Advanced improvement of quality.

Zgodavova, Kristina ; Slimak, Ivan

1. INTRODUCTION

Motto:

"Methods already known do not exclude creation of new methods that meet better new conditions and circumstances".

It has been felt that many large or small projects on the quality improvement as well as different systems of quality management, environmental management, safety and health management and social responsibility management in many institutions are not effective from the point of view of technology, economy, science, trade. Following issues are considered to be problems:

* What issues people in given time and place pay their attention to?

* How do they feel about those issues and how do they present their concerns?

* What do people consider as better and worse?

* Who is responsible for the process of improvement, how is it supposed to be implemented and what resources can be employed?

* Who should be affected by improvements and how should improvements be implemented and how should they affect people?

* What is the significance and contribution of improvements?

The basic agreement of the above mentioned issues deserves a unified platform based on approximately similar values and quality culture which takes into consideration predicted behavior and attitudes of people towards labor, production and life in a given community.

The aim of this paper is to initiate theoretical and practical activities which will lead to gradual but relatively fast transition from the quality management characterized by the system of meeting customers' demands (ISO 9000:2007 chapter 3.1.1) on products quality to more advanced improvements of the production quality, labor quality and quality of life by which the global competitiveness, primacy and excellence can be achieved.

2. PREMISES, METHODS AND PRACTICE OF IMPROVEMENT OF QUALITY

Starting points of our research are following premises:

* Quality of anything (any entity) is perceived as an object of study and not as a result of level determination by what the set of characteristics satisfies the needs according to ISO 9000:2005 chapter 3.1.1.

* Production is understood as a process and result of target-oriented activity, i.e. production processes and products (processed materials, products and services including artistic and spiritual work).

* Improvement is such measurement of function attributes, which is acting positively in certain environment and time, from the point of view of observed purpose.

* Advanced improvement of quality is concerned not only to process of improvement of product quality, but it also a complex and systematical improvement of production quality, labor quality and quality of life.

A lot of different methods can be used to improve the production quality. Among the best known methods are the Deming Cycle of improvement PDCA (Plan, Do, Check, Act), Marsh recommendations on improvement DACP (Define, Analyze, Correct, Prevent), and the complete procedures DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) of Six Sigma method and the ISO 9004:2000 as whole.

Specific standards ISO 14004:2004 "Environmental management systems--General guidelines on principles, systems" and supportive techniques and tools Life Cycle Management (LCM), Design for Environment (DfE), Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Environmental Effect Analysis (EEA) regulate the environment improvement (Tingstrom, 2005); OHSAS 18001:2007's[degrees]Ccupational Health and Safety Management Systems greatest strengths over other management systems is its requirement for continual improvement; SA 8000:2001 Social Accountability standard; and different theories of the quality of life.

Quality management and other areas of management are finally based on the systems theory, or theory of control and information theories.

According to (Golemanov, 2006) "All qualities create real and imaginary worlds". Quality is, in modern definition, inversely proportional to variability, we can expect--and actually we have seen already in practice--that the control and the improvement of quality can be also realized through appropriate applications of information technology (Pan, 2006).

Quality is multidimensional and interdisciplinary, and can be applied to any specific domain with principles independent to the specific domain. The organization of the whole defines a system, which itself as a phenomenon can be considered independent of the physical or conceptual manifestation of its elements. That is, the abstract organization of phenomena is independent of their substance, type, or spatial or temporal scale of existence (Heylighen, 1997). Based on those facts it is considered (Mlcoch&Slimak, 1987), that the total quality control and (Beckford, 1998) total quality management should consistently respect systems theory and cybernetics. (Schroeder et all., 2002), states that systems theory is one of the base principles of Six Sigma model and modern approach to the production quality improvement is without information and communication technology not conceivable today.

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3. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF ADVANCED

IMPROVEMENT OF PRODUCTION QUALITY

Process of advanced improvement of production quality is characterized by two basic features:

1) It should exist as a subsystem of a complex process of improvement of labor, production and life.

2) It should be directed from the management oriented to meet customers' demands, requirements of supported standards, so that the state of competitiveness, primacy and excellence can be achieved. The excellence is according to (Loukas, 2002) "Harmony, creation of stability (but not stagnation) in a dynamic self improving circle, constant monitoring, team working, continuous learning and personal advancement through reflection and conjecture, passion in the acquisition of knowledge and the advancement of science are factors that explain and describe "excellence" but also they constitute the teaching of quality management".

The process of advanced quality improvement comprises these two sub processes or stages:

Stage 1: 'Defining the object of improvement as well as the tasks in a common procedure which should correspond with needs and requirements of quality improvement of labor, production and life of employees and other persons involved in the process.

Stage 2: Designing the project and documentation on implementation of improvement. The design should guarantee achievement of given requirements, mainly by keeping proportionality of interventions into the main factors of quality.

Stage 3: Implementation of suggested improvements, and launching them into operation.

Stage 4: Offering improved products, improved labor, improved life, improved services providing, maintenance and recycling.

Stage 5: Regular controlling and correction of implemented improvements, i.e. general controlling focused on the labor quality, quality of production and life as well as on environmental, safety and sanitary and social accountability issues in all parties involved.

At individual stages well known methods of engineering and quality management are employed according to current needs (Zgodavova at all., 2002) however at the first stage the most significant is an appropriate analysis of internal--inbound environment and especially of the external--out-bound environment employing such methods as a PEST (Political, Economical, Social, Technological) or SLEPT (Social, Legal, Economical, Political, Technological) analysis. Except for these are used the tools of decision-making like Pareto analysis, Decision trees, Methods of prediction and Strategic Decision Making.

The entire process of advanced quality improvement should be in accordance with the principles of project management and should meet the requirements of a particular community in a given environment and time.

4. REVIEW OF FINDINGS

Theoretical basis of advanced improvement of quality understands the quality of entities as a system.

* Quality of production is a complex of its properties, characteristics and features which are expressed by typical functions in a given environment and time.

* Advanced improvement of production quality is related to production processes and products in a given in-bound environment and given out-bound environment and in time and it forms a subsystem of the complex advanced improvement of production quality, improvement of labor and life quality.

* The process of complex improvement of quality consists of three main sub processes:

--Designing improvements in production quality

--Production processes of higher quality

--Providing production of higher quality

* Advanced improvement of production quality is defined by three characteristic features:

--Improvements are designed systematically

--Interventions into improvement factors are proportional

--Consequences of improvements are guaranteed.

5. SUMMARY

In sum, viewing advanced improvement of quality improvement with system theory, cybernetics, ICT, and advanced improvement of quantity tools and methods are necessary. With information and communication technologies and of user-friendly software, it is always easy to use for professionals.

6. REFERENCES

Beckford, J. (1998). Quality: A Critical Introduction, Routledge. New York, NY. ISBN 041518164X

Golemanov, L. A. (2006). Quality Control and Production Management, Industrial, Process, Production, Quality and Systems Engineering. Textbook manuscript. Alexander Dubcek University of Trencin, Slovakia.

Heylighen, F. (1997). The economy as a distributed, learning control system. Communication & Cognition--AI, Vol. 13, pp. 207-24.

Loukas, N. A. (2007). The archetype of excellence in universities and TQM: Journal of Management History, 2007, Volume: 13, Issue: 4, Page: 307-321

Mlcoch, L. & Slimak, I. (1987): Rizeni kvality a strojirenskd metrologie. ALFA Praha

Schroeder, R., Linderman, K., Liedtke, C. & Choo, A. (2002). Six Sigma: definition, theory and research propositions, working paper, Curtis L. Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota.

Pan, X. (2006). Computer-aided SPC and cybernetic view on quality control, International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, 2006, Volume: 23, Issue: 9, Page: 1192-1203.