Chapter 14 - Building and Sustaining Quality & Performance Excellence

Question 1

What is Organizational Sustainability?

Answer 1

The ability to address current needs and have the agility and management skills and structure to prepare successfully for the future

Question 2

How is Culture defined?

Answer 2

It is the organization’s value system and its collection of guiding principles. Culture is an important factor for sustainability and long-term success and is driven by leadership.

Question 3

How can a Culture of Quality be described?

Answer 3

One in which every employee embraces the org’s quality vision, values and goals as a way of life.

Question 4

How does Strategic Change differ from Process Change?

Answer 4

Strategic change is broad in scope and stems from strategic objectives

Process change is narrow in scope and deals with the operations of an organization.

Question 5

What are the questions to ask about Change?

Answer 5

Why is the change necessary?
What will it do to my organization/department/job?
What problems will I encounter?
What’s in it for me?

Question 6

How is a culture of Performance Excellence created?

Answer 6

A premium is placed on excellence in performance - obtaining desired behaviors and results.
Orgs. acknowledge that their success is contingent upon the successful performance of their employees
Strategic outcomes drive the work
Management creates conditions that support and sustain strong performance

Question 7

What are Key Behaviors to foster a Positive Quality Culture?

Answer 7

Create and maintain awareness of quality by disseminating results
Provide evidence of mgmt leadership
Encourage self-development and empowerment
Provide opportunities for employee participation to inspire action
Provide public recognition and rewards as well as tangible benefits

Question 8

What is the Role of the Workforce in Building and Sustaining a Quality Culture?

Answer 8

Senior leadership must provide the vision.
Middle managers translate senior leadership’s vision into operations and act as role models for first-level managers and employees
Workforce delivers quality; must be granted not only empowerment, but ownership of the performance excellence strategy

Question 9

What are some Barriers to Change?

Answer 9

Lack of what Deming calls “constancy of purpose”
Lack of holistic systems perspective
Lack of alignment and integration within the organizational system

Question 10

What are alignment and integration?

Answer 10

Alignment refers to consistency of plans, processes, info, etc. to support key org-wide goals.

Integration is the harmonization of plans, processes, info, etc. to support key org-wide goals.

Question 11

What are Best Practices?

Answer 11

Practices that are recognized by the business community (and often verified through some type of research) that lead to successful performance

Question 12

What are “universal” best practices?

Answer 12

Cycle time analysis
Process value analysis
Process simplification
Strategic planning
Formal supplier certification programs

Question 13

What are some Principles for Effective Implementation? (6)

Answer 13

Committed leadership from top management
Integration with existing initiatives
Process thinking
Disciplined customer and market intelligence gathering
A bottom-line orientation
Continuous reinforcement and rewards

Question 14

What is the Quality Life Cycle?

Answer 14

1. Adoption
2. Regeneration
3. Energizing
4. Maturation
5. Limitation or stagnation
6. Decline

Question 15

What are some Strategies for Quality and Performance Excellence?

Answer 15

ISO 9000
Six Sigma
Baldrige
Integration of two or more of these

Question 16

Learning Organizations have to become good at which Five Main Activities?

Answer 16

Systematic problem solving
Experimentation with new approaches
Learning from their own experiences and history
Learning from the experiences and best practices of others
Transferring knowledge quickly and efficiently

Question 17

What are the Basic Elements of Self Assessment?

Answer 17

Management involvement and leadership
Product and process design and product control
Customer and supplier communications
Quality improvement
Employee participation

Question 18

How are Self-Assessments used?

Answer 18

Many orgs derive little benefit from conducting self-assessments and achieve few of the process improvements suggested by self-study

Question 19

Why are Self-Assessments often unsuccessful?

Answer 19

Managers do not sense a problem
Managers react negatively or by denial
Managers don’t know what to do with the information

Question 20

How can Self-Assessment Findings be Leveraged?

Answer 20

Prepare to be humbled
Talk through the findings
Recognize institutional influences
Grind out the follow-up