Organizational Support

Organizational Support

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Jegak Uli

Introduction

Senior managers must think about and develop mechanisms that can be put in place to support the implementation of quality improvement program.

The introduction of quality improvement program can be facilitated by the use of steering committees, boards, or councils and the addition of quality managers and specialists.

These resources help the line organization accept change as its members go about their normal tasks and provide excellent developmental positions for employees who are being groomed for greater responsibility.

Introduction

In addition, communicate to everyone all the elements of a QI strategy as well the successes and difficulties of installing and working with such a strategy .

Employees must know what the organization really wants.

At first, they need to be recognized for participating; later, when they achieve success, they need to be rewarded for such success.

What Do We Have to Do?

Assisting senior management to bring about change means keeping the current structure in place to continue to run the organization and augmenting that existing structure with new, flexible devices that will address the changes required.

What Do We Have to Do?

These devices are task forces, problem- solving teams, quality improvement teams, and other participatory mechanisms that allow individuals to come together in new ways to solve old problems.

Organizations that have been struggling to become innovative and responsive to changing market conditions may already have experimented with many forms of this approach.

Support Structures - a committee of senior managers An approach that has been successfully used to

install QI is to form a committee of senior managers who have the following responsibilities:

1. Ensuring that the organization is focusing on the needs of the market- place, the needs of the customer.

2. Cascading the mission, vision, and values of the organization throughout the organization so that all individuals are aware of their purpose, where they are going, and how they intend to get there.

Support Structures- a committee of senior managers 3. Identifying the critical processes that need attention

and improvement. 4. Identifying the resources, the trade-offs that must be

made to fund the quality improvement activity . 5. Reviewing progress and removing barriers that have

been identified and brought to the committee for resolution-

6. Improving the macro-processes in which they are involved as senior managers, both to improve the performance of the process and to demonstrate their ability to use the improvement tools on which they have been trained.

These committees are called

Quality boards, steering committees, quality improvement teams (Crosby), or quality councils (Juran), and they are usually linked to similar

groups in other parts of the organization.

Establish sub-councils

"In large companies it is common to establish sub-councils for major organizational segments, such as divisions or functional departments.”

Sub-councils

When a sub-council exists, its function may be more specific than that of a steering committee, and its responsibilities may include:

1. Assessing processes within the organization and targeting specific processes for improvement.

2. Creating improvement teams and activities to address process problems. Usually, individuals associated with a particular process or individuals with the required skills are formed into a team, which will .make a joint effort to address the problems.

Sub-councils

3. Arranging for training of the team members and/or facilitation support.

4. Monitoring, directing, reviewing, and supporting the team's efforts so that the recommendations from the team can be accepted and implemented.

Sub-councils

The existence of such an arrangement of councils and sub-councils creates a mechanism by which improvement issues can be brought directly to the attention of top organizational leaders, usually in a more direct and supportive manner than may be possible through the traditional organizational structure.

A steering committee

Headed by the CEO (eg. vice president) Other members of the committee

included senior managing directors who had major responsibility for the daily operations of the company.

But as a steering committee, they came together solely to address restructuring the company to support total quality management.

The Steering Committee Goals are to:

1. Assure the product quality level that customers expect.

2. Boost both sales and technical capabilities, to make sure the organization is the winner in all business competition.

3. Strive for overall reduction in costs. 4. Encourage more personal creativity.

Networks as an Extension of a Parallel Organization Another resource to assist managers in bringing

about the installation of QI is to create a network of quality support people.

This network may consist of a "quality officer," who ideally reports to the chief operating officer (COO) and who is responsible for helping the senior managers first understand and then install a QI process.

This role of quality officer may then be replicated for each major function and each major facility until a network of full- and part-time employees is dedicated to supporting quality in their respective business units.

Networks as an Extension of a Parallel Organization

These managers help keep quality issues in the forefront by arranging quality training for the business unit and by constantly advocating the use of quality tools and processes.

Senior managers who create such networks then have two ways to influence their subordinates and bring about meaningful change.


The first is through the traditional formal reporting structure, and the other is informally through the quality network.

This network is different from, and should not be confused with, the informal organization described by social scientists.

Networks as an Extension of a Parallel Organization The senior quality officer can also

privately assist other senior managers to increase their understanding of the requirements of managing in a QI process and can work with the business-unit quality managers to overcome functional and local barriers.

This double-pronged approach allows the COO flexibility in changing “the way things work around here.”


Quality managers also support the drive toward employee involvement by assisting problem-solving teams, task forces, and quality improvement teams; by arranging specialized training and benchmarking studies; and by removing existing barriers.

Other Supporting Elements

Two other important activities that senior managers often fail to appreciate are (1). the use of effective communications to

strategically disseminate information throughout their organizations, and

(2). the recognition of those individuals who are successfully applying the concept of Total Quality Management.

Communications

The organization embarking on the installation of QI should recognize that everyone is looking for signals, for the true meaning of what's going on in the organization.

"What does QI really mean, and how will I be impacted?"

"What's expected of me in an organization shifting to a management philosophy based on the principles of QI?"

Communications

To answer these questions, communications techniques must be developed to both inform and instruct everyone in the practices, processes, and approaches that are required for QI to be successful.

Traditional organizational communication mechanisms such as newsletters, communications meetings, or videos of the CEO reporting on the state of the business may be appropriate, or they may be inappropriate.

Communications

If the credibility of the communication vehicle is neutral to good, existing publications, meetings, or videos can be used.

If employees view the company rag or annual "all-hands" employee meetings as irrelevant to their work, concerns, or interests, then additional communication techniques have to be developed.

Recognition and Reward

Once individuals and/or teams have successfully applied the tools of QI and have secured results through process improvement, these employees must be sought out and identified as role models.

In the early stages of implementing QI, individuals may be unsure of what is expected from them, and they may be unsure of how to proceed in order to implement QI in their area of responsibility.

Recognizing and rewarding exemplary performance helps to clarify expectations.


During the first twelve to eighteen months, you may want to shower the organization with small awards that can be earned by participating in training, joining teams, or serving on task forces.

As implementation progresses, you should begin to differentiate between passive participants and those who are committed to the concepts of QI, actively supporting participation, and getting results.


Adjust your existing performance and compensation systems to support the cultural changes needed.

Add new, meaningful awards and recognition programs as further encouragement and end the shower of trivial awards.


Managers determine who gets promoted, who gets special publicity, and who is singled out for special attention.

The point is to encourage managers to support those who demonstrate the desired performance.

In some organizations, promotions are limited to those who demonstrate competence in using the tools of QI and serve as role models for the organization.


Senior managers who are committed to QI go to great lengths to provide recognition to employees who demonstrate similar convictions.

That's why CEOs will travel to a distant office or plant to thank a quality improvement team for removing a barrier to performance.


Recognize and reward managers who demonstrate their own commitment to QI. Who are the managers in your organization who

focus their employees' attention on serving customers?

Who is operating as an effective "process owner" and systemically improving key business systems?

Who is creating teams around process issues and following the leadership framework presented earlier?

Who is serving as a role model, coach, and mentor?


Recognize and reward teams that meet the performance criteria.

A team that did a superior job of articulating its goals, securing participation, following a process, and achieving innovative results is a team that must be recognized, and possibly rewarded, if others are going to follow.

THE END

Thank You

Documents

Organizational Support