The Spirit of Quality in America
Pat Townsend & Joan Gebhardt
ptownsend@qualitydigest.com
The following is from a speech Pat Townsend gave at the
recent Texas Quality Award Conference.
Quality. Leadership. Democracy.
God-centered religions, including Judaism, Islam and Christianity.
These four concepts, these four ways of thinking about how
to conduct ourselves as we journey through the many phases
of our lives, have much in common--common ground that helps
to explain why a commitment to quality does indeed contribute
significantly to building a stronger America.
For instance, at the core of each of these is a belief in
the value of the individual, and it’s that wholehearted
acceptance of the worth of each person that sets these four
concepts apart from their lesser competitors for our time
and energy.
I’ll start with quality. The willingness to believe--and,
essentially, to bet on--the idea that every single person
has potential, that each and every person can, to some degree,
be creative and contribute to the improvement of the whole,
is what sets quality apart from productivity.
And the belief that each individual deserves to be given
respect and deserves to be given the opportunity to be placed
in an environment that makes it possible for him or her
to self-actualize in the process of completing their job
is what makes leadership so much more effective than management.
Central to a democracy is the concept of “one person,
one vote, and all votes have equal value.” It’s
that practical demonstration of the core belief supporting
a democracy, the belief in the importance of each and every
citizen, that makes democracies so far superior to their
autocratic adversaries: superior as places to live, superior
as places to raise families and superior as places to do
business.
Fourth, it’s the idea that each person has an equal
chance at eternal happiness, no matter their material circumstances,
that defines the major religions and sets them apart from
the egocentric, often fanatical groups that sometimes usurp
their names. Not every group that claims to be part of a
religion is truly religious. Just remember all those communist
countries that proclaimed themselves to be “peoples’
democracies” when democratic practices were nowhere
in view.
It’s no accident that no particularly useful ideas
in the inter-related areas of quality and leadership have
come out of countries whose people suffer under totalitarian
rule or which are dominated by false religions. If those
with power do not accept the fact that there is talent and
the ability to think and to be creative at every level of
their organization or society, there will be no sustained
improvement, there will be no quality movement, there will
be only the occasional examples thrust forward by the very
brave.
That quality has already helped to make America strong will
come as no surprise to the people in this audience. But
has anyone outside of the quality community noticed that
the prolonged economic boom and continual increases in productivity
that have been amazing analysts for years began when the
Baldrige became a part of the business landscape in America,
complete with companies teaching each other?
The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award and its approach
to quality reflect the nature of America, allowing us both
the freedom to determine details and to determine how to
actually complete the trip from here to there, freedoms
we have long enjoyed in America. The Deming Prize in Japan
reflects the nature of that country, where, because of the
population density and the scarcity of natural resources,
there was a perceived need for following tightly defined
rules, for keeping everyone inside the lines. Europe’s
ISO reflects the nature of an emerging--and merging--Europe
with its great need to make things fit across rapidly disappearing
borders. But note that it’s the Baldrige--it’s
the American approach to life and business--that has become
the worldwide template for quality efforts. The Baldrige
Award has clones all over the world, and no nation has ever
tried to adapt the Deming Prize. Note too that the International
Organization for Standardization continues to be an uncomfortable
fit in the United States and is now being recognized more
and more as an acceptable step along the way to quality
and perhaps even the Baldrige Award, rather than being an
end in itself.
Recognizing the links between quality, leadership, democracy
and the major religions invites us to do a bit of benchmarking
and thus speed up our own development in some areas of our
business efforts.
For instance, when the great American experiment in democracy
began late in the 18th century, the question was asked,
“Who should we allow to vote and thus to participate?”
Phrasing the question that way led the Founding Fathers
to the decision to exclude one whole gender and one whole
race. It took about 150 years, a long and bloody war, and
a couple of constitutional amendments but America did get
it straightened out. Here in the 21st century, whether we’re
starting a new quality effort or reinvigorating a current
quality process, there’s no reason to follow the 18th
century example and ask, “Who should we allow to participate?”
We can skip straight ahead to the 21st century example and
ask, “Who can we afford to leave out?” The answer
is “Nobody.” Welcome to 100-percent employee
involvement.
But be warned. Not everyone will participate at every moment.
Not everyone answers the invitation to take part--not in
democracies, not in religions, not in response to leadership
and not in quality. But the invitation must be extended;
the assumption must be made that every individual has something
to contribute to the whole. That belief is the foundation
of a quality process, just as it is the foundation that
makes America strong, that makes all democracies strong,
that gives well-led organizations of any type a huge advantage,
and that makes true religions credible and attractive.
Just as citizens of a democracy make the best employees
of a quality-seeking company, the reverse is also true.
People who are treated with respect in their workplace--where
they spend so much time--go back out into the surrounding
world more confident of their worth, more willing to be
active in other areas of their lives. No one can be involved
in an active quality effort at work and then just leave
it there when they go home. They want to know why others
aren’t providing the same level of service that they
strive so hard to offer to their customers, and they want
to know where to go with their ideas for improvements both
in businesses and in government operations at any level.
A person who is invited and welcomed into a corporate quality
effort becomes a more active citizen--and that’s just
one more way that quality helps to build a stronger and
better America.
Please note that when I speak of quality, I have in mind
the sort of effort envisioned by the creators of the Baldrige--one
which is significantly different from the limited, but sometimes
more popular, consultant-driven approaches that litter the
landscape today. I’m not saying that efforts such
as ISO 9000, Six Sigma or the like don’t have merit
because they most surely do have great merit. What needs
to be pointed out and understood, however, is that these
methodologies are subsets of a complete quality process
and that they are too often designed to insure that an organization
reaches and maintains agreed-to minimums. A true quality
process, a well-conceived Baldrige or Quality Texas effort,
instead invites you as a person and invites you as an organization
to reach for your maximum achievement levels and then to
get better again.
It’s that sort of continual drive, of always looking
to--and expecting to--build one success upon another, that
is the hallmark of quality, and it’s how quality helps
to build a stronger America now and in the years to come.
Pat Townsend and Joan Gebhardt have written more than
200 articles and six books, including Commit to Quality
(John Wiley & Sons, 1986); Quality in Action: 93
Lessons in Leadership, Participation, and Measurement
(John Wiley & Sons, 1992); Five-Star Leadership:
The Art and Strategy of Creating Leaders at Every Level
(John Wiley & Sons, 1997); Recognition, Gratitude
& Celebration (Crisp Publications, 1997); How
Organizations Learn: Investigate, Identify, Institutionalize
(Crisp Publications, 1999); and Quality Is Everybody's
Business (CRC Press, 1999). Pat Townsend has recently
re-entered the corporate world and is now dealing with "leadership.com"
issues as a practitioner as well as an observer, writer
and speaker. He is now chief quality officer for UICI, a
diverse financial services corporation headquartered in
the Dallas area. Letters to the editor regarding this column
can be e-mailed to letters@qualitydigest.com.
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