SMU MBA ASSIGNMENTS

Ans:- The eight quality management principles are defined in ISO 9000, Quality management systems Fundamentals and vocabulary, and in ISO 9004, quality management systems guidelines for performance improvements.

This section provides you the standardised descriptions of the principles as they appear in ISO 9000, In addition, it provides examples of the benefits obtained from their use and of actions that managers typically take in applying the principles to improve their organisations’ performance. 

• Principle 1: Customer focus
• Principle 2: Leadership
• Principle 3: Involvement of people
• Principle 4: Process approach
• Principle 5: System approach to management
• Principle 6: Continual improvement
• Principle 7: Factual approach to decision making
• Principle 8: Mutually beneficial supplier relationships

Principle 1: Customer Focus

Customers are the main focus point of all organisations and therefore should understand current and future customer needs, should meet customer requirements and strive to exceed customer expectations.

Key benefits:

• As result of flexible and rapid responses the organisations will increase revenue and market share.
• Organisations can utilise their resources effectively to enhance customer satisfaction.
• Improved customer loyalty leading to repeat business.

Application of this principle leads to:

• Organisations to focus on customers primarily. Therefore they research, understand and communicate with customer to find out about their needs and expectations.
• Measuring customer satisfaction and acting on the results.
• Effective management of customer relationships.
• Balanced approach to satisfy customers and other interested parties such as owners, employees, suppliers, financiers, local communities and society as a whole.

Principle 2: Leadership

Leaders establish unity in achieving organisation’s purpose. They are responsible for creating and maintaining the internal environment in which employees can become fully involved in achieving the organisation’s objectives.

Key benefits:

• Employees can easily understand and be motivated towards the organisation’s goals and objectives.
• Activities are created and managed in a unified way.
• Minimised miscommunication between the various levels of an organisation.

Application of this principle leads to:

· Taking into consideration the needs of all interested parties including customers, owners, employees, suppliers, financiers, local communities and society as a whole.

• Setting challenging goals and targets to ensure a clear vision of the organisation’s future.
• Creating and sustaining shared values, fairness and following ethical role models at all levels of the organisation.
• Providing a trusty environment and eliminating fear.

Principle 3: Involvement of People

People at all levels are valuable resources of an organisation and their full involvement enables their abilities to be used for the organisation’s benefit.

Key Benefits:

• Inspired, committed and involved people within the organisation.
• Innovative nature of employees in furthering the organisation’s objectives.
• Employees are motivated to participate in and contribute to continual improvement and hence increase their own performance.

Application of this principle leads to:

• More responsible employees who can accept the ownership of problems and can solve those.
• An opportunity for employees to enhance their competence, knowledge and experience.
• Sharing of knowledge and experience, openly discussing problems and issues.

Principle 4: Process Approach

Good results are achieved only when activities and related resources are managed as a process towards achieving the organisation goal.

Key benefits:

• Effective usage of resources.
• Improved, consistent and predictable results.
• Focused and prioritised improvement opportunities.

Application of this principle leads to:

• Systematic way of defining the activities necessary to obtain a desired result and clear responsibility and accountability for managing key activities.
• Allocation of resources, methods, and materials that will improve key activities of the organisation.

Principle 5: System Approach to Management

If we manage interrelated processes as a system, it will contribute to the organisation’s effectiveness and efficiency in achieving objective.

Key benefits:

• Integration and alignment of the processes that will inspire to achieve the desired results.
• Steps up the confidence level of interested parties as it brings in consistency in the products, effectiveness in managing and the efficiency of the organisation.

Application of this principle leads to:

• Structuring of system to achieve the organisation’s objectives in the most effective and efficient way and structuring of approaches that harmonise and integrate processes.
• Continually evaluating and measuring the system against improvement.

Principle 6: Continual Improvement

Objective of every organisation is to continually improve the overall performance — this indeed would be the permanent objective

Key benefits:

• Improved performance.
• Distribution of improvement activities at all levels to an organisation’s strategic intent.

Application of this principle leads to:

• Following a consistent organisation-wide approach to continual improvement of the organisation’s performance.
• Establishing a set of goals to guide, and measures to track, continual improvement.

Principle 7: Factual Approach to Decision Making

Effective decisions can be taken with a proper analysis of data and information.

Key benefits:

• Informed decisions.
• More opportunities to demonstrate the effectiveness of past decisions through reference to factual records.
• Increased opportunities to review, challenge and change opinions and decisions.

Application of this principle leads to:

• Reliable, accurate data and information. This makes this data accessible to those who need it.
• Analysing data and making decisions based on factual analysis, balanced with experience and intuition.

Principle 8: Mutually Beneficial Supplier Relationships

An organisation and its suppliers are interrelated and a mutually beneficial relationship enhances the ability of both to create value.

Key benefits:

• Creating value for both parties.
• Immediate responses to changing market or customer needs and expectations.

Application of this principle leads to:

• Establishing balanced relationships between short-term and long-term considerations.
• Establishing joint development and improvement activities.
• Inspiring, motivating and recognising improvements and achievements by suppliers.

Organisations can apply quality management principles in many different ways. Implementation of these principles depends on the nature of the organisation and the specific challenges it faces. It is beneficial for organisations to set up quality management systems based on these principles.