Dr.N.R.Saravanan,MBA, MBA, PGDHRM, MA (Yoga), M.Phil, Ph.D.,
Asst. Professor – Dept. of Management, Bon Secours College for Women, Thanjavur 24
3. Team Mania.
Teamwork is a critical part of TQM, however putting people in teams
before the TQM culture has been developed can result in poor results. Too
many teams can also be a real problem. Team attendance needs to be carefully
monitored, as often the same people end up on a range of teams, will little time
left in their working day to truly contribute to the team, while in parallel, many
other employees, never sit on a team nor or asked to contribute. The objective
must be to harness the capabilities of all employees. Therefore, as many
employees as possible must in some way contribute to improvement activities.
This may be via partaking on teams. However, all teams must be carefully
considered, with clear objectives, properly considered membership, clear end
goals and appropriate recognition for positive efforts where positive results are
delivered.
4. Deployment Process.
It is important to get all key groups on board (e.g. all managers,
employees, suppliers) before rolling out TQM projects. No single group of
stakeholders can deliver total quality performance, nor can TQM be achieved
while missing a key stakeholder group.
5. Taking too narrow or too broad an approach.
Unless the quality program is tailored to fit the organization, problems
will arise during implementation. Careful consideration needs to be given to the
scope of the TQM program, where does the organization see the status of TQM
in say one, two, five years time? TQM is a long term project. It is entirely
reasonable to commence TQM via small steps . Maybe the first starting point
will be to develop the use of analytical tools such as cause and effect, fault
tree analysis, hazop analysis, etc.. Then when these start to get applied, the
next step may be to introduce employee recognition, then improvement teams,
etc.. The plan for TQM should be developed with all employees and shared with
all employees, along with the planned milestone targets.
6. Training & Education.
A critical component in any TQM program. What will be the approach to
staff development? This also sits with plans to improve delegation and decision
making. Developing more capable staff, can also motivate the staff, however, as
staff competence is developed, so too must the opportunities available to utilize
new skills be made available to those same staff, otherwise the outcome of
training can actually be lower levels of motivation. Again, there should be a
clear plan for education and training which in integral with the overall TQM
program.