Analysis of Demings 14 Points of Transformation - Term Paper Example

2,002 words excluding reference list) Analysis of Deming’s 14 Points of Transformation 1. Introduction Deming’s 14 points of transformation for management is a new way thinking that intends to create a system where managers or a company can do other things aside from traditional business practices. It is a system that enables employees to work in a different environment where they can be more productive and proud of their work. The following section is an analysis off William Edwards Deming philosophy as well as views of other authors in relation to the need and practices of contemporary organisations. 2. Deming’s 14 points of transformation The Deming’s 14 points for the transformation of management are guidelines or operating principles intended for leaders of contemporary organizations particularly those that are interested in adopting total quality management principles. These points are advising organisational leaders on what changes they need to take and implement in line with quality improvement (Davies & Minion 1999, p.173). The following is an analysis of these points. 2.1 Creating constancy of purpose toward improvement of product and service. Almost all business organisations want to succeed and stay in business for a long time thus they need to become competitive. In order to do so, these organisations must be consistent in improving their product and services otherwise their competitors will overturn them with products that are much better. According to Walton (1986) in Larson (2009, p.113), Deming’s “constancy of purpose” is a system that incorporates innovation, research and education, proper maintenance of equipment, and new aids to production in both office and plant. The first point is intended to cure what Deming terms as one of the seven deadly diseases in business organisations – the lack of constancy of purpose (Swansburg & Swansburg 2002, p.534). Constancy of purpose towards better product and service can help contemporary business organisations avoid costly mistakes such as hiring people that are not suited for job, ineffective or inadequate supervision, obsolete methods of training, management who do not fully understand their employees’ job. For the most part, constancy of purpose brings innovation resulting to better service, effective planning, better training, and enhance customer satisfaction (Deming 2000, p.200) 2.2 Adopting the new philosophy The logic behind adopting the new philosophy is the fact that businesses today are now operating in a new economic age and therefore traditional philosophies and practices are not longer valid (Deming 2000, p.200). This new economic age is all about reliability, smooth operation, and avoidance of common production problems such as bad materials, poor workmanship, damages caused by poor handling, poorly or completely untrained workers, and negligent after-sales service (Walton 1986, p.58). In general, this philosophy encourage leaders to reject the idea of acceptable delay, mistakes, defective materials, second-rate workmanship, and accept the reality that quality matters most (Fairholm & Fairholm 2008, p.71). 2.3 Cease dependence on inspection to achieve quality. Inspection is a common practice in most organisations thinking that they can control the quality of products by monitoring their workforce. Deming’s philosophy is directing leaders to the advantage of understanding the sources of variation in processes and work than depending on frequent inspection. This is because quality can be achieved easily by eliminating the actual sources of variation (Roussel & Swansburg 2006, p.407). Moreover, supervision and wages do not add value but rather extra cost thus quality built into the process or work itself is much better as it does not require inspection (Basu & Wright 2003, p.13). 2.4 End the practice of awarding business based on the price tag alone. This philosophy emphasizes the reality that price has no meaning when the item purchased is of low quality. Therefore, awarding contracts solely to the lowest bidder is a costly mistake as the quality of the products that will be supplied can affect the final product severely. It is thus much better to work with a single supplier by which the organisation can effectively negotiate prices and quality of components (Salis 2002, p.35). Moreover, it can minimize the total cost and open up an opportunity for a “long-term relationship of loyalty and trust” (Deming 2000, p.23). 2.5 Improve consistently and forever the system of production and service. This is Deming’s way of saying that management should continually look for means to reduce the cost while improving the quality of product. For instance, reducing waste in production iteratively can reduce cost (Allen 2008, p.79). According to Naidu & Rajendra (2006), it is the responsibility of management to find and correct problems consistently so that improvement and quality is continuous. In addition, they should prevent problems before they happen and any variation must be controlled continually. This philosophy can be taken as a sort of PDCA or where management plan-do-check-act iteratively (Swansburg 1996, p.569). 2.6 Institute training on the job Deming believes that fixing a problem is more costly than preventing them (Lunenburg & Ornstein p.51) thus it is always best to be prepared. According to Walton (), workers often do not know if they did their job correctly thus proper training is essential and should not end for as long as there is something be gained and output is not stable (Walton 1986, p.68). In other words, management must transform the organisation into a learning organisation willing to learn and share knowledge (Basu & Wright 2003, p.13). 2.7 Institute leadership Generally, this point means leadership that is aim to helping people and machines do their job better (Rowitz 2009 p.367). These include recognizing workers different abilities, capabilities, and aspirations (Knapp 2007, p.107). Deming recognizes the possibility that people that are misplaced often do not do well at work thus leaders have the responsibility to help them achieve their goals (Tomey 2004, p.438). The seventh point is actually a call for management to change their ways of leadership from ordering and punishing to showing, doing, and supporting workers (Black 2009, p.724). 2.8 Drive out fear. Fear is often present in the workplace and this can be fear of starting an argument, fear of being blame, fear of punishment from their superior, fear of losing their job, and so on (Walton 1986, p.72). For Deming, people cannot give their best performance if they do not feel secured thus it is essential to eliminate different types of fear with the organisation (Deming 2000, p.59). Driving out fear in the workplace such as the fear of management to disseminate bad news, can actually improve processes since the information can be use by workers to strive harder (Fairholm 2000, p.36). 2.9 Break down barriers between departments. To further enhance total quality management in an organisation, the management should break down or eliminate barriers between departments. One suggestion presented by Deming is switching personnel between related departments so that barriers in communication and cooperation are reduced (Deming 2000, p.202). The breakdown can also eliminate the division between management and labour and can lead to worker empowerment and generation of cross-functional teams (Swamidass 2000, p.623). 2.10 Eliminate slogans, exhortations and targets for the workforce Deming explained that slogans such as those calling for much higher level of productivity and error free production are exhortations that create antagonistic relationship between management and workforce. This is because majority of the causes of poor quality products and low productive can be traced to the system which workers do not have any control (Deming 2000, p.24). For instance, the slogan that says “Safety is your responsibility” posted in a stair without railing can give the wrong idea that safety is only the responsibility of workers and management and the system have nothing to do with it. According to Scherkenbach (1986), safety is not the sole responsibility of individual and more often than not some elements in the system are causing much more trouble than the individual. Moreover, management slogans asking for zero defects and higher levels of production without any new method being introduced is a waste of time and money (Culp & Smith p.208). 2.11 Eliminate quotas The logic behind by the Deming’s eleventh point is the fact that unless accompanied by a particular action plan for improving the process, setting targets is meaningless when the system is already stable. The only thing that management can do is to improve or change the system (Beckford 2009, p.79). Eliminating numerical quotas for the workforce and numerical goals for management can lead to more realistic production standards since people do not work at the same level of speed (Swansburg & Swansburg 2002, p.534). According to O’Regan (2002), quotas are barriers to quality improvement since they are mostly based on average worker’s speed and productivity. Consequently, other people with less capability cannot cope and often decide to quit due job dissatisfaction. Although it may be difficult for most businesses particularly those that are conditioned that everything is about numbers, accepting the fact that numbers are also responsible for losses and does not necessarily equate with achieving quality or innovation can greatly businesses change their perception about quotas and quality products (Fay 2007, p.22). 2.12 Remove barriers that rob the hourly worker of his right to pride of workmanship The 12th point was conceived by Deming because he believes that people on the shop floor including managers are being treated by management as commodities (Kondalkar 2009, p.107). Moreover, the 12th point also include barriers that rob people in management and engineering of their right to pride in craftsmanship such as keeping the budget down while ignoring customer satisfaction and appraisal system that reward on end product results. For workers, these barriers are wrong tools, bad materials, uncomfortable condition, and disrespect. In general, cost is the sole driver for most organisation thus other aspect of production such training, maintenance, and customer service are being suppressed (Basu & Wright 2003, p.14). The 12th point emphasises the need to abolish merit rating and traditional management by objective. Consequently, management must give more weight on quality than quantity (Fiore 2004, p.96). More importantly, workers who performed well should be rewarded while those who are performing below the standards should be trained so they too will have the opportunity to be rewarded (Kondalkar 2009, p.107). 2.13 Institute a vigorous program of education and self-improvement The 13th point highlights reality that it is not enough to have good people in the organization particularly when their knowledge and skills are obsolete. For this reason Deming is calling the attention of businesses for re-training or giving opportunity for their people to acquire new knowledge and skills required by current methods of production (Walton 1986, p.84). These include any educational program that can boost self-esteem, provide knowledge that can cope with advance technologies, and enable abilities that can contribute to quality improvements (Swansburg & Swansburg 2002, p.534). 2.14 Put everybody in the company to work to accomplish the transformation. The last of Deming’s 14 points of transformation requires courage and determination to break from widespread business tradition as it involve persuading all members of the organization to take an agreed direction (Walesh 2000, p.178). Deming believes that transformation is all members concern (Deming 2000, p.24) thus employees must be involve in the quality improvement system and possibly creating a quality circle among them (Cohen & Cesta 2005, p.481). Since change of culture is not easy to achieve, for Basu & Wright (2003), involving everyone is one way of changing the culture of an organization effectively. 3. Conclusion Deming’s 14 points can be generalized as enhancing total quality management through consistent improvement of processes, elimination of cultural and other barriers through employee involvement, reduction of cost through prevention instead of rectification, quality through strong supplier-customer relationship, and customer satisfaction using new tools and techniques. Contemporary organization can benefit from Deming’s philosophy since traditional quota driven and adversarial work relationship is no longer relevant in today’s global environment. By driving out fear, communication between management labour will improve thus performance level will increase. Moreover, reducing waste and avoiding inefficiencies being created by the traditional method itself can greatly decrease cost of production while increasing the quality of products and customer satisfaction. 4. 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