Total Quality Management - Essay Example

Total Quality Management (TQM) is ‘an approach to improving the competitiveness, effectiveness and flexibility of a whole organization’ (O’Neill & Sohal, 1999). This requires planning, organizing and understanding each activity. The focal point is improving process performance with a view to derive total customer satisfaction. Wang (1996) refers to TQM as an important methodology to integrate lateral functions and implement best practices. Implementation of such a plan on a continuous basis allows the business process to remain fresh, innovative and powerful throughout. TQM is based on the practice and assumption that problems should be dealt with at the point of origin itself. Each process in any business, like sales, marketing, operations, finance, production, planning, personnel, technical, have parameters of input. If the input is wrong, the output is bound to be wrong. Wang suggests that the correction should be made at the input level itself, which minimizes the chances of a wrong output. Silos also agrees that every aspect and every process of the business system should be involved so that all functions – vertically and horizontally across all levels are covered (1999 cited by Cannon, 2002). Although there have been modification to the adaptation of the TQM, the essential principles of this management philosophy remains the same. This paper will highlight how Marriott considered the TQM in their hotels. Marriott International has always been known as an employee-oriented family atmosphere organization. As service expectation of the existing customers and potential customers have gone up, and as TQM is a management philosophy based on continuous improvement, Marriott felt the need to consider TQM in their company to be able to deliver quality service and to sustain their image in the competitive market. To be able to consider TQM in their organization, Marriott first ventured to define TQM in their own style. To them, TQM meant: # Total – everyone is involved. # Quality – delighting the customer. # Management – organizing not supervising The philosophy of the founder of Marriott was “Take care of Marriott people and they will take care of Marriott guests” (Cannon, 2002). They were in essence attempting to satisfy both their internal and external customers by the TQM approach. They believe that “Hands-on managers” are absolutely vital to continuing the Marriott culture. The managers need to possess the people skills in being able to support, inspire, encourage, lead and listen to associates. Employees leave the organization or form unions when they are dissatisfied with the management. With the changed business environment, emphasis is now on soft skills like conflict resolution and stress management instead of technicalities. It is essential that managers should be well trained so that retaining employees is easier as retention is a critical issue in most organizations today. TQM aims at striving for perfection, a continuous improvement in all that people do, no matter how small or big the improvement is. Marriott decided that quality would be their new culture which would be well integrated into their business plan. The five different functions at Marriott include finance, people, product and service, sales and marketing, and development (Dodwell & Simmons, 1994). Each of these functions individually and collectively contributes to quality. All the elements had to be integrated into a quality manner so that the jigsaw picture fits easily into a larger picture – that of the outside world. This implies that the strategy for quality had to fit into the demands of the competitive market place. In line with their employee-oriented philosophy, the middle managers at Marriott were given the responsibility to involve and empower the staff, encourage participation, give them authority to do things they could never think of doing. This led to the frustration among the middle managers who felt lost and neglected. They were confused about their position in the new structure. The organization then realized that before they could have a bottom-up culture, they needed to have a top-down education and learning process in place. They needed to look back and take stock of what had been achieved, they needed to identify the problem areas, and they needed to rethink their approach, without losing momentum. Subsequently Marriott started a quality circle program and appointed a quality support manager. They then selected circle leaders and put them under a two-day training program. A quality circle facilitator for each property as also appointed who was also put under two-day facilitator training course. Marriott thus had 65 circles operating in 11 hotels within three months. This led to high motivation, involvement and participation. Within six months obstacles started to appear and issues were being raised. The middle management was uncooperative and the managers could not attend hotel meetings due to preoccupation with business. The managers, who could previously tackle the problems on their own, ignored the problems and the attitude was that staff had been empowered to take decisions. The top management at Marriott had assumed that the managers would accept the new idea without even questioning the facts. The problem at Marriott was further compounded as they had three types of managers – the committed and self-educated, the lip-service brigade and the old-fashioned cynics. This situation necessitates the TQM approach in Marriott. Marriott did attempt to give some direction through this business model: Source: Dodwell & Simmons, 1994 This business model of theirs lacked in education and training for the managers. There was no involvement of the top management either. Both these are essential to attain TQM. Marriott needs to apply TQM in their middle managers and the issue of communication. In order to introduce the TQM at Marriott it is first essential to understand the underlying objectives of TQM. The top management team at Marriott has to take an informed decision in this approach. In the hospitality industry, service is an intangible product which requires the involvement of employees. Analysts Kanji and Asher while considering TQM stressed the expansion of the role of employees as internal customers (1993 cited by Cannon, 2002). Hence satisfying customers’ requirements relates to both internal and external customers. The TQM principle states that the internal customers are real and unless there are satisfactory internal working relations, it is difficult to achieve the satisfaction of the external customers. Studies suggest that in the hospitality industry TQM has implications on the entire workforce. Finn and Porter (1994) confirm that improving an organization’s effectiveness, efficiency, motivation and responsiveness can be achieved only by the active involvement of people in process improvement. Communication is the most essential element in interdepartmental relationships. This requires carefully listening and communicating the progress of work. Internal service counter is also strongly related with communication. Internal suppliers need to build their bridges with their customers, verify their expectations on a regular basis, provide them with a forum to express concerns and issues, create a means to communicate information and share knowledge. Cross-functional teams like the TQM team can ensure proper flow of information and work together on potential problems. This improves the service quality within the service chain. Interpersonal relations in the hospitality industry affect both the internal and external service encounters. The right service culture minimizes the interdepartmental conflicts (Paraskevas, 2001). The management of any business according to the Deming’s consideration has two sets of problems – problems of today and those of tomorrow (Kruger, 2001). Problems of today encompass the immediate needs while those of future concern the purpose and dedication to quality improvement. Managers need to have a commitment to the organization and work towards its objectives on a long-term basis. Quality comes from the improvement of company’s work processes. Quality management has to be an on-going never ending process. This has to be tackled simultaneously through all functions. Hence, Marriott first needs to understand that total quality means that each employee has to take the responsibility of managing and systematically improving their own processes. Secondly, as most authors and researchers state, top management support and involvement is essential to bring about a change. They should be personally involved in inspiring quality (Juran cited by Kruger). The culture of Marriott should be such that every employee takes pride in what he does. Management has to generate a cultural atmosphere in the company so that people are not scared to ask questions or make suggestions. Flow of communication across departments and different levels is essential. There has to be total expertise from all departments to solve problems. Today’s TQM approach stresses on the need to positively motivate the individual employee to dedicate himself to quality work. There should be a Quality Council which coordinates the functions of various departments. Quality policies should guide the managerial actions. Management should also establish quality goals. Quality control has to be an integral part of the function. According to Feigenbaum, TQM provides the fundamental basis of positive commitment to quality for all employees from the top management to the shop floor workers. TQM should be able to build up employee responsibility for quality. It is the total participation of all employees and the total integration of all the technical and human resources that contribute to business success. The management at Marriott should understand that when the product or service conforms to requirements the question of quality does not arise (Crosby cited by Kruger). Besides, quality problems do not originate with the workers. The management has to lead by example. Quality should be the responsibility of every employee. Quality begins with education and ends with education (Ishikawa cited by Kruger). Quality should be everyone’s concern. Everyone should grasp the tools and techniques of TQM. Marriott should pay attention to internal customers and internal relationships. It should be the common goal of each department to satisfy the external customer. A set of core values like customer focus, management commitment, process focus, continuous improvements, and fact based decisions unite the description of TQM. It requires cross-functional thinking, planning and execution (Svensson & Wood, 2006). TQM is the essence of a strategic management approach and its implementation requires major changes in the organizational structure to support three activities – decision making, performance measure systems and compensations systems. TQM emphasizes on efficiencies throughout the organization. The business strategy should be based on the knowledge of the customers, the market and the internal processes used to run the business (Matthews, 2006). With the objectives set on improving internal relations and communications, with the involvement of every individual, responsibility and commitment by the top management, Marriott should take steps to achieve the objectives. Managers need to have a direction and knowledge how to move ahead. While Marriott had formed a quality improvement team, they had not introduced any tools and techniques to achieve TQM. Quality, unless regularly checked and controlled, tends to deteriorate over time. The two major areas where Marriott needed to pay attention were training of the employees, including mentoring and coaching, and involvement with responsibility of the top management. Interpersonal relations between managers were strained, as also across departments. The managers had become indifferent when importance and power was given to the workers. Stress led to conflicts. Marriott needed to concentrate on three core sectors to improve efficiency – employee retention, attracting new and retaining existing customers and profit conversion. Progress also needs to be measured and communicate effectively as this can serve as a great motivational factor. The middle managers or the line managers are critical to any organization. Marriott should inculcate a culture of positivity and accountability. If every individual takes responsibility for his own process and progress, TQM is achieved because in words of Crosby, when service conforms to requirements, the question of quality does not arise. Various tools can be used at Marriott to improve efficiency and effectiveness of all operations. Six Sigma is a popular approach and is extensively used in the service industry. Technology changes the way we think about quality and this is how the concept of six sigma came into existence. When automated processes are available, quality level should be high. The acceptable quality level moved from being measured in percentage to measuring in parts of billion. A Six Sigma quality level is said to equate to 3.4 defects per million opportunities (Lmu, n.d.). The basic approach is to identify shortcomings, defects, analyze the causes and make improvements. Six sigma has a customer focus, is data driven, and is proactive. This requires determining the critical success factors, which in the case of Marriott has already been identified. The success of Six Sigma relies on management involvement. They must be involved in the creation and management of the process management system and also participate in the project themselves (Coronado & Antony, 2002). They need to improve upon employee retention, effective communication and customer satisfaction. Each of these core areas have to be broken into sub-actions. For employee retention Marriott has to find out which departments have the maximum attrition, who or what is responsible, whether it is pay structure, lack of motivation or communication with the line managers. Communication strategies have also to be designed after diagnosing the problem areas. Are the workers allowed platform to express grievances? Education and training are essential to bring about changes. This would again require breaking up the different areas and workers who require training. Each element has to be broken into several sub-elements to get the right results. To show tangible improvements in each of these areas would require at least one lean and one high season to get the realistic results. The employee exits can be measured at the beginning and end of the year. Communication effectiveness would reflect partly in customer satisfaction, customer retention and employee retention. To determine customer satisfaction, feedback forms, focus groups of regular customers, interactive website with comments would help. Customer loyalty programs could help determine how many customers are coming back or referring others to the hotel. If customer retention and employee retention have increased, communication has been effective. Thus TQM is a holistic approach which requires the involvement, commitment and acceptance of responsibility of the top management. While Marriott may have been people oriented, they neglected the middle managers who today are the core of human resources. Motivation plays a vital role in fostering communication and accountability. Every individual has to be educated and trained, and if necessary mentoring may also be provided. To survive competition, and to reduce attrition in the hospitality industry, retention has to be encouraged. This can come when employees feel ownership of the firm where they work. The top management has to lead the way without which the subordinate tend to slack too. It is essential that a key person in the organization takes the responsibility to facilitate and stimulate the whole process. Any change tends to bring resistance but applying the tested tools helps reduce this resistance. Empowerment in an organization is good but power and authority have to go hand in hand with responsibility. This requires adequate training and development. Marriott empowered the workers before the right training was given to them. Interdepartmental relations and internal service factors have to be taken into consideration. If the employees are internal customers, due care and attention should be given before empowerment. The allocation for improvement of quality and the way quality is measured are also important issues. The tools should be employed to measure not just the efficiency of the people but the process as well. TQM is not difficult to achieve when each individual dedicates himself to the process improvement. References: Cannon, D. F., (2002), Managing Service Quality Volume 12 Number 2 2002 pp. 87-99 Coronado, R. B., & Antony, J., (2002), Critical Success Factors for the succesful implementation of six sigma projects in organizations, The TQM Magazine Volume 14 . Number 2 . 2002 . pp. 92-99 Dodwell, S., & Simmons, P., (1994), Trials and Tribulations in the Pursuit of Quality Improvement, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Volume 6 Nos. 1/2, 1994, pp. 14-18 Finn, M., & Porter, L. J., (1994), The TQM Magazine Volume 6 Number 4 1994 pp. 56-61 Keating, M., & Harrington, D., (2002), The challenges of implementing quality in the Irish Hotel Industry: a review, Managing Service Quality, Vol. 12 No. 5 pp. 303-315 Kruger, V., (2001), Main schools of TQM: ``the big five, The TQM Magazine Volume 13 . Number 3 . 2001 . pp. 146-155 Lmu (n.d.), Six Sigma, 28 Feb 2007 Matthews, C. R., (2006), Linking the supply chain to TQM, Quality Progress, 25 Feb 2007 ONeill, P., & Sohal, A. S., (1999), Business Process Reengineering A review of recent literature, Technovation 19 (1999) 571–581 Paraskevas, A., (2001), Internal Service Encounters in Hotels, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 13/6 2001 pp. 285-292 Svensson, G., & Wood, G., (2006), Business ethics in TQM, The TQM Magazine Vol. 17 No. 1, 2005 pp. 19-34 Wang, W., (1996), Japanese Implementation of Quality, 25 Feb 2007 Read More