The Total Quality process

Abstract

It is difficult to imagine any manager or executive in industry today not knowing about the existence at least of Total Quality Management. Since the late 1970s TQM has become one of the most discussed topics in the boardrooms of Western companies and interest in this subject can be attributed to a single cause: the rapid development and growth of worldclass industries in Japan and the success of Japanese consumer products in Western markets during the past 20 years. Anyone buying Japanese designed and built motor cars, cameras, radios and televisions, etc. will attest to the quality and reliability of these products. So good are they that Japanese manufacturing industry has come to represent a considerable threat to many Western industries and may, in some cases, have caused their total collapse. This is illustrated by the demise of long established business like the British motor-cycle industry, although it is open to debate how much the collapse of an industry under pressure from competition is a direct result of that competition or how much is a direct result of an inability to accept and manage change and to make sound investment in the renewal of industry. Japanese industry has certainly shown its ability to cope with change and, indeed, change as the catalyst for improvement is encouraged. As Jackson (1993) says, the ability of Japanese companies to respond quickly to outside shocks is better than in any other country, with Japanese business leaders appearing to be more pragmatic and flexible than their competitors.