A Man of Duality Born Christmas Eve,1904 in the Carpathian Mountains of Romania,Joseph Juran had nowhere to go but up.Poverty,superstition,and anti-Semitism were rampant in the villages of his youth.A perilous relo- cation to Minneapolis by the Juran family in 1912 offered little immediate relief,but it did provide opportunity for a bright and ambitious boy. From such an unlikely set of circumstances grew one of the world's greatest innovators of the quality concept.Now in his mid-90s,Juran remains an energetic thinker on the subject,prompting engineers and managers to push the The quality deployment of quality beyond traditional uses.Employed since the age of nine.Juran shows no signs of puiting the movement's brakes on his life's work. heyday is yet to come. By Jane Gaboury http:∥solutons.inet,org◆HIE SOLUT:ONs。March f9g9 29 Copyright 1999.All rights reserved
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COVER STORY HE:How is technology shaping quality issues? duction of goods was pretty much in the hands of craftsmnen. Juran:There are different aspects of technology:one,of course, The planning of quality,to an important degrec,was in the is precision.The need for precision in things like electronics, hands of the guilds.They were sort of a union of craftsmen. chemical purity...they've escalated quite a bit in our century, But the craftsmen were in a good position.What I'm going to and one of the important fallouts has been with respect to qual- tell you now is something that many peopie haven't thought ity.Achieving the necessary precision has been quite a chal- through:The typical craftsman was his own customer,over lenge,and to a degree we've met the challenge.Another aspect and over and over again.Say that he's going to make a barrel is reliability-freedom from failure.When we set up a sys- -start with an oak tree and end up with a barrel-or make tem like,for instance,air traffic control,we don't want it to a wheel or a wagon,or something like that.These craftsmen fail.We have to build reliability into the system.And this is had pretty crude tools,and with those tools they might per- increasing because we put such great dependence on thesc sys-form 20,30,40,50 different operations,but in each opera- tems and the systems are very complex.In addition,there is tion they were their own customers.One operation depended the cost of failures to companies.If things fail out in the field,on what they had done in the previous operation.Being your so to speak,it affects the public.But if they fail internally,then own customer is one of the best ways of discovering what it affects the company's costs,and there has been quite a push the quality problems are and doing something about them to try to discover where these costs are and how to get rid of Somebody who has trouble at the 27th operation has got a them.So thosc are three pretty big factors:precision,relia- bility,and cost.There are others,of course,but I think these are the principal ones. IE:Is it accurate to say that quality has become an industry in the【Inited States? Juran:It sure has.There has been a big shift.Early in the cen- tury when one thought of quality one thought of an inspection department,which had the job of separating good from bad after the stuff was made.Inspection is a pretty fallible process, actually.And anyway,it's pretty late in the day to wait until something has already been produced to see if it's right or not. The big emphasis should be on planning so it isn't made wrong in the first place. There's been a big shift and it's brought about a big growth in the importance of function.Quality has emerged as a major function of the company,which it didn't used to be.Early in the century you couldn't find a department on the orga- nization chart that was called quality or a person that was called quality manager.Now you've got a pretty wide use of quality managers;some of them are vice presidents.The function has moved up in importance and it has changed dramatically in scope.A good analogy there is what's happening in finance. The big roles of the finance department are to help cstablish the company's financial goals,the budget,and then to develop a means of measuring whether they're meeting those goals. And then there are some other functions.And what has emerged is that the quality function pretty much parallels that. The expectation is to help the company cstablish corporate quality goals and to develop means for measuring the extent to which they're meeting those goals and publishing that infor- Juran became an IIE member Dec.1,1955.He was awarded mation to advise the officers. fellow status in 1995. IIE:The pronouncement that "Quality is everyone's job"scems better opportunity of understanding that that trouble came to reduce the need for quality departments within organiza- about because of what he did in the 13th operation,and he tions.What does that mean for the future of dedicated qual-can do something about that. ity departments？ Now we lost that early in this century,partly as a result of Juran:Here again,if you look back carly in the century...well, the Taylor system.The Tayior system focused on productiv- cven before that...go back a few centuries when the pro-ity and accomplished its objectives by separating planning from 30 Maich 1999.IlE SOLUTIONS.http://solutions.iienet.crg Copyright 1999.All rights reserved
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QUALITY execution.And as a result the workforce-the tradesmen finance.In a sense,the finance people are ahead of the quality who went through apprenticeships-they declined because people with regard to measuring accomplishments.They got the trainer took the planning function away from the work-into that a few centuries ago.Bookkeeping is so well advanced meneven from the shop supervisors-and turned it over that there's a lot of standardization.If we know how to read a to the industrial engineers.The job of the supervisors was to financial statement,we can look at those statements and get a increase productivity and that resulted in their taking the posi-pretty decent idea of the financial status of the company.We tion that quality is the job of the inspection department. are in no way able to do that relative to quality.There are a num- So there was a separation.Quality wasn't everybody's job;ber of reasons whry we aren't there,but I think we're follow- it didn't have top priority in the production department,but ing the same scenario.Down the road we're going to see a stan- it had top priority in the inspection department.We came to dardi/ation of measures of companies'quality performance. "In a sense,the finance people are ahead of the quality people with regard to measuring accomplishments." realize that we had to find new ways of protecting quality,and IE:How long before such standards exist? of course,that was done by taking the quality decisions away Juran:I would think as far as standards,reports on compa- from the workmen and shop supervisors and making the nies'quality status,it will be pretty well into the upcoming inspection department independent.Previously,inspectors century,maybe closer to the end of it before we'd achieve that had reported to the shop foreman or the shop superinten- on a broad scale.As was the case in finance early in the game, dent,then companies changed that.They made the inspec- companics that were privately owned didn't disclose that infor- tion department independent and from there it grew into a mation to anybody;it was kept secret.And we do that now quality department.Since then,we've come full circle. with respect to companies'quality:That information is regarded We've got to make the line people-the production depart-as proprietary and they don't publish it.So we have to clear ment,the people who produce the services and goods-that hurdle first.We also have to develop ways to summa- responsible for producing quality.Then the quality depart-rize all of the bits and pieces of information into a report ment has the function of helping the company's top people like the kind that the financial people put out.But that's going establish corporate quality goals,measuring whcther they're to take decades to evolve mecting these goals,and so on.There have been some prctty subtle changes,and the reasoning behind them has not always HE:What you have observed as the biggest changes in American been understood. industry over the last 50)vyears? Juran:There have been two enormous events that took piace HE:So what do you see as the future of the quality movement?during this century.One has been the growth of technology that Juran:It's got a pretty good future.I've occasionally told an we've talked about.That's demanded a lot of evolution of ways audience of quality managers or young people that the best to deal with the increased precision,reliability,and so on. is yet to be.We're in the early stages of achieving what I think But a second major problem has been the Japanese qual- is the future of the quality department.Quality managers ity revolution.That took place after the second World War. can have a high-level status if they're engaged in strategic qual-The Japanese had set out,really,to get a place in the sun by ity planning.Meaning what I've mentioned before:They're military means.Well,that didn't work out very well.After that going to help the top managers establish quality goals.actu- war was over,they still wanted a place in the sun,and then ally get quality goals into the company's business plans,and they tried to get it by trade.They discovered as they went back then learn how to measure them. into civilian production that nobody wanted to buy their goods We've always had measurement in quality as far as mnea- because they had a very bad reputation for quality based on suring relative to technology.The idea of tools for measuring the civilian goods they had exported before the war. length and weight and things like that-that goes back thou- When the Japanese discovered that pcople didn't want to buy sands of years.What's new is measurement of things like cus- their products because of their poor quality reputation,that sig- tomer satisfaction,competitive pride quality,and so on.There nal went right to the top of the companies.If you can't sell,you we didn't have any precedent:we had to start inventing how can be sure that the top people know about it.The top peo- to measure that,measure the effectiveness of the product devel-ple discovered that uless they found ways to improve their qual- opment department as far as quality was concerned and so on. ity they were not going to be able to sell.So then some of us, There are some pretty challenging problems that have been like Deming and mysclf,got over there and gave them lec- put to the quality department. tures on the different aspects of quality.Deming talked to them Again,a good comparison is to look at how we manage for about statistics;I talked to them about managing for quality. http://solutions.ienet.org.HE SOLUTIONS March:1999 3 Copyright 1999.All rights reserved
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COVER STORY The end result was this Japanese quality revolution,and that's Juran:They've got to raise their outlook from looking at what an enormously important event in our century.It enabled the happens in the grassblades of the company to looking what Japanese to become an cconomic superpower.They would not happens at the corporate level.Now I don't mean just walk have become an cconomic superpower without that quality rev-away from helping the operating people at the grassblades level. olution.There are economists and other people who have missed We still have to make the measurements,exercise control, that point.They haven't paid much attention to it,but it's there. determine process capabilities.That does need to go on and So,that's an enormous change that took place.It took improve.But getting into the situation similar to the financial Americans quite a while to realize what happened.And then people of helping the company at the top,setting those cor- they tried to create a counter-revolution.Most of them failed, porate quality goals and the like are important,too.That's but we had some successes,and the companies that succeeded what needs to be the emphasis of quality departments became our role models.We're in the process of trying to scale up to increase the number of successful companies. HE:How can quality management concepts and tools be applied to knowledge and information products? IIE:When the Japanese economy was thriving,the connec-Juran:I don't really see any difference between application in tion between their passion for quality and economic success that area and application in the case of manufacture of goods. was a very powerful argument.Ilow is the current Asian eco- I mean,you're going to have quality goals.You can have it in nomic struggle affecting the evolution and perception of the a company that's producing services as well as producing goods. quality movement？ You are going to measure quality similarly in both areas. Juran:I don't think it's having any affect on it.They're in a lot People in the service industry will take the position that "Our of financial trouble.The banks made too many bad loans.Real business is different."They're right in some respects.Their estate prices went up fantastically and then the bubble burst.cultures are different,their markets are different,technology But none of that has any effect on quality.Toyota still turns out is different,and so on.But as far as measuring for quality is wonderful cars,Sony still turns out wonderful electronics.I concerned,they're identical.They don't know that,but I do. don't see that the fact that their economy has gotten into finan-I've had my foot in both camps.So there's a problem in mak- cial trouble has done any damage to their quality. ing it clear to them that with respect to measuring for qual- ity,you're identical and that cannot be done by logical rea- IE:Where do you see the greatest performance improvement soning,it's got to be done by showing them. opportunities in manufacturing? In the case of some engineer that's trying to get a foothold Juran:Well,it really goes back to the issues that emerged as in the company with respect to that concept,he's wasting a result of technology.One of these improvement opportu-his time if he tries to convert the entire company to follow nities is in perfection-so that users are not going to be faced him.Instead,what he nceds to do is find "the one best way," with failures and shutdowns of some of these important sys-find the department head,some manager,whatever,one of tems that we've developed.The latest buz word has been the 30 department heads in the company who is willing to the Six Sigma program that Motorola came up with.But it's take a chance,willing to introduce these ideas into his depart- just a new name for the need to develop failure-free products.ment,and then help that department head get results.Once There's also this matter of the cost of poor quality.There the results are achieved in that company,then the other depart- has been some improvemnent in our economy on that score,ments,at least some of them,will be attracted to that:"Gosh "They've got to raise their outlook from looking at what happens in the grassblades of the company to looking at what happens at the corporate level." but there's still a way to go.There are still an awful lot of things I'd like to get results like that in my department."So they that have to be redone:the goods have to be repaired or become the next people to get on board.It spreads that way. scrapped,the time delays that take place,things have to be And that's why it takes a long time to convert the cntire com- restarted and the like. pany.These people that are role models,I don't know any So there's still a lot of waste going on,costs of poor qual-of them that became successful and got such stunning results ity,and here again,some of our companies have done pretty in less than six years. well,but most of them not.A big problem is to bring the rest of the companies up to the level of the best. IE:Let me ask you about the concept of customer caring.It seems to be an important aspect of the quality culture,but IE:What are the key success requirements for a strong qual-in the health care industry caregivers object to referring to the ity program? patients as customers,and in the university the faculty object 32 March 1999.IIE SOLUTIONS.http://solutions.ienetorg Copyright 1999.All rights reserved
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QUALITY to referring to students as customers.Is this a distinction with- program defining the students as out a difference or are there real cultural differences? customers.The employers who are Juran:It's a good question.I think the dilemma arrives from going to hire those students,they're the fact that pcople have traditionally assumed "customer" impacted.You can see there's a means client,somcbody who buys from us.And they're very long list of people impacted,and I important people,without question,but they're not the only prefer to call them all customers. ones who are impacted by the company's quality.The own- I think that the problem behind ers are impacted:If we are cheating quality at a pretty high the question that you raised is that Influen cost it affects the owners.The cmployees are affected:Their we've assumed that there is only jobs are on the line if we don't compete as well as our com-one category of people that are petitors do.We sell to clients and they might sell to their clients what we call customers and I think and finally the services or goods end up in the hands of the that assumption is defective. users.The users are important because they are the source of feedback about whether what we've turned out is usable, IIE:What are the most significant whether it gives trouble or doesn't give trouble.Regulators contributions that industrial engi- Juran's theories and accomplish- ments are examined in a new are impacted by what we do with respect to quality.So is neers can make to organizations biography by John Butman. the public,if we engage in actions that cause environmental with regard to quality? damage.Our industrial neighbors get concerned with that Juran:In my view,industrial cngincers are pretty good can- as well.So we have a long list of people impacted by what didates for getting into this work of quality and cnding up as we do with respect to quality. quality managers.As part of their curriculum,they do get into In fact,I'd like to change the dictionary.I'd like to say we the concept of improvement.And industrial engineers learn ought to consider as customers all the people who are impacted a great deal about tools that are used for improvement.Back by what we do. when direct labor was the biggest source of cost for factories, Now in the case of the schools,I ran into this very thing.they got into time study,motion study,and so on.A factory Some dean or head of a university was preparinga proposal for used to have a lot of laborers and very few machines.Today the trustees and it didn't mention the students,didn't have a it's precisely the opposite:a lot of machines and very few labor- THE JOHN D.HROMI COMBINE MANAGERIAL STER FOR QUALITY &APPLIED STATISTICS SAVVY WITH Talking About Quality Isn't Enough TECHNICAL ENGINEER/ Make It Reality SKILLS. SCIENTIST AS A MANAGER Advanced Certificate in Statistical Ouality Our six-course graduate certificate deals with the In this innovative course,scientists and engineers will find the technical aspects of quality engineering and also tools they need to make a smooth transition from technical applies to the MS degree. responsibilities to management.Learn to supervise others and marshall the resources to deal with process and quality Master of Science in Applied Statistics improvement issues as you examine real-life management Available part-time,cvening or full-time. cases.Identify the unique problems of supervising technical organizations-and how to overcome them. Concentrations available in quality control,industrial Next course begins August 1,1999.Register now! statistics,reliability and statistical theory/methods. For more information or for a Course Catalog, Fifteen total courses required. cal(423974-5001 or fax(423)974-4989or e-mail mdc@utk.edu or http://mdc.bus.utk.edu Seminars,Training and Consulting Related Programs: Statistical Quality,Experimental Design,Reliability- Management Development Program FMEA,Quality Standards-ISO 9000/QS-9000, Project Management:Beyond the Techniques Quality Management and Sampling Techniques. Now both the Advanced Certificate and Masters Degree are available in distance-learning THE UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE format or on campus at RIT MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT CENTER 98 Lomb Memorial Dr. Rochester,NY 14623-5604 Competitive Challenges. Ca:(716475-6990 Fax:7160475-5959 E-mai止：CQAS@rit.edu Web:www.rit.edu/eng/cqas Real-World Solutions. http://solutions.iienet.org.lIE SOLUTIONS March 1999 33 Copyright 1999.All rights reserved
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