What is Total Quality Management?

Total quality management and kaizen?

• TQM is changing employee's attitudes so that they try to achieve high quality in every aspect of their jobs. it involves an expensive training programme and setting up Quality circles. are these quality circles called kaizen or is kaizen something totaly different? Thank you

• Answer:

  You are correct in your statement about changing an employees attitude. it is known as "culture change". before a company can successfully implement any quality management system, there has to be culture change. I use 5S as a tool to get people motivated and start the change. 5S is also a good tool that lets me kow if an organization is going to struggle with the implementing and sustaining of the QMS. if they struggle with something as simple as 5S, they will have a hard time committing to a true qms, and the 5th S is sustain. Kaizen is a japanese term for continuous improvement, ( a good book is GEMBA KAIZEN) but it can also be used as a tool in any qms. As in the newer version of ISO 9000 there is an emphasis and clause for continuous improvement. With all Quality Management Systems, education and knowledge is key. As the great Dr. Edwards Deming said....."knowledge is everything". The basic knowledge that has to be absorbed is the knowledge of your current system or method. An organization may think they know what they are doing but in reality have no idea, and cannot improve, if they have not mapped their process, written procedures and developed a true system. once this ystem is established, then the process can be monitored and changed for the better. That last thing I will say that is with all systems, there has to be a way to measure the performance. You can read more at www.manufacturingsystems1.com