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What is Total Quality Management?

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As a business leader or owner it?s likely that you?re constantly searching for ways in which to streamline the production of your goods or services and gain a competitive edge over other businesses in your market. Potentially, at least, the philosophy of total quality management (TQM) can help you reach both of those goals. Rather than a single management process, TQM is a business philosophy that combines elements of statistical analysis and process review in which all employees play a role. Developed initially by statistician Dr. W. Edwards Deming, TQM has evolved from its 1940?s form into a philosophy of business management that is applicable to almost any type of business.

In theory, at least, a TQM system focuses the entire workforce of a business on several key aspects of production and service. It?s not unusual, of course, for businesses to document the needs and wants of their customers. However, in a TQM system that approach is modified slightly; not only does the business identify its customers desires, but it also documents the ways in which customers use the products of the business. The review of internal processes is also important within a TQM system. Methods are established for the constant monitoring, evaluating and updating of every imaginable process within a business, and processes that consistently work are made capable of repetition. Constant employee training is another common attribute of TQM systems, for as a business philosophy, TQM flattens the decision-making structure of a business. Many of the process decisions are thus frequently made at non-management levels, so it?s important that employees receive the training necessary to make such decisions.

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