Dr. W.

Edwards Deming is known as the father of the Japanese post-war industrial revival and
was regarded by many as the leading quality guru in the United States. Deming’s philosophy of
quality has been popularly known as ‘Deming’s 14 points Principles’. W Edwards Deming placed
great importance and responsibility on management, at both the individual and Company level,
believing management to be responsible for 94% of quality problems. His fourteen point plan is
a complete philosophy of management that can be applied to small or large organizations in the
public, private or service sectors:

Deming 14 Principles of Quality Management

1.       Create constancy of purpose toward improvement of product and service: Inspire the
workers to stay competitive in the market and remind about the importance of stability in jobs
and new opportunities which may come up in later stages. Inducing such a sense of purpose in
producing quality products will work as the inspiration to work efficiently without prosy attitude.

2.       Adopt the new philosophy: The customer demands and taste change very fast and the
competition in the market grow at a rapid rate today. As it is said “philosophy of one century is
the commonsense of next”, we have to accept new philosophies according to the market trends
and technology revolutions.

3.       Cease dependence on inspection to achieve quality: Instead of inspecting the product for
quality after production, infuse quality at the beginning itself. This will ensure that none of the
raw materials are wasted for the sake of quality.

4.       End the practice of awarding business on the basis of price tag: Instead, minimize total
cost. We often spend lots of time and money to find better suppliers and shift rapidly between
them for slight monetary gains. Move towards a single supplier for any item, on trust.

5.       Improve constantly and forever the system and of production and service: There in no
stopping point in the process of quality management. The enterprise systems and services must
keep growing indefinitely in order to catch up with the competitive market. Shifting to new
technology y evolved services also ultimately reduce cost.

6.       Institute training on the job: A trained worker has more productivity and quality than an
untrained one, so giving training sessions will drastically improve the quality of the person and
directly it helps in better performance with regard to product quality also.

7.       Institute leadership: Good leaders have always performed wonders everywhere the
growth a company can display stunning growth if potential leaders are identified and encouraged
and also by promoting the leadership quality of other normal workers.
8.       Drive out fear: Some managers think that creating a fearful impression in the employees
would give more quality and productivity to work. But actually just the converse happens; if a
person is not working willingly with satisfaction then he can never do a work perfectly even if he
has the intention to be perfect in conscious mind. Thus driving out fever is essential as everyone
will start working effectively for the company.

9.        Break down barriers between departments: Today most of the companies split
themselves to several departments so that work would finish faster upon splitting up and
distributing to several departments. In par with the above method it is important to remember
that two departments are not two different countries where people don’t know each other. The
workers in design, sales, and production must work together to face problems and resolve them.
This takes the company to better management in quality and also other profit with better
planning.

10.   Eliminate slogans, exhortations, and targets for the work force: This is also an opposite
idea for conventional practices, when slogans or exhortations are introduced they call for more
quantity in production than focusing on quality of the product. This will severely damage the
quality management process. They employees should have a calm and quite, quality atmosphere
in the company.

11.   Eliminate work standards (quotas) on the factory floor: ‘Management by Objectives
(MBO)’ is a very important terminology in principles of management, this technique direct to set
up a list of objectives which have to be achieved within the specified time. This was taught to be
a very effective technique. But Deming’s 14 points in quality management completely condemns
this method as this again focus on quantity rather than quality of product.
12.   Remove barriers to pride of workmanship: responsibility of supervisor must be changed
from numbers to quality. Fixing points for employees and again ranking them inside the
company would infuse more completion within the organization which is very unhealthy for the
quality. Abolish annual or merit rating and MBO completely.

13.   Institute a vigorous program of education and self-improvement: A person have to

grow even after he get’s into the company, letting him learn new technology and techniques will
make him prefer to stay in the company for a longer time whereas a person would always think
about quitting his job if he have no opportunity to grow out or give his own inputs.

14.   Every one must undergo transformation continuously and indefinitely: just like
products and services. Put everybody in the company to work to accomplish the transformation.
The transformation is everyone’s job.

Edward Deming’s PDCA cycle to Implement the 14 Points for Quality in

Actuality

Deming has stated “Continuous improvement is a never ending cycle of events”. Precisely! We
cannot achieve complete perfection in quality ever. It’s a journey, not a destination. But, he
defines this cycle of events very systematically, following this frame work for the 14 points
explained above and channelizing your attention into executing each of those quality
management principles would yield outstanding results. Deming finally suggests the (PDCA-
cycle) for ensuring that this quality is incorporated into every task that an organization carries
out. The PDCA cycle is as shown

P – Plan, the policy by substituting the variables with the values in your own unique environment

D – Do, the actual implementation of those policies. Design brochures, advertise it, and take
pride to be a part of it
C – Check, the improvement periodically. This is the mathematical result of your ‘non-
mathematical-social-thinking’, be astounded at the implicit improvements you get even if you
haven’t done anything to improve those sides. Conduct regular auditing, diagnosis of reporting
etc.

A – Action, with the new reports. Just like you shape a pot from the clay, see the improvements
you have achieved through the policies. Get insights from those observations on what changes
you’ve got from the things you’ve implemented and repeat the success or repeat the cycle! This
cycle, undoubtedly concur with the Deming’s 14 points of total quality management and assures
evident results once implemented!

Here it is important to quote the ‘Deming Prize Checklist’ which reveals important TQM areas
ranging from policy, organization, training, information, collections and analysis,
standardization, quality control and assurance to planning for the next PDCA cycle of TQM. The
content of Deming prize checklist is as follows:

1) Corporate Policy
 Corporate policy for total quality control
 Goals and measures employed in order to plan, design, produce, sell and assure
good products and services.
2) Organization and Administration
 Clarity in authority and responsibility and co-ordination among divisions,
committee activities and small group activities in administering statistical quality
control.
3) Education and training
 Type of education programmes provided with in the company.
 Effectiveness of these programmes
 Quality control circle activities.
4) Implementation
a) Collecting and using information
 Collection of outside information
 Diffusion of information among divisions
 Speed of information transmittal
b) Analysis
 Selection of priority problems and themes
 Correctness of analytical methods
 Use of statistical methods
 Constructive use of suggestions
 c) Standardization
 System of standards
 Method of setting and revisiting standards
 Use of standards
d) Control
 System of controlling quality, cost and production volume
 Control points and control items
 Contribution by quality control cycles
e) Quality Assurance
 New product development methods
 Safety and product liability prevention
 Process design, analysis, control and improvement
 Measurement and inspection
 Quality assessment and audit
5) Effect
 Impact of TQC in introduction in product quality and measuring its effect
 Convergence between expected and actual effect
6) Planning for the future
 Understanding of present conditions and specificity
 Policies for correcting defects
 Plans for promoting TQM

The "Seven Deadly Diseases" include:

1. Lack of constancy of purpose

2. Emphasis on short-term profits
3. Evaluation by performance, merit rating, or annual review of performance
4. Mobility of management
5. Running a company on visible figures alone
6. Excessive medical costs
7. Excessive costs of warranty, fueled by lawyers who work for contingency fees