The 14 Points Deming’s management philosophy is summarised by 14 principles required for the transformation of traditional management of any type of organisation, be it large or small, manufacturing or service based: Create Constancy of Purpose: Toward improvement of product and service. Often concentration on the problems of today precludes sufficient effort directed at the problems of the future. Is the Company dedicated to quick profits or constancy of purpose? The next dividend to shareholders is not as important as working for the prosperity of the Company in 10, 20 and 30 years time. Adopt the New Philosophy: Japan has created a new economic situation. Our tolerance of the mistakes that occur in all aspects of industry must be reversed. We can no longer accept without question mistakes, defects, poor materials or materials not suitable for purpose, ill-trained workforce who is too afraid to ask what its job is, poor supervision, career- seeking management who do not stay in a position long enough to consolidate the current status let alone improve it. Cease Dependence on Mass Inspection: The use of inspection to improve quality is costly and ineffective and unreliable. You cannot inspect quality into a product and therefore, it is too late. Preventive measures should replace mass inspection in most circumstances, thereby reducing the hidden factories producing scrap and rework that employ ever-increasing numbers of inspectors. Cease Award of Business on Price Tag Alone: The lowest purchase price does not ensure the minimum total cost. The acquisition price is one aspect of the total cost of an item throughout its life cycle. If purchase decisions are made with no measure of the quality of the product being assessed, the whole system will drift to one of low price, poor quality and high subsequent costs. If purchasers constantly force their suppliers to reduce the price of their products and change suppliers based on price from one project to another, the suppliers will be forced to cut corners. How much better is it to develop a long-term relationship with suppliers so that they can innovate and develop economies of scale? Improve Constantly and Forever The System of Production and Service: Preoccupation with achievement of specification is not sufficient. We must start to improve all aspects of the product or service life cycle from concept to disposal. Sources of variation must be identified and reduced. By so doing the distribution of the key quality characteristics of the product or service will become narrow and accordingly costs will reduce. Institute Training: Everyone involved in a product or service must understand the customers’ requirements and be trained so that he understands the standard of work required and how he may achieve that standard. Of vital importance is the need to appreciate the sources and nature of variation. Adopt and Institute Leadership: Management should lead not supervise. Focus on the outcome must be abolished in favour of leadership. The role of the leader is to motivate and remove the barriers that prevent the people who work for him achieving pride in their work. Drive Out Fear: Frequently the best interests of a Company are subordinated to the need to satisfy particular performance measures - especially production quotas. If people make mistakes they frequently hide them for fear of the consequences of disclosure. Fear of the effect on annual performance assessment can lead people to mediocre performance - if you don’t make a decision you cannot be wrong and held to blame for a poor decision. Break Down Barriers Between Departments: Most companies are organised in functional departments each of which may be busy optimising its processes without understanding the function or problems of the others. Each department is the customer of and supplier to other departments in the company. Many problems are contained within the confines of a single department so why not break down the barriers and start functioning as a team. Eliminate Slogans Exhortations and Targets: Slogans, exhortations and targets aimed at the workforce urging an increase in productivity by working harder or by making no mistakes is a waste of time and is counter-productive. Such campaigns imply that the workforce, or supplier, is deliberately producing poor work and thereby further alienates what is already probably a strained relationship. The management must support the workforce by providing better training and supervision and improving the quality of goods inwards by supplier development. Eliminate Numerical Quotas for the Workforce and Numerical Goals for Management: Numerical quotas and goals are demotivating and confusing in most applications. Production quotas will create tension between workers who can easily exceed the rate and those who cannot achieve it - pressure to ‘not make us look bad’ will be put on the more effective workers, while others will find the constant battle to achieve target stressful. There is no incentive to share expertise or learn from experience. Numerical goals such as budgets distort behaviours; No-one wants to be under budget in case it is cut the following year, but equally exceeding budget (even for a good reason) will cause disapproval. This leads to penny-pinching if the budget is in jeopardy and unnecessary largesse if things are going well. Neither of these things serve the organization well. Remove Barriers That Deny People Pride of Workmanship: There are many barriers which prevent the workforce from achieving pride in their work; poor quality of incoming materials, inadequate work instructions so that people do not understand the standard of work required, ill-maintained machines from which is demanded maximum output regardless of quality achieved, supervisors who do not understand the work and who are unable to assist the workforce, defect reports and suggestion schemes which are ignored by management etc. Pointers to industries suffering from barriers to pride of workmanship are high absentee rates, high job turnover, high accident rates and high proportions of defective items. Only leadership will overcome these barriers. If people are made to feel that they and their work are important they will want to come to work. If management understands the problems which beset the workforce and takes corrective action, the workforce will respond as they are enabled to achieve good work. Institute a Vigorous Programme of Education and Self-Improvement: There is no shortage of good people in industry, but that in itself is not sufficient. The strength of a company is very much dependent on its knowledge base and, therefore, an industry needs good people who are improving with continued education. This may be regarded as the strategic capability of education as compared to the tactical use of training to meet a specific need at a particular point in time. Take Action to Accomplish The Transformation: Management must take action to understand the preceding 13 points and decide on the direction to take the company for the future. Management must have the courage to forego traditional styles of management and adopt the new philosophy. It will be necessary to explain by various means that the process of continuous improvement involves everybody, and that this is not just a passing initiative like those which have gone before. Each activity in a company is part of a process and all of the processes combine to provide the product or service to the final customer. Each constituent process can and should be the subject of continuous improvement working in harmony with the next stage and preceding stage to achieve a quality of output that will delight the ultimate customer. Deming’s 14 principles outlined above constitute what he considers to be good management practice, the adoption of which would transform the company or industry concerned. The next stage in the development of his management theory involves an understanding of what he terms the Deadly Diseases that prevent the transformation from taking place.
Posted on: Wed, 06 Nov 2013 07:31:08 +0000
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