TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT

The Barriers To Tqm, Implementation And How Can They Be Eliminated

1. Lack of commitment from Top management.
This is dealt with by organizing visits by TQM experts to the company or the top
management people visiting other advanced companies.
2. Lack of cooperation from Middle management

Dept Heads do not support TQM as they are afraid of losing their power.
This should be dealt with by showing that TQM is beneficial to every one and not
following it is detrimental to the survival.
3. Functional Barriers:
Traditional way of working has built vertical silos around the functions and this should be
broken by Process approach.
3. Lack of Team work :
Teams are the basic necessities for TQM implementation.
Teams should be formed and they should be recognized by the top management.
Quality circles and Cross functional teams should be fully supported by the top
management.
5. Subjective decisions:
4. TQM requires analysis of problems. But some people tend to be subjective about
problems, Data collection should be made mandatory and judgments and intuitive way of
solving problems should be discouraged.
6. No knowledge of tools
Ishikawa said TQM starts with education.
Full time programs should be run to teach problem solving tools to every one.
7. No customer focus:
Whatever we do, we need to ask what value is this to customer?
Encourage process audits to find out how customer requirements are translated into
products.
8. Fatigue:

People tend to expect too much in a short time and if the goals are not achieved, they tend
to become frustrated.
To avoid this, frequent communications and some fun gatherings should be organized