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© 2001 Sandholm Associates
Do we need a quality manager?
PAPER TO THE 4TH INTERNATIONAL QMOD CONFERENCE 2001
IN LINKÖPING, SWEDEN
Dr. Lennart Sandholm
Professor and President, Sandholm Associates AB, Djursholm, Sweden
Abstract
Occasionally it is said that there should be no need for a quality manager in the organization. Each and every individual in the company has a responsibility for quality and so it is obvious that a quality manager is superfluous. This opinion reflects a misunderstanding of what quality management is about. There are two important aspects on a business - finance and quality. The financial part is managed by means of a finance manager - a highly respected profession. The same should apply to the quality manager. Due to ignorance, this is generally not the case. The consequence is that managers of the quality function are not recruited with regard to the necessary professional competence. Quality management is actually a professional area very similar to financial management. There are many tasks, important to the company's success, to be assigned to the quality manager. Such tasks are related to strategic business development, quality promotion, improvement work, follow-up, co-ordination, etc.
FROM INSPECTION TO TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT
The way of managing for quality has during the last 80 years been developing a great deal. This is of course due to tremendous development of the industrial and service sectors. Managing for quality has gone from being dealing solely with inspection in the 1920's to be more and more involved nowadays in company-wide strategic issues with a wide implication for the business outcome (Sandholm, 2000). The principles of total quality management are more widely put into practice, in the private sector as well in the public sector. Due to these developments the role of the quality manager is changing.
Sometimes it is said that there is no need for a quality manager in the organization. Each and every individual in the company has a responsibility for quality and so it is obvious that the quality manager be made redundant. In addition, it is also said that the goal of the quality department is to work for eliminating itself. Is there a role for a quality manager and, if so, what should this role be?
QUALITY MANAGEMENT COMPARED TO FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT
Another discipline to be considered is financial management, which is a discipline that shares many similarities with quality management. All employees have, to a greater or lesser extent, an affect on the company's financial outcome. The same is true of the result in terms of quality. If a good financial result is to be achieved, co-ordination and control of the entire business with a focus on finance, is essential. The same is true for quality.
To chief executive officers, it is self-evident that they have to give a clear and goal-oriented leadership directed towards finance. This leadership is also focused on achieving the intended result in monetary terms. To support this leadership, the company has a finance department, managed by a finance manager. This structure is regarded as a matter of course in medium-sized and large companies. But what clear and goal-oriented leadership do chief executive officers provide when it comes to quality? They might not see leadership of quality as quite so obvious. This has to do with a lack of understanding and knowledge of how to manage for quality.
Just as a chief executive officer in the provision of leadership within the financial area requires the support of employees who are professionals within the field, the exercise of leadership within the field of quality also requires the support of professionals in that particular field. It is here that the quality manager and the quality department have an important role today. Recognition of the fact that every individual has a responsibility for the company's financial result in no way implies that there is no need for a finance manager or a finance department.
QUALITY MANAGEMENT IS A PROFESSION
Nobody questions the fact that financial management is a profession. The job of finance manager is not given to a person without an education in economics and accounting. Finance managers have generally completed a four-year university education within their professional field. Professionalism in this field is a must.
Do we make equivalent demands when appointing a quality manager? It is hardly so in many companies. Other qualifying factors come into the picture. It may be that the individual in question has experience of the company's operations or is well known within the organization as good at working with others and possessing a sound judgment. There could be numerous reasons and many of them quite sensible, but the rate for the selection of a person for the job of quality manager seldom is based on his or her knowledge within the field of quality management. This fact is sometimes due to the view that quality management is not a profession, and sometimes to the lack of people with a proper qualification in the field.
Recruiting senior personnel within the quality area without requiring them to be professionals can have unfortunate consequences for the business. Quality is, properly speaking, a question of how a business is to develop. The wrong choice of strategies and methods, incorrect ranking of priorities and missed opportunities can have very serious consequences. Selecting a quality manager without paying regard to professional competence can be just as serious a mistake as appointing a finance manager without checking if he or she is qualified in economics and finance.
THE TASK OF THE QUALITY MANAGER
The role of the quality manager varies from company to company and so do the tasks. Listed below are areas where there is a need for the services of a competent quality manager.
1. Acceptance and verification
There was a time during the development of the quality profession when questions relating to the acceptance of manufactured products would normally be the responsibility of an inspection department, which was run by a quality control manager or chief inspector. Many companies have abandoned this type of organization. This area of responsibility has been transferred to the respective line-department, which is a sound development. In some cases, however, the traditional organization has been retained, and then usually with a change of title from quality control manager or chief inspector to quality manager. The quality manager in this traditional form of organization is responsible for activities relating to inspection, such as incoming inspection, in-process inspection, final inspection and inspection planning. The work can also involve tasks relating to the verification and validation of new products (including software).
2. Follow-up
In this area, the role of the quality manager is similar to that of the controller in the financial area. It is a matter of following up to ensure that the tasks are being performed in the desired manner and that established goals are being reached.
The duties of the quality manager include producing information that shows the results in terms of quality, as well as providing management and other parties concerned with the information they need. The work therefore includes developing, introducing and maintaining systems for the feedback of information concerning customer satisfaction, existence of faults and failures, costs associated with poor quality, process output, results of quality audits, etc.
Follow-up also includes responsibility for quality auditing. This could include system audits, process audits and product audits. At companies possessing ISO 9000 certification, the quality manager also has responsibility for the internal audits required by the standard.
3. Running improvement projects
Improvement activities shall be conducted in a structured way and they should include the products and services provided, as well as how the operations are being conducted. The object is to satisfy the customers' requirements more effectively and also to eliminate faults and failures. Special consideration must be paid to chronic problems.
The quality manager has an important role to play in the improvement process. Initially, the role includes developing a structure for the improvement activities as well as the necessary procedures and pattern of responsibility. The quality manager shall then drive the actual improvement process, which means ensuring that information on the quality status is available, identifying and ranking improvement projects on the basis of analyses, and ensuring that improvement projects are started and completed. The quality manager is responsible for ensuring that information on improvements made is brought to the attention within the organization.
Improvement work according to a Six Sigma approach is gaining in interest. More and more companies are practicing Six Sigma as an improvement strategy. In these companies the quality manager has a key role. It could be as a master black belt or as a Six Sigma deployment director.
4. Promotion
Many companies, if they are to achieve significant improvements, will need to give their internal culture a greater focus on quality. This requires changes in attitudes and the introduction of new knowledge and skills. Everyone in the company must become involved in this process.
Changing processes like these have to be initiated and driven by the quality manager. This includes, above all, planning and providing training in quality for everyone in the organization. Naturally, this does not mean that the quality manager has to act as instructor himself or herself, but he must see to it that the training is arranged and carried out in such a way that it has a significant effect on the operations. Training in quality must not become an end in itself.
The quality manager will also exert influence in various other ways. One such way is to serve as a source of inspiration and motivation, not only in the day-to-day work but in many other situations.
5. Source of information
For companies to be successful even in the future it is necessary to keep up with the professional developments that takes place in areas important to success. A major area of this kind is quality. The quality manager has to follow the developments of the quality profession, both nationally and internationally, and use the information collected for benchmarking purposes. Steps that seem eligible as an outcome of this effort are proposed to top management.
The quality manager serves within the organization as a source of information on the state of the art of the quality profession.
6. Strategic business development
Quality is of strategic importance to every company. This means that the business is being continuously developed with a focus on quality, for which a strategic plan should exist. This plan should combine different concepts, approaches and methods in such a way that the company achieves excellent results.
The quality manager plays an important role in the development of the business by providing top management with ideas and advice on issues for how the business can be developed with a focus on quality. The tasks also include preparing the ground for management to make strategic decisions and supporting management in the strategic planning. All important decisions of a strategic nature are naturally made by top management.
For the business to be developed successfully, it is essential that the quality manager is properly qualified in the quality profession. He should be able to judge what the company should be doing to achieve the excellent results intended.
7. Coordination and management
All activities that have an impact on quality must be coordinated. It is also important to have quality-oriented leadership practices. Without such coordination and leadership, there is a serious risk of the company's operations suffering from sub-optimization and ill-considered activities.
The quality manager supports top management in this area by taking steps to ensure that the operations are conducted in a structured and systematic manner. This involves ensuring that the work has a process orientation, as well as dealing with matters pertaining to quality policy, quality goals, quality systems and organizing for quality.
8. Partnership with customers and suppliers
A close cooperation with customers and suppliers is becoming more common. Such a cooperation is particularly important to develop with customers and suppliers having a considerable impact on the company's situation and result. The term partnership is often used in this connection.
The quality manager has an important role in developing partnership with customers and suppliers when it comes to quality related issues.
9. Certification
For companies aiming at an ISO 9001 certification of their quality system, the quality manager has several tasks:
- to explain what the requirements in the standard mean for the company;
- to ensure that the quality system is structured in a way that suits the company;
- to coordinate the development of the necessary procedures;
- to ensure that the quality system and the relevant procedures are documented;
- to ensure that quality documentation is distributed to the parties concerned;
- to manage the implementation of procedures;
- to handle contacts with the certification body before and during the certification process.
Once the company has obtained certification, the quality manager will have further tasks:
- to ensure that internal quality audits are carried out in accordance with the requirements in the standard;
- to act as the management representative as laid down in the standard, which involves having the authority and responsibility to ensure that the requirements in the standard are satisfied;
- to maintain the quality system and the relevant procedures;
- to ensure that all documentation is kept up-to-date; - to ensure that the documentation is distributed to the parties concerned;
- to handle contacts with the certification body.
10. External representation
The company might have to be represented externally in some contexts. This could involve work on quality committees of trade associations, participation in national quality programs, work on national standardization, and other such representative activities.
It is often most appropriate for the quality manager to represent the company externally in connection with this kind of matters related to quality.
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