You all knew that I would chime in sooner or later. I've been on spring break for a few days so here goes:
The only problem with saying that everyone is responsible for quality is that it has come to mean that the worker must produce quality product and service regardless of the system or process in place. Any worker is responsible for learning how to do the job as defined by the process and then actually implementing what they learned. In a quality progressive company, they would also be responsible for identifying failures in quality. Ultimately, the systems define quality and we all know who is responsible for systems.
Yeah, Management! Ahhhh, the Deming Disciples have arrived. Perfect answer, Mr. Pflanz.
I think your posts say it all. Just another meaningless phrase in the manual. Don't bother, IMO.
Knowing you, Sidney, I know what you mean. Allow me to translate: If you don't really let everyone be responsible for quality then the phrase is meaningless. Responsibility + authority = accountability. I cannot be accountable for the quality of process that I do not have the authority to change. Nor should I be changing a process for which I am not responsible.
... remember we have two types of customers - the internal customers and the external customers" . In this view , everyone should satisfy his next customers. That tends up to build and satisfy our external customers.
ABSOLUTELY! With this kind of thinking you can put statements like the one below in your Quality Policy. If you look at our organizational chart over in
this thread, you will see what it looks like when you have a chain of customers that goes backwards and forwards.
I completely agree with you Jennifer.Management cares a least about quality because it is not a money generating department, Being in a software company it is very evident...But imagine a company without a quality assurance dept...will it sustain an existing customer? or can it generate a new customer...definitely not!...
MY quality department is a PROFIT generating department. Since receiving our ISO cert. We have grown about 10% in revenues but at the same time we have reduced the amount spent on poor quality every quarter, both as a percentage of total sales and as an absolute $ figure. We can sell the exact same mix of products in the exact same quantity as two years ago and make money now, instead of just breaking even.
One of the 5 bullets in our Quality Policy reads:
Every member of the Team is accountable for both process quality and product quality.
There is no "Not my job" here. We have taken the time to train people in systems thinking, interpersonal relationship skills, and our quality management system. Once that's done you have the capability to make "everyone responsible" for quality. The Sales Team can't just go rushing into the Shipping area and start making process changes without getting the Warehouse Team involved. With everyone equipped to work together, you can raise an "accountability" issue with the Sales Team if they know about a Shipping problem and do nothing to work with the Warehouse Team to solve it. By the same reasoning, you could raise the accountability issue with the Warehouse Team should the Sales Team bring them a quality issue only to have it ignored.
Let's say that the Service Team knows about a consistent failure mode in a product based on warranty returns. They don't tell the Engineering Team. Now, who is accountable for the CONTINUED warranty returns on shipping product? The Engineering Team who failed to take into account a potential failure mode? Or the Service Team for doing what they are supposed to do: fix products and send them back AND [IN OUR SYSTEM] feedback the repair results? Guess what? IT'S BOTH!!! If everyone in this miniature system example does not believe that they are accountable for the failure mode and everyone does not work to solve it, then you will continue to have the same failure mode. Of course, this could also be the Quality Team for not analyzing the results from the Service Team and communicating the precious few to the Engineering Team. Let me tell you something: in a healthy system, Service would be sick of Engineers always dropping by to chat about what kind of failures they've been seeing lately, Engineering would be tired of Service hauling them in to show them the latest innovative way that the customer found to break our products ("Can you believe the customer microwaved this?", "You heard me, I used it to hold up a fork lift", and "I'm not sure, what's the difference between 12 volts DC and 120 volts AC, again?) and both teams would be sick of Quality constantly bugging them for the next Continual Improvement on their "screamlined" processes.
