Total Quality Management (TQM) in Service Organizations - Research Paper Example

Total Quality Management (TQM) in Service Organizations “Quality is never an accident, it is always the result of high intension, sincere effort, intelligent direction, and skilful execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives” (Quality quotes, 2010).Total quality management (TQM) is an approach adopted by the modern organizations to improve their performance, effectiveness and flexibility of businesses. “TQM is a way of thinking about goals, organizations, processes and people, to ensure that the right things are done right first time. This thought process can change attitudes, behaviour and hence results for the better” (Total Quality Management, 2007). It is a way of totally changing the existing culture and business philosophies in order to meet the ever changing needs of the modern customers. All the departments, activities, and employees at all levels in an organization may undergo changes as part of the implementation of TQM. Customers are accepted as the most important entity for an organization and all the organizational resources or activities should work for satisfying the needs of the customers which is the core principle behind TQM. Modern organizations, irrespective of manufacturing or service, look for options to respond to the changing tastes, needs and wants of the customers through TQM. The success of an organization mainly depends on the quality of the product or service it offers to the customers. Customers have increased their quality consciousness and demands markedly in recent years which urged the organizations to take every possible means to ensure customer satisfaction through the product or the service offered. The above customer tendency will most likely increase in years to come because of the changing trends in life styles, technological advances, etc. In short, organizations need to implement a sound quality management program in order to survive in the market. This paper analyses the TQM concepts, its history, background, significance and applications focusing mainly on the service organizations. Total Quality Management in service organizations History/background Stark(1998) has pointed out that “total Quality Management is an approach to the art of management that originated in Japanese industry in the 1950's and has become steadily more popular in the West since the early 1980's” . In his opinion, “Total Quality is a description of the culture, attitude and organization of a company that aims to provide, and continue to provide, its customers with products and services that satisfy their needs” (Stark, 1998). Total quality management concepts originated in Japan during the mid-twentieth century. Japanese organizations realized the importance of TQM much earlier than any other organizations in the world and as result they started to change their organizational culture, business philosophies etc I order to convince the customers. As a result TQM is accepted as a management function rather than a mere concept on paper. Japanese organizations realized that the customer satisfaction is the ultimate aim of any kind of quality management policies and hence it is always better to think in terms of the perception of customers rather than the perception of the manufacturer or service provider. Most of the current customers will consider the serviceability factor of the products before they purchase anything. For example, an expensive/ luxury car cannot be sold in any area without having the backing of proper service centers in the near proximity. Significance and Applications of Total Quality Management in Service Organizations TQM Principles work on; Customers Satisfaction, Customer Perception of Quality, Customer Complaints, Service Quality, Customer Retention, Employee Involvement, Motivation, Empowerment, Team Work, Recognition and Reward, Performance Appraisal, Benefits, Continuous Process Improvement etc. Moreover, there are eight principles of quality management: “customer-focused organization, leadership, involvement of people, process approach, system approach to management, continual improvement, factual approach to decision making and mutually beneficial supplier relationships” (Total Quality Management, 2007). For example consider an organization or a hotel in hospitality industry. It is impossible for a modern hotel or restaurant to survive in the market it fails to deliver the needs of the customers. Internet facility becomes a basic necessity for most of the tourists nowadays and it is difficult for a hotel group to attract customers without giving such facilities to the tourists in the room. If a hotel tries to compete in the market without offering such modern facilities to the customers, they may not be able to attract adequate customers. The employees of the hotel or the restaurant should also be more focused on servicing the customers without giving any opportunities for the complaint. The employees should be provided adequate training and awareness periodically to meet the demands of the customers. To achieve customer satisfaction, a service organization should respond rapidly to the customer needs. TQM is a way of life for a service organization and it should be introduced and led by the top management itself. Most of the service organizations fail to implement TQM perfectly because of the lack of involvement of the top management in the implementation process of TQM. Customer satisfaction is seen as an organization’s highest priority. The employees should have adequate knowledge about the necessity of TQM in the modern business world, especially in the service organizations. The management should create a work culture needed to ensure greater enthusiasm from the employees in implementing TQM. For that purpose, management should motivate the employees with the help of suitable strategies. TQM team Product development in a TQM environment is customer-driven and focused on quality. Teams are process-oriented, and interact with their internal customers to deliver the required results. Management's focus is on controlling the overall process, and rewarding teamwork. A successful TQM environment requires a committed and well-trained work force that participates fully in quality improvement activities. Such participation is reinforced by reward and recognition systems which emphasize the achievement of quality objectives (Stark, 1998) Total quality management is a complex process which involves many procedures. It is a process in which actual quality performance will be compared with the standards being set by an organization. It includes processes like; Identifying the characteristics needed to be controlled, selection of a unit of measurement, setting a standard, selecting a measuring device, measuring actual performance, comparing the standards being set and the actual performances and taking necessary actions whenever required. It is nearly impossible to perform a same task and obtain the same result when it is repeated. In other words, what is expected to happen and the actually happens under similar conditions may vary a lot in different conditions and occasions. For example, as mentioned earlier in a service organization like a hotel, even a regular customer may ask different things at different times. So it is difficult for the management or the employees to fix some standards even for the same customer on different occasions. Customer Focus techniques like Customer surveys, Focus groups, Structured interviews, Representative Body reports, Customer analysis, segmentation, etc are normally adopted by service organizations as part of the implementation of the TQM in their organizations. The feedbacks obtained from such methods will be used to improve the service quality of the customers. According to Kenneth Crow (2002), quality must be designed into the product, not inspected into it. Quality can be defined as meeting customer needs and providing superior value. This focus on satisfying the customer's needs places an emphasis on techniques such as Quality Function Deployment to help understand those needs and plan a product to provide superior value (Crow, 2002) In a service industry, the customers are the entities needed to be serviced. So, all the servicing strategies should be focused on the needs of the individual customers. The customers can be of different types; some of them may need cold water for bathing while others may need hot water for the same purpose, some of them may need vegetarian foods whereas others may need non-vegetarian foods, some of them may need soft drinks while others may ask for hot drinks and so on. In any case, the management and the employees should be able and ready to provide the services needed by the customers and that also in time. Benchmarking is another strategy adopted by service organizations in order to implement the TQM in true sense. It is a process of comparison between the organization and the competitor regarding the cost, time and quality. The evaluation process through Benchmarking can help the TQM team in measuring the effectiveness of the TQM in their organization. In service industry, understanding of the result orientation and the trends in the market are important. For example, it is quiet possible that the competitors may implement unique and innovative customer servicing strategies in their organization occasionally. For example, airliners often offer subsidized tour packages to the tourists. Suppose Emirates airlines is offering a reduced ticket fare to the passengers from London to America. If an American airliner, fail to know about it and taking similar strategies, their businesses can be seriously affected. According to Dexter A. Hansen (2005), “an ISO implementation is a basis for a Total Quality Management implementation. Where there is an ISO system, about 75 percent of the steps are in place for TQM” (Hansen, 2005). ISO 9000 and 14000 series of standards are in place currently in service and manufacturing organizations in order to assure the quality of the products or services offered to the customers. Another important factor in ensuring TQM in service organizations is the leadership styles and functioning. The leaders must set examples for the employees to follow in the service organizations. The leaders must educate the workers about the necessity of keeping standards in delivering quality services to the customers. The employees must be develop a feeling that quality is as important as quantity. Organizational structure and culture can also play vital roles in delivering adequate services to the customers. Some service providers will be highly focused on their profits rather than the quality of the service provided to the customers. This is totally against the norms of implementing TQM in service organizations. In such cases the TQM team will be handicapped by the lack of support from the top management. The organization should have a well designed quality policy in order to implement TQM in its true sense. Conclusions In order to succeed in ever changing, technologically advanced and competitive market, the service organizations must be dedicated to continuous improvement in quality of their services offered to the customers. The commitment of the management plays a vital role in implementing TQM in service organizations. Organizations fail to change or implement TQM principles in their operations may not survive in the highly competitive service industry. TQM implementation can be managed successfully only if the organization provides maximum stress on the voice of the customer. References 1. Crow, K. (2002). CUSTOMER-FOCUSED DEVELOPMENT WITH QFD. Retrieved from http://www.npd-solutions.com/qfd.html 2. Hansen, D.A. (2005). Total Quality Management (TQM) Tutorial. Retrieved from http://home.att.net/~iso9k1/tqm/tqm.html#Introduction 3. Stark, J. (1998). A few words about TQM. Retrieved from http://www.johnstark.com/fwtqm.html 4. Quality quotes. (2010). Retrieved from http://thinkexist.com/quotations/quality/ 5. Total Quality Management. (2007). Retrieved from http://www.thecqi.org/resources/d2-4.shtml Read More