TeamReadiness Looks at Deming’s 14 Principles

Published on November 3, 2009 in Best Practices | No Comments


W. Edwards Deming (1900-1993) was a statistician and leading management consultant in the area of quality. In 1987 President Ronald Reagan awarded him the National Medal of Technology. The New York Times referred to him as, “the high prophet of quality control.” Revered in Japan, and largely credited with inspiring the Japanese to become experts in efficient and high quality manufacturing, Dr. Deming spent a great deal of time working with the Japanese after World War II. In 1960, acting on behalf of Emperor Hirohito, the Japanese Prime Minister awarded Deming the Second Order of the Sacred Treasure for his contributions to Japan’s industrial rebirth and its worldwide success. The Japanese named the coveted Deming Prize after him. It is awarded yearly to organizations and individuals that make major contributions to the advancement of quality. Deming’s 14 Key Principles for management for transforming business effectiveness are amongst his best known works.

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Deming Principle

Explanation

Inspired or quoted from Deming’s book, Out of the Crisis

How TeamReadiness Can Help
1. Constancy of purpose Stay focused on continual improvement of products and services. Allocate resources to provide for long range needs rather than only short term profitability. Implement plans to become competitive, to stay in business, and to provide jobs. Invest in training, tools, processes, and equipment that will make the organization more competitive.
  • TeamReadiness gives people the skills necessary to use and continuously improve investments in tools, processes, and equipment.
2. The new philosophy Adopt the new philosophy. We can no longer live with commonly accepted levels of delays, mistakes, defective materials and defective workmanship. Transformation of management style is necessary to halt the continued decline of business and industry.
  • Whatever your management style, strategy, or process, TeamReadiness can help you communicate it so people understand it and put it to work.
3. Cease dependence on mass inspection Eliminate the need for mass inspection as the way of life to achieve quality by building quality into the product in the first place. Use good process to show that they are statistically under control to produce good outputs.
  • TeamReadiness can document the procedures and techniques you use to ensure good process control and outputs so team members can reference them and train on them to do their jobs and do them well.
4. End lowest tender contracts End the practice of awarding business solely on the basis of price. Require quality, service, and price. Reduce the number of suppliers for a particular item. Minimize total cost, not merely initial cost, by minimizing variation. Move towards a single supplier for an item. Build long term relationship with suppliers based on loyalty and trust.
  • TeamReadiness can help build relationships with suppliers by making it easier to share information and collaborate using TRM On Demand™ software.
5. Improve every process Continuously improve every process for planning, production, and service. Continually look for problems and solutions to improve every activity in the company. Improve quality and productivity, decrease costs. Innovate and continuously improve products and service. It is management’s job to work continually on the system improvements (design, incoming materials, maintenance, machines, supervision, training, etc.).
  • TeamReadiness helps with some of the most important aspects of continuous improvement: documenting current processes or activities, and then, using TRM On Demand™, enabling people to share, comment, and collaborate.
6. Institute training on the job Institute modern methods of training on the job for all, including management, to make better use of every employee. New skills are required to keep up with changes in materials, methods, product and service design, machinery, techniques, and service.
  • TeamReadiness can document the knowledge your people need to train on and then deliver it in video and highly visual formats online to accommodate a variety of learning styles and maximize knowledge transfer.
7. Institute leadership Practice leadership that helps people do a better job. Focus on quality. Improvement of quality will improve productivity. Management must take immediate action when defects are reported, requirements are not clear, tools are poor or difficult to use, etc. and all conditions detrimental to quality.
  • The mission of TeamReadiness is to easily capture and share knowledge so that people know how to do their jobs, and can do them well.
8. Drive out fear Encourage effective two way communication and other means to drive out fear throughout the organization so that everybody may work effectively and more productively.
  • TeamReadiness requires, promotes, and encourages sharing of information and provides the means for communicating and collaborating using TRM On Demand™.
9. Break down barriers Break down barriers between team members, teams, departments, functions, customers, and suppliers. People in different areas must work in teams to tackle problems that may be encountered.
  • TeamReadiness provides the means for sharing information, collaborating, and problem solving to bring people together, break down barriers, and foster cooperation
10. Eliminate exhortations Eliminate the use of slogans, posters and exhortations for the work force, demanding Zero Defects and new levels of productivity, without providing methods. Such exhortations only create adversarial relationships; the bulk of the causes of low quality and low productivity belong to the system, and thus lie beyond the power of the work force.
  • TeamReadiness is not about cheesy slogans or “Go Team Go” exhortations. TeamReadiness gives team members the knowledge they need to do their jobs and do them well.
11. Eliminate arbitrary numerical targets Eliminate work standards that prescribe quotas for the work force and numerical goals for people in management. Substitute aids and helpful leadership in order to achieve continual improvement of quality and productivity.
  • TeamReadiness makes it clear what the requirements are for a specific job and how to achieve them.
12. Permit pride of workmanship Remove the barriers that rob hourly workers, and people in management, of their right to pride of workmanship. This implies a number of things including negative behavior, poor working conditions, lack of feedback or recognition, poor supervision, not asking for input, basically any behavior that takes people for granted or mistreats them.
  • TeamReadiness can train and educate team members on exactly what values, behavior, culture, and expectations are for the organization and for each job function. TeamReadiness gets team members involved in sharing and demonstrating their procedures and practices, inspiring pride and esprit de corps.
13. Encourage education Institute a vigorous program of education, and encourage self improvement for everyone. What an organization needs is not just good people; it needs people that are improving with education. Advances in competitive position will have their roots in knowledge.
  • This is the very reason for TeamReadiness – to enable and make possible education, knowledge sharing, self-improvement, communication, collaboration, continuous improvement. and more.
14. Top management commitment and action Clearly define top management’s permanent commitment to ever improving quality and productivity, and their obligation to implement all of these principles. Support is not enough — action is required!
  • TeamReadiness makes it easy and affordable to implement all of Deming’s Principles. We document all of your procedures, processes, policies, practices, etc. in easy to understand, easy to use formats; and make it securely available to those who need it.





DMW

TeamReadiness™ can help!
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