Deming (1984) - (Booth, 1993)

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Content Theory - Deming (1984): Quality (Also my notes Deming's “Out of the Crisis”, 1984)

Deming argued that the “good enough” attitude resulted in failure.

Low quality means high costs. Cost of rework is only part of the cost of poor quality.

Institutionalised rules mean that workers know a crisis will occur in advance, but the system prevents them from doing anything about it, forcing them to product poor quality.

The following are Deming's 14 points of management, from "Out of the Crisis"( points 1-6):

1. Create consistency of purpose for improvement of product and service. Problems of tomorrow as well as today need to be considered. Allocate resources into research and education.
2. Adopt the new philosophy (in Japan). Americans accept too many defects and mistakes
3. Cease dependence on mass inspection. Quality comes from improvement, not inspection. Inspection is too late. What is required is training of workers to understand the causes and repercussions of mistakes.
4. End the practice of awarding business on the basis of price tag alone. Price is meaningless without quality. “The US government, civil and military, are being rooked by rules that award business to the lowest bidder” It is advised that employees are more greatly valued, having a say in operating decisions, such as planning, goal-setting and monitoring of performance. They can make decisions which pack some weight to the movements of the firm. Quality circles are useful. There is an emphasis on close-knit relations between parties, such as management and worker, and firm and supplier.
5. Improve constantly and forever the system of production and service. Quality must be built in at the design stage and there must be “continual improvement in test methods” (pg49). Never-ending improvement requires maintenance of close relationships. An evaluation at the end of the year is useless, as the mistakes need to be corrected immediately, or made so that they do not happen at all.
6. Institute training. Training in the US is too variable and often not good enough.

Deming's points of management continued

More on quality

Content Theory - Minzberg (1973): “Facts of managerial life”

Systems Theory - Morgan (1986)

Contingency Theory - Burns and Stalker (1961)

Change Management - Gibson et al.