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A couple of anecdotes illustrate this.
Deming taught upper management at three day seminars.
He would only teach them if they were willing to commit to the full three
days. He felt that the principles could only learned if enough time
were given to the process. Upper level management, used to finding
out about new trends in two hour meetings, had to commit substantial time
to learn his idea. He also was not afraid to put these managers in
there place, if he thought they were incorrect.
Another anecdote relates to his delivery of a seminar at UMass Lowell. He was invited to attend a seminar at the student chapter of the Society of Manufacturing engineers, not knowing of his worldwide renown. The weekend before the planned meeting (after most had forgotten that the invitation had been extended) he faxed a handwritten note that he would be happy to attend if he could be picked up at the airport, and delivered to his next appointment after the meeting. He then preceded to engage in a debate, rather than a talk with the 100 or so guests who had come to hear him talk. (This at the age of 81).
Many of his ideas are embodied in his 14 principles of
quality management.
Deming's 14 points
| 1. create a statement of aims and purposes of the company |
| 2. learn the new philosophy |
| 3. understand the purpose of inspection, for improvement of processes and reduction of cost |
| 4. end the practice of awarding business on the basis of price tag alone |
| 5. improve constantly and forever the system of production and service |
| 6. institute training |
| 7. teach and institute leadership |
| 8. drive out fear |
| 9. optimize towards the aims and purposes of the company |
| 10. eliminate exhortations for the work force |
| 11. eliminate numerical quotas and mbo |
| 12. remove barriers that rob people of pride of workmanship |
| 13. encourage education and self-improvement for everyone |
| 14. take action to accomplish the transformation |
Now we look at each of these statements in greater detail:
| 1. create a statement of aims and purposes of the company: build quality into your mission. State that the culture in your organization will have to be changed. |
| 2. learn the new philosophy: probably the most difficult thing is actually implementing a cultural change. Managers do not like to give up power |
| 3. understand the purpose of inspection, for improvement of processes and reduction of cost: Change from inspecting incoming and and outgoing product, that is sorting good from bad, rather make it right the first time and monitor the process so that changes are implemented before bad quality product is produced |
| 4. end the practice of awarding business on the basis of price tag alone; when choosing suppliers, look at a variety of issues such as delivery time and quality of delivered goods |
| 5. improve constantly and forever the system of production and service; continuous improvement |
| 6. institute training; training of how to do your job. Also training in interpersonal skills and the acceptance of responsibility |
| 7. teach and institute leadership; managers must become more like facilitators |
| 8. drive out fear; don't punish workers for performance they have no control over |
| 9. optimize towards the aims and purposes of the company; look at the long term, rather that short term |
| 10. eliminate exhortations for the work force; slogans to perform to a certain short term goal does not lead to a team goals and long term perspective |
| 11. eliminate numerical quotas and mbo; short term evaluation is irrelevant and counterproductive |
| 12. remove barriers that rob people of pride of workmanship; for example in communication, allow the one who has the question to talk directly to the one who can solve the problem rather than having to go up and down the bureaucracy |
| 13. encourage education and self-improvement for everyone; this is general education of quality principles, but also understanding the business as a whole |
| 14. take action to accomplish the transformation; implement and learn from your errors |
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