Quality improvement and evolution over the last 10 years in United Arab Emirates - Essay Example

In addition, suppliers have also recognized that quality acts as a differentiating factor between what they offer and what their competitors offer (Knowles, 2012). In the last ten years, the quality differentiator in the UAE has reduced greatly between competing services and products with the maturation of Quality Management. Organizations in the UAE, as well as other countries in the Middle East, have raised their quality standards through various initiatives to meet customer demands and international standards.

Three of the most widely used Quality Management tools include the ISO 9000 series, the Six Sigma, and the Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence, especially for organizations with American business connections like Sheikh Khalifa Medical City. By the, late 1990s, Quality Management had become a mainstay in most organizations and those in the UAE were not an exception. With the beginning of the 21st century, there was a maturity of the quality movement in the UAE, which saw evolution of new systems of quality beyond the foundations laid by early Oriental practitioners like Japan.

One example of this maturation was the revision of the ISO 9000 series of international standards that increased client satisfaction emphasis (Knowles, 2012). The ISO 9001:2000 was integrated by UAE organizations to replace the earlier ISO 9003, ISO 9002, and ISO 9001. This version sought to centralize the process management process, while demanding the involvement of executive management in the integration of business systems quality. It also sought to ensure that quality functions were not delegated to junior managers.

Performance-metrics was another goal of the improvement. Another improvement was made in 2008 with ISO 9001:2008, which clarified the requirements that were in existence (Knowles, 2012). The Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence has also matured in the UAE for organizations that run in partnership or are owned by US. This quality standard serves various purposes; including aiding organizations in assessing efforts ate quality improvement and identification of improvement opportunities, facilitating information sharing and communication, and as a tool for performance and quality management (Knowles, 2012).

The standard’s integrated approach seeks to ensure that organizations deliver improving stakeholder and customer value, as well as improved capabilities and effectiveness of the organization. This quality standard added healthcare to original organization categories in 2005. Finally, the Six Sigma methodology is a quality standard whose main aim is to reduce defects and improve the bottom line. It uses data to achieve quality that is near-perfect and has evolved greatly in the last 20 years.

In the last 10 years alone, it has matured to include consultancy, training, and implementation of the tool as a methodology, a metric, and a management system (Knowles, 2012). These quality initiative movements have had various successes with regards to their effectiveness. They allow organizations to strengthen their position competitively, while also offering the organizations adaptability to conditions in changing markets and regulations by the government, especially in the UAE where q number of organizations are foreign-owned.

In addition, on top of increasing organizational productivity, they enhance the image of those that use them in the public eye,