Quality Management: Past, Present & Future. A Case from the Manufacturing Sector

Yesterday, we delivered our final event before the summer break. At the London Branch of the Chartered Quality Institute, we aim to bring a diverse set of events throughout the year that cater to Quality Professionals from all sectors and industries. Yesterday’s event was our fifth event and it was about the Quality Management Systems, their origins, traditional implementation, their current state and how they are evolving into the future.

The event was presented by Thiago Barcelos, a Chartered Quality Professional and a Quality Manager at Dyson. Thiago shared his international experience with various organisations in the manufacturing industry. A human and social need that set the face of quality, moved into this cumbersome boring non value added time of documents over documents that do not reflect what businesses need. So where is the QMS at now and where is it heading?

Working with Quality Management Systems in organisations that are multicultural and multi dimensional in the products and services they offer, as well as geographical locations they operate in is almost always faced with what is called the Babel Syndrome.

People in different departments and office locations speak different languages, would be working on very similar tasks or projects but the communication between them is not efficient at all that causes the business lots of operational waste and therefore money.

To overcome this syndrome, Thiago shared his experience and how he sets out to build an integrated QMS that answers to the needs of all interested parties. His approach is the pyramid approach with four key top-down aspects:

• Guidelines and over all structure
• Department Map
• Department Processes
• Forms, Instructions and Manuals

These aspects are very important as they help organisations understand what the framework they are operating within and most importantly help the Quality Professionals understand the scope of their work. Once the framework is clearly defined by leadership and the corporate quality professionals, it moves into the second layer of department leadership and process owners who define the ‘what’. This has to come from them and be aligned with the framework as they are the experts of what they do. Quality professionals play an important role in guiding the process owners, and helping them identify a structured approach such as SIPOC – Suppliers, Inputs, Process, Outputs, Customer.

Once the department processes are completed, layer 4 of the pyramid kicks in. This is the layer that should be fully driven by the people doing the work. Quality professionals should not be involved to this level. They should allow and encourage those who own the work to produce whatever they see suitable for the process, as long as it is aligned with the framework.

By following this approach, the entire concept of quality management  is already evolving from a ‘Quality’ to ‘Business’ Management where knowledge is embedded within the entire system.

It was indeed a great event that had lots of experiences shared by the speaker. It was well received by the audience and I could not help but notice several people snap pictures of the slides and take notes as Thiago shared his ‘how-to’ approach within a QMS.

If you are registered for the event and attended, you will definitely receive the slides that were presented and use them for your reference. This event was open to members and non-members of the Chartered Quality Institute. If you would like to know what we do as a committee and how you can be involved or know when such events are taking place, please get in touch, and I will be glad to assist.