. Awards are presented only to companies that meet the stringent award criteria. Not since 1992 have awards been presented in all three categories.

Read next month's "News Digest" for a more detailed report on this years' Baldrige Award winners.
http://www.quality.nist.gov

Geon's In Control

Geon, a $1.2 billion maker of polyvinyl chloride compounds and resins, makes sure that all employees keep top-notch customer service and product quality as their main goals. "Consistency" teams play an important role in attaining that goal.

"In the plastics industry, it's sometimes hard to test the product and predict how well it will perform for our customer," explains Barry Hendrix, director of quality and operations planning for the Cleveland-based company. "The main feedback we get from customers is: 'All we want is for your product to be the same every time. We can adjust to it if it is the same.' "

Geon's consistency teams, usually five to six employees, look beyond measuring product properties and instead concentrate on how accurately a process is controlled, thus ensuring product consistency. Depending on the process to be examined, the teams may be cross-functional or narrowly focused around a set of operators. The most successful teams have been those comprised of plant process people, Hendrix points out.

Consistency teams first determine which processes are out of control, then do a fishbone diagram to identify critical areas and develop control plans to aid process workers to bring a process back under control. The control plan focuses energy on determining why a process is out of control rather than trying to bring a product into specification by changing the recipe, says Hendrix.
Since these teams were put into place, the number of consistently in-control processes has increased by a factor of three, says Hendrix.

"That translates into a better, more consistent product, which will ultimately lead to savings and much more hassle-free service," says Hendrix. "Customers won't complain as much, and employees will know that they are making a top-quality product all the time."


ISO Conference Attendees Say "No" to OH&S Standard ISO

As prophesied by occupational health and safety stakeholders, little support was voiced for an international occupational health and safety management standard at the International Organization for Standardization's Geneva meeting this September.

In general, according to ANSI, opposition arguments included: a lack of existing national or regional OH&S management standards prevents harmonization; there is insufficient experience with ISO 9000 and ISO 14000 to embark on yet another standard; such a standard could conflict with existing national OH&S regulations; and cost-benefit concerns.

Those in favor of the proposed standard argued that it could improve global health and safety, would provide for integration of OH&S into quality management systems and could help start the process of improvement in countries with weak or nonexistent OH&S standards.

ANSI Chairman Lawrence Wills points out that with the big-five ISO members-France, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States-against the idea, there is little chance that it will carry.

Several attendees of the Geneva meeting provided Quality Digest with an unofficial report of how some countries felt about the development of an international OH&S standard.

Australia-Strongly recommended the idea and offered to lead the effort.
Canada-No.
Columbia-Yes, or else they will pursue it at the national level.
Denmark-Yes. Suggested the formation of a strategic advisory group to make recommendations.
Finland-No. Costs too much.
France-No.
Germany-No.
Italy-No. European Union directive 89391 already covers the issue.
Ireland-Yes, but perhaps not yet. Currently drafting a guidance document.
Japan-Not at this time.
Korea-No. Wanted specific standards rather than management standards.
New Zealand-Yes.
Norway-Yes. They already have a draft document that integrates OH&S, environmental and quality standards.
Spain-Qualified yes. They suggested forming an advisory group and are already working on a draft OH&S and environmental standard.
Trinidad and Tobago-Yes.
United Kingdom-No.
United States-Definite no.

Employees Want More Quality Time

For an increasing number of men and women, family, rather than work, comes first. Consequently, an increasing number of quality industries may have to modify their process to keep pace with the growing trend.

Today, employees are more willing to take larger cuts in pay and work hours to spend time with their families than they were almost a decade ago, according to a poll conducted by Robert Half International Inc., a staffing service specializing in accounting, finance and information technology.

The poll revealed that nearly two-thirds of Americans would reduce their hours and compensation in exchange for more "family or personal time."

Which Directive Do You Choose?

If you manufacture electrically operated machinery, you may be wondering whether to use the Machinery Safety Directive, the Low Voltage Directive or both. The answer is: You must comply with the most relevant of the two directives, according to Technology International Inc., a subsidiary of Interference Technology International Ltd., a U.K.-appointed Competent Body. Nonetheless, the legal opinion in the European Union is that while it is the manufacturer's duty to determine if its product presents more of an electrical-safety hazard or a mechanical-safety hazard and to choose the appropriate directive, it must still make an effort to meet the essential safety elements of the other directive.

For more help understanding CE Marking and for free downloads of Windows 95 Helpfiles "Understanding Product Safety" and "Understanding the Medical Devices Directive," visit Technology International's Web site.
http://www.techintl.com

Understand Those Critical Incidents

When preparing a customer-satisfaction questionnaire, understanding the behaviors critical to good customer service is key. Therefore, interviewing customers in order to find "critical incidents" is an important first step, according to NCS, a Minneapolis-based information services company. Critical incidents are examples of positive or negative performance on the part of a service provider as viewed from the customer's perspective.

To locate critical incidents, interview a sample of customers and ask them about positive and negative service experiences with your company. Interviewing 20 customers should provide you with several hundred incidents from which to develop your questions.

Be sure to break down a customer's experience into its component parts. For instance, suppose a customer says that he liked the service he got from an automotive service manager because: "She called to tell me what the problem was and how much it would cost to fix. When I got there, the car was fixed, and I got a detailed description of the charges and the service performed." This indicates at least two positive critical incidents: The service manager called to inform the customer of the problem, and she provided a detailed description of the work performed.

Once you have gathered the critical incidents and edited them to be specific and behavioral, you can turn them into satisfaction items on a customer-satisfaction survey.

Source: "Research Notes," August 1996, National Computer Systems Inc.

Four Steps for Peer Coaching

In today's climate of increased downsizing, peer coaching is a skill that's more critical than ever, according to Ron Zemke and Kristin Anderson, authors of Coaching Knock Your Socks Off Service (AMACOM Books). Here's a four-step model to smooth and successful peer coaching.

Step 1: Positioning-Allows the coach peer to state why the session is needed and then ask permission to discuss the performance.

Step 2: Discussion-Provides the person being coached the opportunity to clarify the situation. The peer coach must make an effort to acknowledge the positive and affirm the peer's good intentions.

Step 3: Advice giving-Must be forward-looking, specific, actionable and, above all, respectful. The focus must not be on criticizing a colleague for past performance.

Step 4: Closure-The peer support session should end on a positive note. If appropriate, closure may include an offer for future assistance.

ISO 14001 Aspects and Impacts

Many people who have completed the first stage of implementing the ISO 14001 standard-identifying environmental aspects and impacts-can tell you that it isn't an easy task.

For the process to be credible, it must be performed by individuals who know the organization's operations, products and services, according to Thomas Ambrose, an advisor with HSE Management. These individuals must also have sufficient multidiscipline expertise to make informed judgments to identify, access and prioritize significant environmental impacts.

The following is a suggested analysis for ISO 14001 aspects and impacts, which, according to Ambrose, should also involve nonenvironmental people to validate judgments.

Assemble a cross-functional team that knows the organization's activities and issues.
Devise a structured process to identify the environmental aspects of operations, products and services.
Establish boundaries regarding what you will manage.
Align criteria with the scale, severity and duration of each aspect.
Develop a first-cut list of obvious and nonsignificant aspects.
Refine the list. Locate individuals throughout the organization to obtain input and feedback from research and development, marketing, production, law, etc.
Rank aspects that can have a significant impact on setting initial priorities.
Develop objectives, targets and metrics to measure progress and reduce impacts.
Hold quarterly team updates and an annual senior management strategic review.

Women Manage Better Than Men

When it comes to managerial skills, women are not equal to men. They're better, according to a study recently conducted by Janet Irwin and Michael Perrault, authorities in executive assessment.

Using a peer-assessment tool directed toward team performance without reference to gender, a total of 645 men and 270 women (a ratio that coincides with the ratio of men to women managers in the workplace) evaluated themselves and their teammates in 31 skill areas within seven categories: problem solving, planning, controlling, managing self, managing relationships, leading and communicating. Because women comprised only 30 percent of the database, they were evaluated more often by men than by other women.

Female managers outperform males in 28 of 31 skill areas, lagging behind only in handling pressure and coping with their own frustrations. They scored identical to men in delegating authority.

Based on a third-party evaluation of the data conducted by the California Lutheran University statistics department, the differences between the men's and women's scores are statistically significant in 25 of the 31 areas at the 0.01 level. "That means that the differences have been caused by something other than a mere statistical fluke," say Irwin and Perrault.

The highest scores for women were in the controlling category, which includes meeting commitments, producing high-quality work, organizing and orchestrating events, monitoring and controlling performance, and meeting schedules and deadlines. In short, women managers are more likely to keep commitments and turn projects in on time, say the authors.
http://www.ateamware.com/study.html