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Total Quality Pioneers

Diana M. Shepherd

University of Phoenix

May 29, 2012

MGT/449 – Mr. Felkins

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Total Quality Pioneers

How can one define quality, quality has been define in various ways by different people

and organizations (Goetsch & Davis, 2010) People such as Fred Smith, DEO of Federal of

Express, defines quality as “performances to the standard expected by the customers, General

Services Administration (GSA) defines quality as “meeting the customer’s needs the first time

and every time, Boeing defines quality as “providing our customers wit products and services

that consistently meet their needs and expectations” and there are many ways one can define

quality (Goetsch, & Davis, 2010). However, quality can simply be define as a dynamic state

associated with product, services, people, processes, and environments that meets or exceeds

expectation and helps produce superior value (Goetsch & Davis, 2010).

Once elements of quality are put into place then organization can provide to the customer

needs and provide better service. Elements such as:

• Focus on quality and prevention of problems- which means customers wants and reducing errors • Cooperate with supplier and customers- means get satisfaction • Continuously Improve and eliminate wasteful steps – means to meet customers needs • Encourage the proper climate, empower employees- means to improve service • Use the problem solving/problem prevention cycle- fix problem before they happen • Use measurement to back decision- customer feedback (Chaudron, D. Organized Change).

Let’s take a look at Fred Smith the founder, chair, president and CEO of Federal Express

Corporation, became successful because he choose to treat his employees and customers as one

(Goetsch & Davis, 2010). He felt that if the right hand knew what the left hand was doing that it

would keep down problems as well as errors and would continue to have customer satisfaction.

He used the elements of customer satisfaction and employment involvement. Also, Economist

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Vilfredo Pareto is commonly known in the quality circle as the 80/20 rule. This rule is simply

saying that 80% of the problems can be traced to a few critical sources. He advised organizations

to focus a large deal on improvement efforts on identifying and eliminating few critical source of

problem (Goetsch & Davis, 2010). Pareto used the elements of continual improvement and

statistical data.

The elements of quality are very useful in today’s environment simply because it teaches

and shows you how to deal with changes. Organization should always open to changes such as

upgrades technology, training, usage of credit card, education and global/outsource/internet these

are things that organization should stay on top of the constant changes. These elements should

provide better services to their customers as well as providing better working conditions to their

employees. However, future will become more of fast pace work place, things such as working

from home and using webcam where you can communicate without having to travel, everything

will sooner or later be done with just a push of a button.

In conclusion quality is what you are trying to accomplish when it comes to dealing with

customer and trying to provide them with their needs. Customers are who contribute to your

organization but employees are the backbone because they have to make sure that they are doing

to provide the proper service as well keeping a line of communication open in order to provide

the product that is in demand.

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References

1. Chaudron, D. Elements of Quality, Retrieved on May 31, 2012

www.organizedchange.com

2. Goetsch, D. & Davis, B. Quality Management for Organizational Excellence: Introduction to Total Quality, Sixth Edition, Published by Prentice Hall. Copyright 2010