Re: REQUEST: Total Quality Management

["William J. Latzko" <latzko@worldnet.att.net>]

At 11:12 AM 3/28/2000 -0500, Kurt Schoch wrote:
"I find this an almost impossible question  - excuse the irreverent
parallel, but it's almost like asking which of the Ten Commandments is most
important.  However, if forced to pick one I'd select Constancy of Purpose.
 Without this there is no system and nothing around which to organize
process and people."  

Dear Kurt,

You are right and Dr. Deming often said that if he had to select a point
most important, it would be constancy of purpose.

However, I wish you had not labelled the subject with "Total Quality
Management." There is no such thing. Quality is the result of modern
methods of management not a method itself. Since quality is an attribute,
it makes no sense to speak of "Total". There is no such thing as half
quality as implied by the word "Total". The derivation of the term came
from a twisting of a Japanese concept by the Navy. They could not label any
system after a person and so were searching for an alternative to describe
Dr. Deming's system. Dr. Dockstader, who was involved in this process gave
me a pretty good account of what happened. I believe that I passed this on
to the DEN at the time.

Bill
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William J. Latzko                              Voice: 201-868-5338
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