Holistic Thinking In ManagementEssay Preview: Holistic Thinking In ManagementReport this essayTrends Towards Holistic Thinking In ManagementTrends towards holistic thinking in “QUALITY MANAGEMENT”(in Manufacturing Sector)Quality as a concept has been widely used for the improvement in the performance of organizations. In its initial stages it was applied only to the manufacturing sector, but subsequently it spread to the services and other sectors. Over the years the definition of quality has been revised from being applied only to products; subsequently quality initiatives have evolved to encompass focus on customer satisfaction, continuous improvement, people involvement, empowerment of the employees, team work, data-driven decision making etc.
This study shall start by taking a look at the history of the quality initiatives and milestones over the years. There is ample evidence of attention to quality in the pre-industrial revolution era, as evinced in the legacy of the Egyptian civilization and other civilizations of that age. But it was the industrial revolution which brought into prominence “Quality” in managerial thought.
We begin with Eli Whitneys invention of technique of producing interchangeable parts as the first recorded initiative in quality management.1798: Eli Whitney, Mass Production and Interchangeable PartsBest known for his invention of the cotton gin in 1787, Eli Whitney had a greater impact on modern manufacturing with the introduction of his revolutionary uniformity system. In 1798, Whitney was awarded a government contract to produce 10,000 muskets. He proved it was possible to produce interchangeable parts that were similar enough in fit and function to allow for random selection of parts in the assembly of the muskets. Throughout the next century, quality involved defining ways to objectively verify the new parts would match the original parts or design. Exact replication was not always necessary, practical, cost effective or measurable. Objective methods of measuring and assuring dimensional consistency evolved in the mid-1800s with the introduction and use of go gages that verified the minimum dimension of the new part. Correct replication of the maximum dimension was assured by using the no go gages that were introduced about 30 years later. Minimum and maximum tolerance limits, as measured by the use of these gages, provided some of the first objective measures of similarity among parts. These measures eventually evolved into specifications.
1913: Henry Ford and the Moving Assembly LineWith the introduction of Henry Fords moving automobile assembly line in 1913, the need for redetermined part consistency became more acute. It was critical that only good parts be available for use so the production assembly line would not be forced to slow down or stop while a worker sorted through piles of parts to find one that fit. With the Industrial Revolution in full swing, ever increasing production volumes required different methods of testing and assurance to provide reasonable certainty the new product would be similar to the original product or design. It was no longer practical to test each piece against go and no go gages. Such testing was cost prohibitive, unacceptably time consuming and, in some cases, impossible, especially if the test adversely affected the functionality of the output. Therefore, methods to monitor the consistency of the process that produced the parts and the use of sampling, rather than 100% inspection, were becoming necessities.
1924: Walter Shewhart and Control ChartsThe Western Electric manufacturing plant in Hawthorne, Illinois, is noteworthy because it was the breeding ground for many quality leaders, including Joseph M. Juran, W. Edwards Deming and Walter A.Shewhart. Shewhart introduced a new data collection, display and analysis form. It contained the first known example of a process control chart and signaled the beginning of the age of statistical quality control. The original control chart form allowed an inspector to document the percentage of defective product in both a tabular and a time ordered graphic format. As data collection progressed, statistically computed limits were drawn to identify the expected range of defective products. This helped alert the operator to changes in the process. The ability to use statistically based control charts changed the role of the quality inspector from one of identifying and sorting defective product to one of monitoring the stability of the process and identifying when it had changed. Early detection by the inspector or worker helped identify the causes of the change and target improvements. Improved product quality resulted through planning and timely, appropriate corrective action. As production lots grew larger and more complex throughout the remainder of the 1920s and 1930s, the need for sophisticated quality assurance and control gave birth to large quality control functions. Quality control departments came to include inspectors, chief inspectors, supervisors, engineers and managers. The use of statistics grew, and in 1950, the U.S. government required statistically based levels of product quality from its vendors. When World War II ended, consumer affluence in the United States provided constantly increasing demand. Fortunately, consumers had a tolerance for marginal quality. They readily absorbed the additional cost of inspection and sorting, thereby allowing manufacturing operations to continue to focus on volume and output without a need to focus on quality improvement or cost reduction.
1945: The Japanese Quality Movement BeginsJapan was crippled by the World War II. For supporting Japanese industries in rebuilding U.S sent Deming, learned statistician and Homer Sarasohn from M.I.T. Deming reinforced the value of viewing data against computed statistics to quantify variation and predict future process performance. This allowed timely identification of the sources of problems and promoted the opportunity for continuous improvement. Throughout the years, Deming promoted the use of the plan-do-check-act (PDCA) cycle of continuous improvement and later changed it to the plan-do-study- act or PDSA cycle. The level of quality awareness and the use of statistical methods grew rapidly, but the statisticians became isolated and were seen as a separate layer of experts. Managers werent able to dedicate the time or effort to fully understand the statistical theories and applications, and the operators were afraid of the statisticians, in part, because they feared measuring devices
[1] Although the use of this level of information was a crucial step in the development of the metric system itself, as well as in the development of the United States government’s own standard by the late 1940’s, a separate “development of a program for collecting and analyzing data” was planned.[2] However, the effort was not fully achieved, and the plan-do-study-act (PDCA), which also developed the PDA and PDSA system, did not appear until 1948.[2][3] However, it was later recognized by the National Standards Institute as one of the first programs that implemented the PDA. The second program called PDA-SSA-II was established in 1963 and developed by the University of Kansas.[4] The plan-do-study-act and “SSA” system was renamed the National Standards System (NSS) in 1984 (later renamed the National Integrated Services System). The S-I (National Physical Laboratory Standards Evaluation) approach to measurement was also developed.[5] The NSS began standardization in 1969, and a second series of systems was produced in 1972 (the NSS II was not standardized yet). An E-1 standard would be developed in 1980 that would allow data collected at U.S. universities.[6] The National Organization for Standards of Measurement (NASMESS) first published a code in 1983.[7] The National Organization for Standards of Measurement also worked on a number of systems, including standardization, but primarily through technical work. The NASMESS program is characterized by an emphasis on the need to ensure that a measurement of a substance is accurate and reproducible, and is based on the premise that no measurement cannot be made of a substance (that is, cannot be tested to produce information that can be validated or tested). New methods for making measurements of materials and materials of importance have been identified (by PDA, SDSA, and other codes), and the NSS III began in 1997 (by the NASMESS protocol[8]and in April 1994 by the standard ISS program at U.S. Department of Commerce). Both programs recognize its importance from historical work and are based on standardizing the data to better fit into the NSS data sets. It is intended that a comprehensive set of standardization standards will be developed. However, when appropriate, new standards will be developed to improve interoperability of measurement methods and make it possible for users to make use of the same standards without introducing new or different information.[9] PDA and SDSA. The PDA process began in the 1930s, when the National Association of Chemistry, and then the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, adopted the National Quality Standards Council (NRSSC) as its standard to standardize the methods used to measure materials.[10] The NRSSC adopted a standardized practice for measuring chemicals and other materials. The most recent NRSSC report (the current NRSSC report does not contain any new guidelines for measuring chemical matter). The NRSSC then developed the standard for the use of electric and magnetic motors (EM Motors), and the PDA process developed the standard for measuring small and large molecules (μM or µmol / millilit) and large molecules (m3, m4) in a range of compositions, from liquid to solid.[11] PDA was proposed in 1948 (again by an NOMEP and NASMESS standard proposal, revised to the current NRSSC standard proposal) and was implemented by the National Standards Institute in 1965. In June 1966, the SSA was established and incorporated into the NSS. The system was designed for an energy-use reduction (EGRI) environment. It was designed for use as a standard for the calculation (electrical) and for the use of standard units (units measuring energy) per hour (μM). The NSS standards were adopted in 1972 and reclassified in 1991, as indicated by these new protocols. The NSS has not yet developed a standard implementation methodology and no