Quality Week Ideas - Initiating a 'Quality Week' at our company

Our management team wants to initiate a "Quality Week" at our company. We have been registered to QS-9K for four years and have approx. 380 employees. The goal is to increase quality awareness to all levels of the organization. Does anyone have any suggestions that would make this effective?

[Kevin Mader]

Ask the folk in your System to write up a brief statement about Quality and the benefits of ISO9000 on an index card. Collect them, review them, and post them all on a board.

From the review, you should note where your program appears to be invisible and allow you to formulate an approach to address oversights.

While Quality is everyone's business, Quality starts in the Boardroom. Strong Leadership is necessary for the Quality cause.

Regards,

Kevin

[CarolX]

Mike,

Along Kevin's lines...how about a questionaire or survey. Generally, you should get more responses this way. Requires minimal thinking on their part, and may get you the information you are looking for. Leave some room for comments, and post the results, especially the positive ones.

Good Luck!

CarolX

[E Wall]

What a great idea!

How about a spin off a treasure hunt? In advance plant 1 thing in each department that is wrong - and award the first person/team that finds it! This would take some control measures so as not to affect the product, but the planted item can range from forms used, control charts, unmarked (but truely calabrated) equipment, uncontrolled document (of course all depending on your policies)...etc

What can I say? I'm all for work, but like to have fun too!

I think keeping the lines of communication open between all levels of employees is key. You don't say what the 'environment' of your company is. Will anyone ask a question? Are they afraid to voice their opinions? Are they a valued part of the process and know they play a roll in process input? When I started here there was a complaciency that was very discouraging "why say something, they just ingore it/me and keep doing what they want or tell us to". The new plant mgr had a time of it but after 3 years it's quite different now. Our processes have improved, and production capabilities increased (along with decrease scrap).

Do you have customer visits (with any frequency)? Are your operators a part of the presentation, being the ones walking the visitors through their portion of the process? Doing this has helped us a lot. It was done gradually, educating along the way...but boy do the customers love it! And many operators see it as a 'feather' in their cap and vie for a chance to present.

When you put this even together, I would love to hear what was done and the results. It sounds like an effective tool to not only improve quality awareness but maybe initiate quality competetiveness and boost morale/relieve stresses.

Other ideas -
* Quality challenge - review current metrics, add to them if need be, and measure the occurances of rework/scrap, etc... associated with the processes/product
* Put up a 'hall of fame' that would carry over year to year (or whatever frequency you've chosen)
* Add a periodic walk-through asking pertinent questions randomly and annoucing what the best (most accurate and complete) responses and respondants were.
* Find out what your associates value most about their jobs and offer a long term award system, so they know this isn't just another 'flavor of the month' idea that will come and go.

[Michael T]

We use a "Quality Question of the Week" approach. Each Monday a new quality question dealing with ISO, our procedures, training, etc. gets posted on the bulletin boards throughout the plant. On Friday, the President, Executive Vice President and Vice President of Operations takes a stroll through the plant and asks various employees (supervisors as well as general works) the answer to the quality question. If they answer correctly, they get a $2 bill. Those who answer correctly also get their names posted on the bulletin board, with "Last Friday, the following employees won the respect and admiration of their friends and loved ones by knowing the answer to the Quality Question". We like to keep it fun. I've been toying with the idea of replacing the $2 bills with pens or something that can be a longer reminder.

We have found that this keeps quality on everyone's mind.

Cheers!!

Mike

[E Wall]

Does there seem to be the same folks over and over winning the $2 bills? What a FAB! and clever concept, by the way. Thank you for sharing this idea. If your of a mind to I'd love maybe a copy of some 'general' types questions you ask. Also how long has this been done? and have you been able to show an effect? I would like to propose this idea to our company and anticipate a number of questions.

Thank you again! Eileen

[Michael T]

Originally posted by E Wall
Does there seem to be the same folks over and over winning the $2 bills? What a FAB! and clever concept, by the way. Thank you for sharing this idea. If your of a mind to I'd love maybe a copy of some 'general' types questions you ask. Also how long has this been done? and have you been able to show an effect? I would like to propose this idea to our company and anticipate a number of questions.

Thank you again! Eileen

Hi Eileen,

We try not to ask the same individuals each week. We only have 150 employees, so it's not that difficult. We've been doing this for over a year. Unfortunately, there tends to be some repetition in the questions over a period of time (perhaps my fault as I can get somewhat lazy in trying to think up new questions... ) While we don't directly measure the effect, I like to throw a question or two in during internal audits to see if they have stuck. By-and-large employees remember the questions and the answers. Here are a few of the more general questions we ask:

- Why are documents stamped with the red "Controlled" stamp?
- What should you do if you think that a Controlled Document is incorrect?
- What should you do if you want to change a procedure in your work area?
- What should you do if a Calibrated Instrument falls on the floor or fails to check accurately at the beginning of your shift?
- How do you know an employee is allowed (trained or in-training) to perform a job?
- What do you do if you are unsure of a specific answer during an audit?

I hope these give you a general idea of the type of questions we ask. The other questions are more specific to our procedures, etc.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

Cheers!!

Mike

Thanks everyone for all these great ideas. Not only will they increase the quality culture throughout the year, but it will give us an opportunity to gauge the health of the quality system. I will keep everyone updated on the results of the quality week.