Masonry Magazine April 1993 Page. 17
Within the southern Florida market, many would say that ABC had it all: the most qualified employees, a track record of consistent success in the markets that they served, a loyal customer base of owners who preferred to negotiate their work, and, most of all, a genuine obsession with making their customers happy. What else could they want?
In addressing the changes that were having an impact on their business, ABC decided to continue the strategies that had gotten them where they were. With a strong emphasis on "staying on the leading edge," ABC committed themselves to implementing a Total Quality Management (TQM) process.
The purpose of their TQM focus was to establish a systematic process for making continuous and incremental improvements throughout the organization. The improvements were specifically aimed at satisfying both internal and external customer requirements by including employees, subcontractors, suppliers, and owners in the process.
ABC took a very structured approach to implementing TQM, which began with the president and executive vice president attending a three-day program intended to lay out the work steps required to successfully implement TQM and test the commitment of top management.
Once the commitment was confirmed, approximately twenty-five of ABC's top managers, department heads, and project managers spent three days in a TQM senior management program. During this planning session, the group prepared and documented a detailed TQM implementation plan that addressed the organization structure, information systems, awards and recognition system, and training required to insure a successful TQM process. The results ployee and customer satisfaction, as well as many other measurable goals.
From that point, each of the fifteen objectives was baselined to determine where the company was relative to where they wanted to be, as defined by their objectives. During this baselining process, the president was amazed at "how much we really learned about ourselves."
Once the baselining was completed, several "quick start teams" were assembled to address, solve, implement, and monitor the opportunities for improvement (OFI's) that were being identified by everyone in the organization. The purpose of the quick start teams was to provide a quick return on the investment that ABC had made in planning, training, and implementation. In addition, these quick improvements were very effective in getting everyone's attention; especially when it was their OFI that made a difference.
Within the first six months of ABC's TQM process, the employees identified over 200 OFI's and teams had successfully addressed and implemented solutions to twenty percent of the OFI's. ABC estimated the costs of implementing these 45 improvements to be about $25,000 with associated savings of about $218,000 on an annualized basis.
After adding the cost of initial TQM training and all the costs of getting the process up and running, ABC had realized a return on investment of well over two-hundred percent.
In addition, ABC has achieved numerous non-quantifiable results in the areas of improved morale and employee satisfaction, and improved cooperation between various departments and work groups. One of ABC's key subcontractors was actively involved on a team that addressed the issue of improving change order processing and payment procedures.
According to the subcontractor's president, "This is the first time in the history of our relationship that we have felt like ABC was genuinely interested in working with us. We have noticed remarkable improvement in our working relationship."
Purpose of the TQM focus was to establish a systematic process for making continuous improvements throughout the organization, specifically aimed at satisfying both internal and external customer requirements by including employees, subcontractors, suppliers and owners in the process.
The Six Basics for
TQM In Construction
Management must determine that quality improvement is the key to the company's survival and commit the necessary resources to make it happen continuously.
By DAVE WILLIS
Vice Chairman and Director
FMI Corporation
TOTAL QUALITY Management (TQM) is a continuous process of improving customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, productivity and safety through structured team problem solving.
The following basic concepts form the conceptual framework of the Total Quality Management process. These basics are finite and do not
MASONRY-MARCH/APRIL, 1993 17