FINAL PROJECT

Creation of Formal Process

Kaylene Ritchie
kaylene.ritchie@yahoo.com
Keller Graduate
Professor Walter Mamak
GSCM588 Managing Quality

Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

Contents
Introduction ................................................................................................................................................... 2
Problem Statement ........................................................................................................................................ 3
Literature Review.......................................................................................................................................... 5
Six Sigma ................................................................................................................................................... 5
Balance Scorecard ..................................................................................................................................... 5
Total Quality Management ....................................................................................................................... 6
Analysis ........................................................................................................................................................ 7
Recommendations ......................................................................................................................................... 8
Reflection .................................................................................................................................................... 10
References ................................................................................................................................................... 11

Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

Introduction
The company that I have chosen to write about for this paper is Veolia Water
Technologies. Veolia is a large multinational corporation that provides services in multiple
markets for water and waste water management solutions. The company currently has
employees and operations in multiple countries including North America, France, and other parts
of Europe, South America, Africa, and Asia.
The office location that I currently work out of is in Moon Township, Pennsylvania. In
addition to our Moon Township location, our company also has joint business units that are
located in Dayton, OH and Cherry Hill, NJ. Out of the three business locations, Veolia
employees 124 staff members with various positions that include Administrative Support,
Account, Information Technology, Safety Coordinator, Quality, Procurement, sales,
Engineering, legal, and various management positions.
Currently, Veolia Water Technologies focuses on major markets such as oil and gas,
mining industry, power and chemical processing, metals, and food and beverage. The company
has an extensive amount of experience in the design-build of technological solutions in water
treatment. It is the combination of the superior expertise and innovation that allows Veolia to
provide excellent technological solutions to industrial and municipal customers. Out of the many
industries that Veolia Water is involved with, the Pittsburgh business units where I currently
work specialize in project execution in the Industrial sector. However, our office is currently
expanding and starting to work on projects in the oil and gas industry as well.

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Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

Problem Statement
Veolia Water Technologies currently lacks a formal process for their selection in hiring
equipment vendors on the projects that they are awarded. Due to a lack of formal process, the
proposal and bidding for each project is done each time a new project is awarded. This constant
need to seek out vendors, field proposals, evaluate them, and then select a vendor is wasting time
and money for the company.
In addition to the additional time and money wasted, Veolia is also experiencing other
issues when it comes to the delivered goods that were ordered. By not having a proper screening
process or doing a thorough analysis of the vendor, some of the problems that has been
experienced is delay in equipment being shipped, equipment received not built to specifications,
financial problems, equipment doesnt perform as expected, or the equipment never gets shipped
in the first place.
When these issues occur, the result is an increase in cost of the total project and wasted
time waiting around for the equipment to be shipped back to the manufacturer for correction or
waiting for someone to come onsite to fix the problem. Either situation is not an ideal one and is
something that can be corrected. Due to the large amount of projects that Veolia is involved with
and the need for specialized equipment on each job, too many times vendors have been awarded
a contract without Veolia knowing if that company can deliver on their bid.
The significance of not having a formal process for vendor selection is that it is costing
Veolia Water Technologies a large amount of money in wasted dollars to correct problems that
could have been resolved before the equipment even shipped onsite. This is increasing the
overall cost of each project that they work on and is resulting in lower profit margins for the

Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

company. In addition to lower profits, the effects is also being felt by the customers that hired
Veolia to perform the work.
Any delays that occur while waiting for equipment to be fixed or returned from the
manufacturer is resulting in the overall project to be delayed. This delay has a negative impact
on the customer service aspect for Veolia and can have a negative effect on their ability to attract
new business in the future. Veolia as a company establishes themselves as an innovative
provider for technological water management solutions. Negative customer feedback will
diminish their credibility in a highly competitive market.
This is where establishing proper quality management practices can help Veolia Water in
their day-to-day operations. By establishing a formal process for vendor selection, this will
enable Veolia to select vendors that will be able to provide the equipment and materials need
correctly the first time. When establishing the formal process, Veolia needs to focus on
implementing quality management principles in all aspects of the process.
Instead of selecting a new vendor each time, there should be a concerted effort to form a
partnership with several vendors and continue to work with them for their equipment needs. By
establishing these partnerships, Veolia can work with the vendors to improve the quality of the
equipment they receive by following quality related principles such as six sigma and
implementing a balance scorecard.

Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

Literature Review
Six Sigma
Six sigma methodology is something that is starting to gain traction within companies
within the Unites States. The premise of six sigma is to eliminate as many defects as you can
within your process to improve the quality of your work. With six sigma, a company is expected
to eliminate defects to the point where they only occur 3.4 times out of every million
opportunities. This level of accuracy has been proven to greatly improve the overall customer
satisfaction level for companies that have implemented these processes.
Six Sigma is change in management methodology from traditional views. With six
sigma, everyone involved in the process should have an input or say in how things are
implemented and the evolution of new processes. It is this teamwork environment that helps
lead to a better quality product. According to the article The right approach to six sigma
leadership, Teams that utilized six sigma relied more on shared leadership approaches than
when they were not using it for change management. (Galli, B. J., & Handley, H. 2014)
Companies that have embraced the six sigma methodology has been able to eliminate
waste and reduce costs within their business. All aspects of their processes are analyzed for
ways to be improved and prevent errors from occurring in the future.

Balance Scorecard
The balance scorecard is another metric that is gaining favor within organizations
because of the relevant information that they provide to management. The balance scoreboard
provides critical business metrics for a company that can be reviewed and assessed by
management to make decisions on how well the company is performing.

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Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

The balance scorecard provides this information to all levels of the organization through
performance measures connected to specific business area. Linking Learning Strategy to the
Balanced Score Card. (Pangarkar, A. M., & Kirkwood, T. 2007) This information becomes
invaluable to manager to assess how well a critical section of the company is performing and
what areas need improvement.

Total Quality Management

Total quality management is a process of integrating departments within and organization
for better collaboration. This integrated management approach enables each employee to feel as
though they are contributing to the team and in the long term improve the quality of the product
being made. It breaks down the conventional barriers that exist within organizations and allows
for more teamwork environment within the organization.
Research on the effectiveness of TQM has been split. Some researchers disagree on why
and how improvements derived from TQM occur and who really benefits from them (Why and
How TQM Leads to Performance Improvements). (Garca-Bernal, J., & Ramrez-Alesn, M.
2015)Even though the research on this topic cannot agree on specifically how TQM improves
quality, one that is for sure that is that when companies do implement TQM into their
corporation, the overall effectiveness and quality of their work does improve.

Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

Analysis
Veolia Water Technologies problem with their vendors stems from many possible
reasons. All of which are correctable ones. The issues that Veolia faces can first stem from the
fact that their buying department, the group that is in charge of finding and procuring vendors, is
severely under staffed. Out of the 124 employees currently employed in the region, only two
individuals currently work in the buying department.
With this department being understaffed, it does not give much time for the individuals
working in that department to create a formal process for selecting vendors. In addition, it also
does not provide adequate amount of team for the team to thoroughly review and objectively
select and appropriate vendor for the job. This results in the company selecting vendors that may
not be skilled enough or has a poor customer satisfaction rating within the industry.
The company does currently have a quality department but just as it is with the buying
department, it is severely understaffed as well. Currently, there is only one individual working in
the quality department. This individual can be overwhelmed at times and has limited impact on
what can be changed within the company.
The corporate structure within Veolia does promote some principles of Total Quality
Management, such as working as a team. However, even in this regard, the amount of teamwork
provided is limited in scope. While the buying department does work closely with various other
departments within the organization, it is not a complete and thorough collaborative
environment. The reach of teamwork does not stem through to the top of the organization. What
you end up with is several miniature groups within the organization working together but
separate from other groups within the company.

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Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

Recommendations
The recommendations for Veolia to improve upon their situation is to first fully commit
to improving there processes. To be able to work more efficiently, they need to invest more
money within their buying and quality departments and hire additional help. This will enable the
group to distribute the work more effectively and provide them the time to come up with a
formal process.
After hiring additional help, the company needs to fully commit to the Total Quality
Management principle. They need to remove the barriers between the individual sub-groups and
start working together as a single unit. This change needs to be implemented from the top level
management and integrated down through the other departments. They need to strive to
recognize areas for improve and work on correcting those issues.
To recognize the areas that can be improved upon, the company can do root cause
analysis on the problems. Helpful questions to ask to find the root cause would be What
changed, Is this a unique situation, and Is there a relationship between the problem and the
process? (Spencer, K. 2015). By identifying the root cause of their problems will enable them
to improve upon those areas.
By implementing the six sigma methodology will help the company improve the quality
of their work. The company should invest in getting their managers trained on the six sigma
methodology and how to implement it within the organization. The training will enable to the
managers to effectively identify areas within their process that need to be improved upon. Its
important for firms to debrief their current processes at least annually to identify opportunities

Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

for improvement and the introduction of Lean Six Sigma provides a fresh perspective. (Kepczyk,
R. H. 2015)
The final recommendation for Veolia Water Technologies is to implement a balance
scorecard with their organization. By having up-to-date information about key metrics of the
different aspects of the business, it will better enable the managers to make decisions and be
proactive in their management solutions.

Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

Reflection
After reviewing Veolias situation, it is clear how important it is to implement quality in
your daily operations. Too often companies do not truly commit to the benefits of total quality
management and their processes suffer because of it. Also, it usually results in the company
losing money because of wasteful spending.
After learning about the quality management initiatives such as TQM and six sigma, it is
easily seen how removing the traditional barriers in the corporate environment and employing a
team work structure can really improve the day-to-day operations. Companies cannot continue
to operate without committing to these quality initiatives because do so puts that at a
disadvantage against their competitors.
The biggest takeaway that I will get from this class is how important it is for a company
to work together as a cohesive unit and really analyze each aspect of their daily work. All work
completed in a day can be improved upon and it should be an effort taken on by the entire
company. Failure to do so will result in lower profits and a lower overall customer satisfaction.

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Final Project

Kaylene Ritchie
GSCM588

References
BURROUGHS, A. (2015). LEAN AT WORK. (cover story). Smart Business
Akron/Canton, 25(4), 24-30.
Costantini, A., & Zanin, F. (2015). The influence of total quality management on risk
identification and non-financial performance measures: an Italian-based empirical
analysis. International Journal Of Management Cases, 17(4), 73-87.
Environnement, V. (2015). Water and Wastewater
Treatment Solutions | Veolia.Veoliawaterstna.com. Retrieved 14 September 2015, from
http://www.veoliawaterstna.com/
GALLI, B. J., & HANDLEY, H. (2014). The right approach to Six Sigma leadership. Industrial
Management, 56(3), 25-30.
GARCA-BERNAL, J., & RAMREZ-ALESN, M. (2015). Why and How TQM Leads to
Performance Improvements. Quality Management Journal, 22(3), 23-37.
Gatti, M. (2015). Exploring the challenges of measuring intangibles: The implementation of a
balanced scorecard in an Italian company.International Journal Of Management
Cases, 17(4), 120-133.
Kepczyk, R. H. (2015). 10 Lean Six Sigma Audit Considerations. CPA Practice Advisor, 25(4),
20.
Oosterhuis, W. P., & Sandberg, S. (2015). Proposal for the modification of the conventional
model for establishing performance specifications.Clinical Chemistry & Laboratory
Medicine, 53(6), 925-937. doi:10.1515/cclm-2014-1146
Pangarkar, A. M., & Kirkwood, T. (2007). Linking Learning Strategy to the Balanced Score
Card. Chief Learning Officer, 6(7), 38-52.
SPENCER, K. (2015). Getting to the Root Cause. Quality, 54(8), 42-45.
Westgard, J. O., & Westgard, S. A. (2015). Assessing quality on the Sigma scale from
proficiency testing and external quality assessment surveys. Clinical Chemistry &
Laboratory Medicine, 53(10), 1531-1535. doi:10.1515/cclm-2014-1241

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