Principles of Quality

Question 1

Many of the approaches and techniques used by Japanese industry have been developed in the United States. This is especially true with respect to quality management. Concepts developed by prominent experts such as Deming have been successfully adopted in Japan but rejected by many North American firms. Why has this happened? Use at least one example in your answer.

Answer

In the period following World War II, North America was a plentiful society. And while the rest of the world was repairing and rebuilding, North American industry was intact and thriving, and there was very little competition to worry about. During this time, North Americans developed a tolerance for poor quality and defects. An extreme example surfaced with a defective design of a simple O-Ring, which is believed to be at fault for the explosion of the Challenger space shuttle. Substandard products were accepted by North Americans as human nature, perhaps in part, because many Western companies believed that the cost of quality was too much. Other parts of the world put forth tremendous effort to be able to compete in the marketplace again. Countries, such as Japan, adopted the total quality management (TQM) approach and did not tolerate the level of errors and defects that were so commonly accepted by Western companies (one of Deming’s 14 points). The U.S. started to lose some of the market share to imports as customers looked for more reliable products. From this trend, it is apparent that the cost of unquality is much greater than the cost of quality itself. Other nations throughout the world began to regain their share in the market by embracing concepts such as quality management. These concepts have been known and used for many years. TQM is a practical approach, not