Becoming The Total Quality Manager (TQM) : Topical Coverage

Becoming the Total Quality Manager (TQM)
Jack B. Re Velle, Ph.D., Director

Center for Process Improvement & Integration
GenCorp Aerojet
1100 West Hollyvale Street
Azusa, CA 9170
Abstract- Because so few universities and colleges
understand, teach and/or practice the philosophy,
concepts and tools of Total Quality Management (TQM),
industry practitioners have for many years been providing
this much-needed education and training in a variety of
venues, both to recent graduates and their more senior
colleagues. This paper reviews the intent, content and
results of a comprehensive TQM course which has been
taught under the sponsorship of the Institute of Industrial
Engineers (IIE) and The George Washington University
Continuing
Engineering
Education
Program
(GWU/CEEP).
Introduction
The course, "Becoming the Total Quality Manager," was
prepared in response to requests voiced by several
organizations, i.e., a professional society (the Institute of
Industrial Engineers-IIE), and educational institution (The
George Washington University Continuing Engineering
Education Program-GWU/CEEP), and my employer at that
time (Hughes Missile Systems Company-HMSC). A twopage notice of course availability drawn from a
GWU/CEEP catalog is presented in Figures 1 and 2.
The original and sustaining purpose/objective of this
three-day course is to provide participants with a high level
of awareness and appreciation for the multiple aspects of
Total Quality Management (TQM), i.e., social, managerial,
and technical. Since its initial presentation in 1993, the
audience has been highly diversified, i.e., participants have
come from various types of organizations and levels of
responsibility.
The course presentation begins with some definitions to
provide the participants with a common frame of reference.
Working definitions are included for TQM, Continuous
Improvement (CI), process, system, process control,
process capability, enablement,
empowerment, TQ
manager, as well as other relevant terms.
Pedagogy is always an important decision with respect
to the selection of the most utilitarian media to insure
maximum knowledge transfer consistent with course
objectives. This course is offered as a combination of
lecture, discussion, and class workshops.
Topical Coverage
Day One provides coverage on three topics and includes three
workshops. The topics are:
Setting the stage
Implementation strategy
Planning for CI
The workshops are:
Mission statement development
Vision statement development
Policy and values statement development
Day Two examines three topics and includes two workshops.
The topics are:
Challenges of CI
Managing and Leading for CI
Keys to Sustaining a CI Effort
The workshops are:
Strategic objectives development
Education and training plan development
Day Three is devoted to some of the most widely-used TQM
tools as well as a synthesis of all the topics covered throughout
the course. The tools are:
Quality Function Deployment (QFD)

Design of Experiments (DOE)
Statistical Quality/Process Control (SQC/SPC)
Seven Management and Planning Tools (7-MP)
Cycle Time Management (CTM)
The course concludes with an examination of a comprehensive

model of TQM and a TQM maturity matrix.
Selected Specifics
1. Leadership and Management. In 1990 Warren Bennis was
quoted as saying that "Leaders are people who do the right thing;
managers are people who do things right." He went on to say
that "Americans (and probably those in much of the rest of the
world) are underled and overmanaged. They (those at the top)
do not pay enough attention to doing the right things, while

paying too much attention to doing things right."
Managers identify, acquire, allocate, control, replace,
modify, and maintain a variety of resources such as land,
buildings, equipment, tooling, tools, space, furniture, etc.
Thus, managers manage inanimate resources.
Leaders create organizational cultures which inspire
members of an organization to be come self-motivated,
more focused, goal-oriented team players with a sense of
urgency.
Managers are selected and appointed by owners,
general managers, site directors, etc. This is a fleshing out
of a formal organization structure, i.e., building a
bureaucracy.
Leaders appear, and provide direction and action
without the benefit of formal appointment. The relationship
between TQM and CI is presented in Figure 3.
Some formal organizations identify their leaders and
encourage them to become a part of management. Some
don't! Those organizations fortunate enough to have
executives who have the character and/or charisma to be a
leader as well are the organizations which thrive, not just
survive. Intel, GE, IBM, Microsoft and Lockheed-Martin
do. Apple, Chrysler, Ford, EDS, and Boeing did. GM, GD,
AT&T, Hughes, and Raytheon don't.
Some managers and leaders espouse the long term
value of TQM, both in its current state as well as when it is
taken to its next level. Others aren't sure. Some still don't
know. But the stockmarket knows. For the fourth year in a
row , the fictitious Baldrige Index has outperformed the
Standard and Poors 500 by nearly 3 to 1, according to the
Commerce Departments National Institute of Standards
and Technology. The Baldrige Index is made up of
publicly-traded U.S. companies that have received the
Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award during the years
1988 to 1996.
2. TQM and CI. Total Quality Management (TQM)
continues to exist and persist under a variety of aliases
despite statements to the contrary by pseudo gurus looking
for headlines. Some even consider TQM to be the
equivalent of Continuous Improvement (CI) or to
aficionados of things Japanese, Kaizen. A study of the
literature would indicate otherwise.
TQM is both an overarching philosophy and operating
concept which encompasses a broad variety of subordinate
concepts, tools and techniques. A comprehensive model of
TQM is presented in the conclusion of this paper and
includes an examination of its social, managerial, and
technical aspects.
CI is one of the major subordinate concepts of TQM,
along with its cousin, Process Re-engineering (PR). CI
addresses periodic, incremental process improvements
while PR focuses on those processes which are not longer
competitive and require total re-structuring.
3. Enablement and Empowerment. Enlightened leaders

recognize the futility of empowerment prior to enablement.
Enablement begins with a skills needs assessment and concludes
with the provision of specific skills training. Until an individual
or a team has been enabled, any attempt to encourage
empowerment is likely to fail.
Empowerment is a function of capability, alignment and
trust. The relationship between these three dimensions is
presented graphically in Figure 4.
4. Variability Reduction Process (VRP).
Originally,
advocated in the late 1980s by the Air Staff (US Air Force
Headquarters in the Pentagon), the VRP is composed of three
major TQM tools applied in sequence: first - Quality Function
Deployment (QFD), then - Design of Experiments (DOE), and
finally - Statistical Quality/Process Control (SQC/SPC). The
intent is that the output of one tool becomes the input to the next
one.
A QFD analysis begins with the Voice of the Customer
Table (VOCT) and is followed by the House of Quality
(HOQ). The HOQ is an L-shaped matrix with the inputs
referred to as the WHATs, i.e., what do our customers
want? The HOWs, also known as the Counterpart
Engineering Requirements, describe how we are going to
respond to the WHATs. One of the several outputs from the
HOQ is its' "roof" which contains a completed analysis of
the relationships between the HOWs. Those HOWs with
high negative relationships become the basis of one or more
subsequent DOEs.
A DOE analysis of the key or critical HOWs achieves
several objectives. First, it provides essential insights
regarding what operating levels should be used to create a
Robust Design, i.e., a product or process design which is
essentially insensitive to conditions of use (for products) or
operating conditions (for processes). Second, it identifies
which of the HOWs (experimental factors) are so influential
with respect to the key or critical performance metrics that
they require constant monitoring using SPC to assure
operational excellence.
SPC, like SQC, uses the Seven Quality Control (7-QC)
tools to constantly monitor, analyze and respond to process
and product changes. While SQC uses the 7-QC tools to
baseline and monitor process outputs (e.g., ppm and
Cp/Cpk), SPC uses the same 7-QC tools to baseline and
monitor process inputs (machine speeds, operating
temperatures, depth or cuts, etc.). The 7-QC tools are:
histograms, Pareto analysis, cause and effect analysis,
control charts, scatter analysis, checklists (tally sheets), and
trend charts.
Conclusion
5. Seven Management & Planning Tools (7-MP) and
Cycle Time Management (CTM).
The 7-MP tools are a collection of TQM tools created
for analysis of communications or qualitative data
while quantitative data is collected and analyzed using
the 7-QC tools. This balance of power is presented
graphically in Figure 5.
The 7-MP tools are: affinity analysis,
interrelationship
digraph,
tree
analysis,
prioritization matrices, matrix analysis, process
decision program chart (PDPC), and activity
network diagram (also known as CPM, the critical
path method.
The CONTEX (CONTract-EXpand) model
demonstrates the lost likely sequence of 7-MP tool
application as well as their individual purpose in
the overall scheme of things. This model is
presented in Figure 6.
CTM, or Work Flow Analysis (WFA) as it is
sometimes known, is a TQM tool designed to analyze
the steps of a process. The analysis reveals valueadded versus non-value-added steps, bottlenecks, and
other process delay and waste factors. Application of
other TQM tools follows the identification phase so as
to eliminate or at least reduce the impact of these
waste-makers.
Workshops
Using a fictitious enterprise, a soft drink distributorship in a
mid-western city, as a focal point, each class is lead through
a sequentially-oriented series of exercises designed to
expand their individual and collective understanding of
enterprise-level thinking relative to TQM.
Working in teams of three to four persons, the
participants use a structured QFD matrix approach to
develop first a mission statement, then a vision statement,
followed by a policy and values statement, then a set of
strategic objectives, and finally an education and training
plan.
Following development of each of the documents, the
teams deliver brief discussions regarding their efforts.
Class discussion about the strengths and gaps of each
document provides the participants with additional insights
about the development process. Each team takes the name
of a well-known soft drink, thus a greater number of teams
results in a corresponding increase in the number of soft
drink franchises represented in any given class.
1. Teams, Tools and Tasks. By mid-afternoon of the third and

final day of the course, all the necessary topics have been
presented and discussed. As the conclusion of the course begins,
a succinct flow chart is used to initiate topical synthesis. Class
members find this graphic useful in understanding how the entire
process is intended to work. See Figure 7.
2. The focus then turns to the TQM Puzzle. This graphic is
offered to remind the participants of the complex nature of TQM
and how important each piece of the puzzle really is relative to
maintaining a cohesive enterprise-level team. The puzzle is
presented in Figure 8.
3. Synthesis.
TQM: A Comprehensive Model.
As the class
approaches the final hour, a comprehensive model of TQM
is analyzed to insure that the class members recognize the
diverse nature of the topic. See Figure 9.
Finally, the TQM Maturity Matrix is examined and
discussed as a tool for organizational self-assessment. This
matrix is presented in Figures 10 and 11.
Post Script
Subsequent to the conclusion of a class, numerous participants
have approached the instructor to offer their thoughts on various
aspects of the course. Invariably, the synthesis of the various
topics at the conclusion of the presentation is identified as one of
the highlights of the class. Of course, the synthesis portion of the
course would be meaningless without that which went before it.
The George Washington University maintains records of
course evaluations and, inevitably, this course results in
extremely high ratings by the participants.
A final thought is presented to each class in Figure 12.
Bibliography
Byrnes, Margaret A. (Ed.S.), Cornesky, Robert A. (Sc.D.) and
Byrnes, Lawrence W. (Ph.D.) The Quality Teacher:
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Classroom. Cornesky & Associates Press. Bunnell,
FL. 1992.
Crosby, Philip B. Quality is Free: The Art of Making
Quality Certain. McGraw-Hill Book Company. New
York, N.Y. 1979.
Feigenbaum, Armand V. Total Quality Control, Third
Edition. McGraw-Hill Book Company. New York,
N.Y. 1983.
George, Stephen and Weimerskirch, Arnold.

Total
Quality Management:
Strategies and
Techniques Proven at Todays Most Successful
Companies, Second Edition.
John Wiley &
Sons, Inc. New York, N.Y. 1998
Goldratt, Eliyahu M. and Cox, Jeff. The Goal: A Process
of Ongoing Improvement, Revised Edition.
North River Press. Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y.
1986
Jablonski, Joseph R. Implementing TQM: Competing
in the Nineties Through Total Quality
Management, Second Edition.
Technical
Management Consortium, Inc.
Albuquerque,
N.M. 1994
Kolarik, William J. Creating Quality: Concepts, Systems,

Strategies, and Tools. McGraw-Hill, Inc.
New
York, N.Y. 1995
Pyzdek, Thomas. What Every Manager Should Know About
Quality. Marcel Dekker, Inc. New York, N.Y. 1991
Scherkenbach, William W. The Deming Route to Quality
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Washington, D.C. 1988

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Becoming the Total Quality Manager (TQM)

Jack B. Re Velle, Ph.D., Director

Quality Function Deployment (QFD)

The course concludes with an examination of a comprehensive

do not pay enough attention to doing the right things, while

3. Enablement and Empowerment. Enlightened leaders

1. Teams, Tools and Tasks. By mid-afternoon of the third and

George, Stephen and Weimerskirch, Arnold.

Kolarik, William J. Creating Quality: Concepts, Systems,

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