Quality Management

Successful management of quality requires that managers have insights on various aspects of quality. These include defining quality in operational terms, understanding the costs and benefits of quality, recognizing the consequences of poor quality, and recognizing the need for ethical behavior. It is true that all members of an organization have some responsibility for quality, but certain parts of the organization are key areas of responsibility: Top management has the ultimate responsibility for quality.
While establishing strategies, for quality, top management must institute programs to improve quality; guide, direct, and motivate managers and workers; and set an example by being involved in quality initiatives. Examples include taking training in quality, issuing periodic reports on quality, and attending meetings on quality. Design: quality products and services begin with design. This includes not only features of the product or services; it also includes attention to the processes that will be required to produce the products and/or the services that will be required to deliver the service to customers.
Procurement: the procurement department has the responsibility for obtaining goods and services that will not detract from the quality of the organization’s goods and services. Production /operation. Production /operation have responsibility to ensure that processes yield products and services that conform to design specifications. Monitoring processes and finding and correcting root causes of problems are important aspects of this responsibility. Quality assurance. Quality assurance is responsible for gathering and analyzing data on problems and working with operations to solve problems.

Packaging and shipping: this department must ensure that goods are not damaged in transit that packages are clearly labeled, and that instructions are included, that all parts are included, and shipping occurs in a timely manner. Marketing and sales; this department has the responsibility to determine customers needs and to communicate to the appropriate area of the organization. In addition, it has the responsibility to report any problem to the product or services. Customer service: customer services are often the first department to learn of problems.
It has the responsibility to communicate that information to the appropriate department, deals I reasonable manner with customers, work to resolve problems, and follow us to confirm that the situation has been effectively remedied. Total Quality Management. (TQM). A philosophy that involves everyone in an organization in a continual effort to improve quality and achieve customer satisfaction. The term Total Quality Management (TQM) refers to a quest for quality in an organization .
There are three key philosophies in this approach. One is a never- ending Push to improve, which is referred to as continuous improvement; the second is the involvement of everyone in the organization; and the third is a goal of customer satisfaction, which means looking only at the quality of final product services – to looking at the quality of every aspect of the process that produces the product or services. TQM systems are intended to prevent poor quality from occurring. We can describe TQM qualities as follows:
1. Find out what customers want. This might involve the use of surveys, focus groups, interviews, or some other techniques that integrates the customer’s voice in the decision- making process. Be sure to include the internal customer (the next person in the process) as well as the external customer (the final customer). 2. Design a product or service that will meet (or exceed) what customers want. Make it easy to use and easy to produce. 3. Design processes that facilitate doing the job right the first time.
Determine where mistakes are likely to occur and trey to prevent them. When mistakes do occur, find out why so that they are less likely to occur again. Strive to make the process “mistake proof”. 4. Keep track of results, and use them to guide improvement in the system. Never stop trying to improve. 5. Extend these concepts to suppliers and distributors. Many companies have successfully implemented TQM programs. Successful TQM programs are built through the dedication and combined efforts of everyone in the organization.
Top management must be committed and involved. 2. 4 Boston Group Matrix The BCG matrix indicates the balance of a portfolio of a business in terms of relationship between market share and market growth The context of which this BCG matrix is used has excluded the idea of balance of matrix and only considers the relationship between the market share and market growth As market growth rate is important for a business or company seeking to dominate the market, it is appropriate for that company to be a star.
This is explained by the idea that higher profit levels often come from product or business with high market share in more stable markets. It is worth noting that an in-depth review of all the different theories mentioned above, is beyond the scope of this thesis. However, the perspective of market growth strategies of multinational companies will provide the main support and serve as a foundation for the research reported in this thesis specifically as this thesis intends to use them to assess the strategies adopted by multinational companies towards market growth.
The original business and corporate level strategy theory will be looked at in more detail hereof as explained in the figure below. ( Numfor N. and Ajang P. E. 2007). 2. 5 PEST Pest analysis is analyzing internal environment of a business. It involves political environment, economic environment, technological environment, and social environment. 2. 5. 1 Political environment Politics is what forms a government of the day, and the government influences the activities of businesses operating in there territory.
It has been argued that the government influences the society directly by means of laws that are set as well as providing some services which influence the business activities in the country. Businesses are affected by the government through many ways such as; loss of the land, regulations to be followed by businesses. Therefore business managers must have basic knowledge of the registration of the environment in which they are operating in. Which such kind of knowledge they will be able to come up with some strategies that will help them effectively perform the market.
Some of the rules and regulations that are set by government and are constituted of political environment include; the tax laws of the land. The tax law maybe favorable or unfavorable for businesses depending on the type of country in which the business is operating in, some countries may require payment of tax at least every month which others may require the payment of tax at least quarterly or annually. The tax policy whether indirect or direct has serious ramifications in the performance of the business.
There is also business registration which constitutes a political decision. In some countries registering a business may take as long as 120days while others it is an issue of 30minutes, trying to register a business in such a country where it takes 120 days to start operating business it means that you have to be patient to register such a business in such a country. Unlike developed world 3rd world countries have long process of registering businesses. Before entering into a business for registration in a certain country, the politics of the day must be considered.
Be it national or international politics a companies which operates internationally will consider the relationship between the mother country and the host country. The marketing environment which is influenced by politics includes:- the registration process of a country, the macro and micro policies of the government, rules and regulations governing business in that country, development of infrastructure, international relationship with the country in question.
Therefore before any reasonable business manager enters into a business environment he must be able to estimate the political environment of the market. Because it plays an important role in decision making which affects the businesses in the long run, The business manager must be able to estimate whether the government is involved in conducting business in that country. Political environment as it were is a major factor affecting the competitiveness of the business.