TQM
Company Cultural Influence
In the past two decades, many companies restructured and down-sized operations. Gone are the companies that could not compete successfully.
Among many of those that survived, there is a common ingredient. They recognized that they must change. This change involved the basic way they conducted their business.
Culture within many companies changed dramatically. For most companies, the new culture is still is still evolving.
Much of the change involved humanizing the work place. Workers during the 80s were much different from their predecessors. Unskilled labor accounts for only 30% of the work force down from 50% in the 1960s. Women in the work force increased from 16% in the 1940s to 42%. The employees with only an eighth grade education dropped to 6% from 30% in 1950. College graduates now comprise 40% of the work force. The workers are well informed and much more technically oriented. They are also less willing to work in a hierarchical, autocratic business setting. Because of this, many companies have modernized their style of management. Self - management is widely practiced rather than rigid supervision. A team approach involving interested parties is used to solve problems instead of taking the problems to management for solution. In many plants, workers are allowed to stop production lines to assure consistent quality. They also changed to that of a facilitator to help employees make improvements.
Other major changes have taken place in the work environment. There is now a customer centered mentality. It is widely recognized that meeting the needs of the customer is the only way to survive in the market place. Also there is awareness that better solutions are drafted by those involved in the process than management.
The last observation is that the only competitive strategy for a company is continuous improvement. Those believing in continuous improvement recognize that the journey will be long and hard and probably never end.
Quality became the dominant issue. Understanding quality has become a high priority.
There is a common theme to the thinking of the quality gurus of the 1980s, Deming, Juran, Crosby, Feigenbaum and others. They all express a strong agreement that quality must be a fundamental business strategy for accompany to survive. This new strategy was observed as the driver of an immense culture change in companies. Real change in culture is often a painful experience. It forces all employees to adopt new roles. Long term employees may feel uncomfortable in new roles that often result in more participation and responsibility. For management the change is particularly difficult since it seemingly reduces power and authority. A different style of management is necessary involving everyone in decision making.
The process to assure quality product involves everyone in a company. Giant strides were made in creating widespread understanding of these concepts and that is the start of cultural changes in many companies.
