Quality comes first always!

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Quality comes first always! 2016-10-02 Quality and Certification: No one objects to quality. In fact, if you ask ten people, all ten of them will tell you that quality is the most important thing; quality comes first above everything else, it’s absolutely essential to us. However, in real life, a riddle reveals the true mystery behind this. It says this: There is one thing that is most important when talked about, but becomes less important when it comes to taking action; it’s not necessary at critical moments. Please type in a word. What is the answer? Having said that, everyone must have guessed it by now; indeed, the answer is—quality! Back then, Mr. Crosby carefully studied these companies, and through decades of experience in consulting and teaching, he came to the conclusion that if a company faces the following five problems, it is surely an organization plagued by traditional concepts and methods; Mr. Crosby referred to such organizations as \"organizations troubled by quality issues.\" Now let’s take a look at what kind of problems, according to Mr. Crosby, organizations plagued by quality issues actually face Products and services often fail to meet their own promises or customer requirements ； There are many patchwork tasks and \"fire-fighting\" actions ； The policy is unclear; in effect, it allows everyone to make mistakes ； I don’t know if not meeting the requirements will result in real consequences ； Managers often look for various excuses rather than confronting the root of the problem. In many companies, whether they are state-owned, foreign-funded, or private enterprises, I have their managers, especially the senior executives, come together to carefully assess these five issues on their own first, forming individual assessments before combining them into an overall assessment for the entire company. In fact, scoring and self-assessment are very easy. Regarding the above five questions, ask yourself one by one: if you think your organization is like that, give it a score of 5 ； If not, assign a score of 1; if partially true, assign a score of 3. I believe everyone can imagine these answers. Because when most managers get together, they tend to opt for a moderate approach and give scores of 3, while in private conversations they would prefer to give scores of 5 to everything. Sometimes, it happens that when the boss or senior managers are present, they give a score of 1, thinking that things are doing very well right now and there are no problems. Of course, if you compare the answers of middle managers with those of senior executives, you will find that senior executives view issues more realistically. Many times, executives will step forward and say, “Looking at your scores, I feel both happy and sad.” Fortunately, if our organization were truly as you say, it would indeed be something worth celebrating with a toast, but that is not the case. So, my sorrow lies in the fact that, up to now, we are sitting here in front of Teacher Yang without having seriously reflected on our own problems; we have even committed the fifth major mistake and are still looking for various excuses. ” So, what is it that still drives our corporate managers, or what causes these managers to continue operating their companies using traditional management methods? Clearly, our managers are guided and influenced by what Mr. Crosby calls “traditional quality wisdom.” I have repeatedly emphasized one thing to corporate executives: zero defects means advocating that things be done correctly from the very first attempt. In other words, what we emphasize is “doing the right thing,” not just “doing things correctly,” and certainly not just “doing it the first time.” I also kept earnestly telling the executives that it’s no big deal if we occasionally give an incorrect answer to a correct question; all that matters is to correct it. But if we desperately try to give the correct answer to a wrong proposition, what will be the result? It’s no exaggeration to say that we probably don’t even know how we get driven mad. That is indeed the case; many companies that seemed to be doing well suddenly closed down. Upon investigation, it turns out that they were all trying to turn a wrong approach into one that was correct. The result is mistakes piled on top of mistakes, leading to destruction. Therefore, \"traditional wisdom\" is harmful; it prevents us from focusing on doing the right things, instead directing our thoughts and resources in the wrong direction. This forces us to calculate how much we are off target and then to determine a \"reasonable\" and acceptable \"quality level\" (AQL), such as 3% or 1%. As Mr. Crosby said in his book \"Quality Is Free\": \"Traditional wisdom is incorrect and harmful... It believes that the standard for achieving quality is AQL, and that quality should be measured using ‘indexes’; as a result, companies end up spending at least 25% of their annual revenue on doing things wrong and having to redo them... To bring about change, I suggest stopping the use of AQL and focusing instead on ‘zero defects’.\" This means meeting the requirements completely, rather than wasting time calculating how far we have deviated. Because the problem lies with us, not with probability. ” Coincidentally, Tom Peters, who sparked the \"management revolution\" in the United States and is known as the \"Pope of Business\" in the U.S. and throughout the Western world, also mentioned in his book In Search of Excellence that: \"The American management community has for a long time been dominated by rational models and quantitative analysis... On one hand, quantitative analysis has an ingrained conservative tendency to prioritize cost reduction over increasing profits.\" ； Which leads to a focus on cost rather than quality and value ； It leads to a preference for fixing old products rather than dealing with new ones that are not yet perfect ； This has led to a desire to improve labor productivity through investment rather than by boosting employees’ motivation… Treating people, rather than capital, machinery, and ideas, as the resources for production might be the key to solving all problems. ”Perhaps this can help us discover and understand the origins of this “traditional wisdom.” - End -