Our Individual Role in Raising the Quality Status Quo

In the busy world of quality assurance and testing we often as individual testers/quality assurance professionals dig in and do the daily work that we need to do and sometimes leave the overall quality measures to those in management positions. As individuals we need to realize that each of us makes an impact on quality whether we are proactively and consciously doing so or not. To effectively attain and maintain quality each of us needs to actively and proactively work toward quality practices and products by assuming conscious, forward-looking, active roles. That time-proven saying holds true in quality as in many other aspects of life–"If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem."

In an attempt to consider our individuals roles as effective quality assurance people and encourage and enhance quality we can start by reviewing the 14 Quality Principles by Dr. W. Edwards Deming which are:

1. Create constancy of purpose for improvement of product and service.
2. Adopt the new philosophy.
3. Cease dependence on inspection to achieve quality.
4. End the practice of awarding business on the basis of price tag alone.
5. Improve constantly and forever the system of production and service.
6. Institute training.
7. Adopt and institute leadership.
8. Drive out fear.
9. Break down barriers between staff areas.
10. Eliminate slogans, exhortations, and targets for the work force.
11. Eliminate numerical quotas for the work force and eliminate numerical goals for people in management.
12. Remove barriers that rob people of pride of workmanship.
13. Encourage education and self-improvement for everyone.
14. Take action to accomplish the transformation.

To get our creative juices flowing we might begin with various questions such as the following:

What can we as individual QA people or the entire QA team do to improve quality? What can I individually and realistically do where quality is concerned? Am I part of the solution or the problem? Can I accomplish quality individually or only in cooperation with others? Are there quality principles I as an individual can apply and blatantly or by example encourage others to apply as well? Is the culture too large or too set for me to change or am I by my inactive role maintaining the status quo? Are these principles something I consider at all? Are they things I do automatically or only when forced to think about them? Do they affect my work life, my personal life, or both? Does considering these quality principles and living them enhance the meaning of my life–work and personal–and its effect on others? How do we balance the effects and costs of principles such as training vs. actual work to improve quality? Does consideration of these principles stymie our quality output or enhance it? Are these pie-in-the-sky principles or can they promote practical application that can and will affect our daily work lives?

Considering these questions led me to list one example for each quality principle as to how it applies and affects my daily work and goals. What I came up with is shown here but I would encourage each of us concerned with quality to consider our own individual examples and periodically revisit these items and see if they still apply or could be enhanced or need to be changed. At the very least they are reminders of how quality can be achieved, but by reviewing them we are more able to consciously work towards better quality.

After considering these I found I could organize my thoughts about the principles into these groups.

Q–Quo vs. growth and progress. Keep an open mind, stay open to new ideas, be reluctant to stay with the status quo in order to pursue quality of product as well as practices and your own growth and the progress of quality throughout the organization, and carry through on the execution of ideas and practices while assessing their purpose and ability to improve quality and not stagnate or stymie it.

U–Useful role in quality. Actively pursue quality relationships with others in all aspects of the daily active participation in work life, take an active and useful role on all teams and in all meetings to promote quality, exhibit cooperation and adherance to standards and quality practices, and be an example to others that change brings positive aspects as well as perceived negatives.

A–Attitude of quality. Keep a proactive and 'can do' attitude, maintain forward looking perspective and practices instead of just digging in the daily dirt of practical application of quality principles, consider what factors you can accomplish to improve quality and the cost of our individual and corporate daily and long-term efforts vs. their overall value, and realize you are here to provide service as well as a product to others.

L–Learn and apply. Learn how to attain and maintain proactive positive participation in activities that promote quality theory and practice at all stages of the development process, balance what you must accomplish with how you can best accomplish it with quality, and bravely take on roles to promote and enhance quality on individual, team, and overall levels.

I–Improvement. Realize that slogans and targets only go so far to affect quality and can work against quality, realize and put forth the attitude that meaningful accomplishment in life is driven by our desire for improvement and not in attaining any artificial quota or goal, and work toward ultimate quality of total work product not individual goals or issues.

T–Training. Participate in and suggest appropriate training activities and classes, assess their value, apply what you learn, and encourage others to see the benefits of training and application of that training vs. just getting the job done.

Y–Yourself and your role. Consider your role in quality each day as you try to improve quality in your own section of the world and consciously take one step forward every day to transforming yourself and ultimately the culture to affect the quality of our products and practices.

But, even though these are useful items to which I can refer periodically it is too busy and too wordy so I attempted to summarize them into the following seven sentences which support my theory that we "Improve constantly and forever the system of production and service" by accomplishing all of Deming’s quality principles. We each are part of that system as are our practices, processes, and products.

Q–Status quo is heightened by a mind open to new practices that provide progressive quality.

U–Useful roles in quality depend on cooperative relationships and active participation.

A–Attitude–proactive, positive, and forward-looking–helps accomplish quality.

L–Learn and apply quality at all stages of the development cycle.

I–Improvement, motivated by our desire for it, drives meaningful accomplishment.

T–Training, appropriate and applied, is essential to progress

Y–Your conscious daily steps lead to a quality transformation of yourself and the culture.

In preparation to discuss these with the other members of our Quality Assurance team I considered each of these statements and what might spur discussion and encourage myself and others to more proactively and effectively pursue our roles in quality. What I came up with is shown here and is useful to spur a thoughtfulness in each of us as we periodically revisit them in an attempt to continually address the needs of quality in our own organizations and our individual roles in quality assurance in our teams, our workplaces, our products, and our processes.

Q–Status quo is heightened by a mind open to new practices that provide progressive quality.
The status quo is rarely good enough because in our world the only constant is change. Thus, with change in what we produce, our clients needs, our environment, etc. we have to continually assess how we are accomplishing our jobs and whether this is leading to quality or whether we need to improve how we do things to improve the quality of our processes and products.

–Useful roles in quality depend on cooperative relationships and active participation.
We are only useful quality-wise and otherwise to the extent that we accomplish what is best for our clients. We need to always be cognizant of our relationships with others–employees on our teams and company-wide, clients, and service providers - and what bearing that has on our jobs, our products, and the quality of both. When we positively approach change and quality we actively set an example and statement to others that it is 1) desirable, 2) possible, and 3) will occur. Effective communication, by our words and by our actions, at all levels is necessary for us to play useful roles in quality.

A–Attitude–proactive, positive, and forward-looking–helps accomplish quality.
Often we get so busy doing our jobs that we are heads-down and don’t necessarily think in terms of quality of the long-term effects of what we are doing. When we attempt to gain and maintain an overall attitude of quality we are more likely to accomplish that goal. This is hard but the challenges are usually the things in life that grow us. We can grow quality. We must grow quality because it is essential to our products, our processes, and ourselves.

L–Learn and apply quality at all stages of the development cycle.
Notice I didn't say quality principles or quality practices but quality because quality entails both of those as well as the best we can give to our roles in the quality effort. Learning about quality is not a one-time thing to gain certification but an on-going process. The more we learn the better we get at it and the more we realize what we can and need to apply to each stage of the development process is essential to the overall level of quality in our products and processes. We must continually review–whether formally or not–whether our quality practices and processes are cost-effective and work toward the ultimate goal or not. That review may be individual, group, or corporate and conscious or just a part of doing our jobs but it is necessary for effective quality.

I–Improvement, motivated by our desire for it, drives meaningful accomplishment.
As with anything in life whether it be athletics, financial goals, work goals, health goals, or other personal goals, we only succeed in meaningful accomplishment when we are motivated by our own personal desire for improvement. Others can tell us what we need to do but only when we desire it will we accomplish the goal. Many challenges may get in our way on a daily basis and we may be tempted to put aside our goals. Sometimes that putting aside is appropriate but often our determination to stay the course is ultimately what brings about a goal we might not otherwise accomplish. It is very important in any organization that our goals ultimately lead us in the same direction so we need to assess our goals in the light of corporate goals. Sometimes we don’t see the overall purpose and must communicate effectively in all directions and at all levels to insure that everyone involved knows the goals and how we can best achieve them.

T–Training, appropriate and applied, is essential to progress.
In our changing world training is always necessary. Training may take on different forms such as taking classes in groups or individually, attending conferences, or personal development by surfing quality web sites or reading professional journals or books. The point is that training is effective when we seek it, learn from it, apply it, assess it, understand the value and essential nature of it, and encourage others by sharing what you’ve learned.

Y–Your conscious daily steps lead to a quality transformation of yourself and the culture.
It is up to each of us to consider quality on a daily basis and take steps, small or large, to transform ourselves, our roles in quality, and ultimately the culture to work toward, attain, and maintain quality processes, products, and services that will benefit our clients and ourselves. Quality won’t happen without each of us understanding and doing our part.

In summary, I believe that for quality to occur we must each become and remain cognizant of our role in achieving it. We can actively and proactively work towards achieving that goal while recognizing that the goal is never fully achieved but is an ongoing process. Our vigilance in attending to quality processes and products is an ever-challenging and worthwhile part of our daily lives. Our attention to quality not only raises the status quo, our consciousness, and the standards by which we perceive and measure the level of quality, but also gives us more satisfaction in knowing we are doing our part in achieving quality and making a difference in our corner of the world for our clients as well as for our neighbors and ourselves.