1. Choose and describe one key element of total quality management.

 Trust – Trust is a by-product of integrity and ethical conduct. Without trust, the
framework of Total Quality Management cannot be built. Trust fosters full participation
of all members. It allows empowerment that encourages pride ownership and it
encourages commitment. It allows decision making at appropriate levels in the
organization, fosters individual risk-taking for continuous improvement and helps to
ensure that measurements focus on improvement of process and are not used to
contend people. Trust is essential to ensure customer satisfaction. So, trust builds the
cooperative environment essential for Total Quality Management.

2. Briefly explain how your chosen key element would contribute in maintaining quality
standards in the organization.

 The successful implementation of Total Quality Management requires a relationship of

trust among the individuals that are part of the organization. In order for teams to be
able to improve and provide a high quality product or service to the customers, they
need to work together in an atmosphere of trust. If that requirement is met, problem
recognition, problem analysis, problem solution and decision making all become easier.
Employees need to trust each other to ensure participation of each and every
individual. Trust improves relationship among employees and eventually helps in better
decision making which further helps in implementing total quality management
successfully.

3. Cite other ways in achieving total quality in the workplace.

 Other ways in achieving total quality in the workplace are:

a) Management’s commitment to quality - The top management should continue all the
efforts and provide the resources to continue quality improvement programmes.
b) Recognition of high quality - Total Quality Management aims at developing long term
relationships with a few high quality suppliers rather than those suppliers who supply
the inferior goods at the low cost.
c) Benchmarking - Benchmarking is a systematic method by which organisations can
measure themselves against the best industry practices. Benchmarking aims at
developing best practices that will lead to better performance.