TOTAL QUALITY AND HUMAN RESOURCES MANAGEMENT

MEANING AND DEFINITION

Total Quality is defined as, a people-focused management system that aims at continual increase in customer satisfaction at continually lower cost. Total Quality (TQ) is a total system approach (not a separate area or programme), and an integral part of high level strategy. It works horizontally across functions and departments, involving all employees, top to bottom, and extends backwards and forwards to include the supply chain and customer chain. Total Quality Management (TQM) is a continuous process of improvement for individuals, groups of people and the total organisation. Unlike other methods, TQM is the concentrated focus on continuous improvement. TQM is about changing the way things are done within the organizations life time. People must know what to do, how to do it, have the right methods to do it and be able to measure the improvement of the process and the current level of achievement in order to improve the process.

PRINCIPLES AND CORE CONCEPTS OF TQM

Total Quality Management encompasses a set of four principles and eight core concepts as shown below: Principles of TQM of TQM 1. Delight the customer 2. Management by fact 3. People-based management 4. Continuous improvement (a) Customer satisfaction (b) Internal customers are real (c) All work is process (d) Measurement (e) Team work (f) People make quality (g) Continuous improvement cycle (h) Prevention Core Concepts

(1) Delight the customer: The focus is on the external customer. Delight means being best at what really is important to the customer. Making the continuous changes to satisfy the customer is an integral part of TQM. (2) Management by fact: The management should know the quality of the product or service that the customer is presently using. This quality level is used as a benchmark to improve it further. Management gathers the facts about the present level and provides this information to the employees at all levels to make the decisions based on the facts. These facts are an essential aspect of continuous improvement.

(3) People-based management: The management should make the employees understand what to do, how to do it, get the feedback about their performance. The people should also be encouraged to assume responsibility for the quality of their work. People can be more committed to customer satisfaction, if they are involved more. The quality is heavily influenced by the continuous involvement of the people rather than by the systems, standards and technology (See Fig.31.1). 4. Total quality management is a continuous process: It is a management philosophy and a long-term process. It is not a short-term programme based on goals, targets, programme or a project. TQM is continuous improvement based on the incremental change. TQM can also be applied for smaller companies (See Box.31.1).

CORE CONCEPTS FOR IMPROVEMENT

Customer satisfaction: Companies should understand the importance of the external customer as the external customer is the main source of income. Companies should identify the changing needs of the customers from time to time; find out the factors which satisfy them and which cause grief to them. Companies should enhance the satisfying factors and reduce the factors those cause grief. Internal customers are real: Internal customers are as important as external customers as they continuously influence the quality maintenance. They also influence speed, efficiency, perfectness and cost. All work is process: All work is a business process: Business process is a combination of methods, materials, manpower and machines that taken together produce a product or service.

MEASUREMENT
Measurement of present level of quality is more important in order to determine the future quality level. Internal quality measurement of products are: (a) Breach of promise, (b) Performance to standard, (c) Reject level, (d) Accidents, (e) Process in control, (f) Yields scrap, (g) Time cost due to availability of raw materials, (h) Number of changes to works order, (i) Cost of quality. Team work: People work together in teams to accomplish the most difficult goals. People work in teams to maintain and improve the quality. Team work enables the people to work from a cross-functional approach. People make quality: Mostly organizational efforts influence the quality. Organizational efforts influence the individuals and teams in the organisation to commit to the quality.

CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT CYCLE

Identifying the present level of quality standards, establishing the customer needs, establishing the ways and means to produce the product or render service to meet the customer needs, measuring the success and improving the quality continuously are the parts of the continuous improvement cycle. Prevention: Preventing the failures to occur is the central system of total quality management. Foreseeing the possible failures and take steps in advance to prevent them from occurrence is important. Feeding information forward helps to prevent the failures. This process helps for the creation of the culture for continuous improvement. Fig. 31.2 presents the pyramid model for TQM.

HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT AND TQM

Human resources play a vital role in total quality management. The following forces shape the human resources management towards TQM: (i) Economic liberalizations announced by the Government of India in 1991. (ii) Opening the Indian economy to the rest of the globe through the globalization policy. (iii) Entrusting more priority for the private sector to play a constructive role in the restructuring and development process of Indian economy. (iv) Mounting competition among the industries across the globe. (v) Successful companies accord high priority to productively and systematically understanding and responding to current and future external customer needs. (vi) Successful organizations proactively and systematically understand and respond to current and future external customer needs. (vii) Human resources diversity and mobility are creating new employee needs and expectations about the future work culture. (viii) The information technology revolution is reshaping the core competencies needed in a knowledge economy. (ix) Organizational and human resources leaders are being challenged to become effective strategic partners in the creation of world-class work cultures. The TQM approach brought changes in the attitudes and expectations of the managers about the roles of human resources managers. Further, the expectations of stakeholders about the HRM profession have also been changing. Traditionally, objectives of the business organizations were restricted to productivity and profits. Consequently, stakeholders particularly the customers and employees were given low priority. Workers participation in management programmes were limited to offering suggestions by employees. Training and development programmes were limited to job related activities rather than extending to employee capacities. But the business objectives and total quality HRM approach are to maximize customer satisfaction and market share through improved quality.

THE TOTAL QUALITY HUMAN RESOURCES STRATEGY

Traditionally, human resources plans were not integrated with the strategic plans. But in the total quality organizations, human resources plans should be integrated with the strategic plans. In fact, HR strategies are given top priority in total quality organizations. However, HR managers feel that HR strategies are not yet given due importance even in total quality organizations. The human resources role can be of four types viz., (i) strategic high profile i.e., change agent, (ii) strategic low profile, hidden persuader, (iii) operation high profile i.e., internal contractor and (iv) operation low profile i.e., facilitator. There are several strategies of human resources related to profile total quality human resources grand strategies. Exhibit 31.1 presents total quality human resources grand and selected tactical strategies. Total quality human resources strategic management is also reciprocally interdependent with business strategic management. This is the most important contribution to the total quality orientation of human resources. Total quality human resources approach requires organisation around process (instead of tasks), flatten hierarchies, use teams to manage everything, let customer satisfaction drive output, reward team results, maximize supplier and customer contact and inform and train all employees.

Total quality HR strategy managers must shape, introduce, maintain and review the total quality initiatives. The TQ human resources managers actively involve themselves in the following activities in order to shape the TQM: (1) Preparing and synthesizing reports from other organizations that have experience in TQM, in conjunction with the management team. (2) Assisting with choices about which TQM approach to adopt. (3) Identifying any internal sources of expertise. (4) Utilizing the expertise of practitioners from other organizations. (5) Ensuring that an appropriate infrastructure for TQM is put into place and takes sufficient account of both customer feedback and human resources management issues. (6) Reviewing current practices, behavior and attitudes in the organization and assessing their degree of fit with TQM. (7) Shaping the type of organizational structure, culture and ethical climate appropriate for introducing and sustaining TQM. (8) Designing and delivering senior management development courses that set the proper tone for TQM. (9) Developing a TQM directory of internal resources and expertise. Total quality HR strategy managers facilitate the introduction and adoption of TQM by being actively involved in the following activities: (1) Encouraging and facilitating a total quality partnership between the company and union leadership in order to establish collaboration to benefit all stockholders. (2) Training all formal leaders (including union officers) in the principles of TQM, advising them of the best means of developing a process of continuous improvement within their areas of influence, encouraging them to persuade everyone to take personal responsibility for their own quality assurance and being prepared to seek improvements. (3) Identifying the conditions necessary for the successful use of quality management tools and techniques. (4) Providing guidance on what is necessary for the successful employment of teams that focus on quality improvement and how they fit into the organizational structure. (5) Training and coaching facilitators, mentors, and team members in inter-personal skills and how to manage the improvement process. (6) Designing communication events and vehicles to publicize the launch of TQM and early successes. (7) Consulting with employees about the introduction and development of TQM. (8) Institutionalizing organizational ethics development programs. (9) Proactively contributing to vision and mission statements and preparing quality objectives for dissemination to staff, customers and suppliers. Next, total quality HR strategy managers maintain and reinforce TQM within the organization by being actively involved in the following activities: (1) Adopting selection processes that target and screen for conceptual, technical, ethical, and social skills that support a TQM environment. (2) Introducing or upgrading the quality awareness and TQM component within orientation courses.

(3) Identifying the most appropriate mechanisms for recognizing and rewarding achievements, in particular looking at non-traditional reward systems. (4) Ensuring that training in quality management tools, techniques and processes continues to be provided within the organization and that the knowledge imparted in such training is being used in the workplace. (5) Redesigning appraisal procedures so that they contain criteria relating to specific TQM objectives, appropriate social relations, skills and support personal responsibility, selfassessment, and 360-degree performance feedback. (6) Preparing and overseeing special newsletters or team briefs on TQM and improvement initiatives and the outcome of quality improvement team projects. (7) Assisting continuous improvement and project teams to work effectively and innovate. Finally, the total quality HR strategy managers review TQM implementation progress by being actively involved in the following activities: (1) Contributing to or leading the preparation of an annual TQM report. (2) Assessing the effectiveness of the TQM infrastructure, including steering committees, quality councils, quality improvement teams, improvement facilitators, project teams, and individual performance. (3) Preparing and administering employee attitude and ethical climate surveys and disseminating their results. (4) Co-coordinating customer comments on the organizations progress. (5) Benchmarking the effectiveness of the organizations TQM with that of competitors and global best practices. (6) Facilitating the operation of internal reviews using criteria such as ISO 9000, the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award or the Deming Prize. ISO certification enables to enter global markets. (7) Identifying the barriers to continuous quality improvement. (8) Conducting HR, quality and ethics audits. Total quality HR strategic management would not be complete if HR practitioners do not review their own activities as they do all other areas. Some of the more typical self-review total quality activities include: (1) Undertaking a department mission analysis of the functional contribution of human resources to the organization, this could include the following: (a) Identifying internal customers and suppliers. (b) Agreeing to performance measures as part of service-level agreements. (c) Tracking such measurements. (d) Identifying non-value-added activities. (e) Taking part in cross-functional project teams to resolve interface problems with customers and suppliers. (2) Selecting new HR employees only with peer and customer involvement. (3) Appraising and rewarding HR staff for teamwork, ethical integrity and customer satisfaction. (4) Training and developing HR employees on a regular basis. (5) Surveying and distributing the results of HR staff satisfaction and ethical climate surveys.

(6) Providing advice on ethical problem analysis and conflict resolution within a specified and agreed-upon time period. (7) Benchmarking HR policies and processes with world-class models.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

1. Discuss the terms, Total Quality and Total Quality Management. 2. Explain the principles and core concepts of TQM. 3. Explain the significance of human resource management in TQM. 4. How do you formulate and execute total quality human resource strategies.