Learning from the quality movement: What did and didn't happen and why?

California Management Review

Volumn , Issue 1, 1998, Pages 43-73

  Cole, Robert E ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0032346442     PISSN: 00081256     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/41165975     Document Type: Article

References (57)

1. D. Garvin, Managing Quality (New York, NY: The Free Press, 1988).
2. For semiconductors see D. Angel, Restructuring for Innovation: The Remaking of the U.S. Semiconductor Industry, (New York, NY: The Guilford Press, 1994). For autos, see the report on John Paul MacDuffie's findings cited in Diana Kurylko, "Quality Rises Rapidly in North America," Automotive News, March 4, 1996, p. 43.
3. For semiconductors see D. Angel, Restructuring for Innovation: The Remaking of the U.S. Semiconductor Industry, (New York, NY: The Guilford Press, 1994). For autos, see the report on John Paul MacDuffie's findings cited in Diana Kurylko, "Quality Rises Rapidly in North America," Automotive News, March 4, 1996, p. 43.
4. For sheet steel see American Iron and Steel Institute, "Domestic Steel Producers Respond to Automakers' Demand: 'Quality or Else'," Quality Progress, 18 (1985): 57-59; for copiers see D. Kearns and D. Nadler, Prophets in the Dark (New York, NY: Harper Business, 1992); for automotive see W. Abernathy, The Competitive Status of the U.S. Auto Industry (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1982); for semiconductors see D. Okimoto, T. Sugano, and F. Weinstein, Competitive Edge: The Semiconductor Industry in the U.S. and Japan (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1984); for color TVs see J. Juran, "Japanese and Western Quality: A Contrast," Quality Progress (December 1978), pp. 10-18; for air conditioners see D. Garvin, "Quality on the Line," Harvard Business Review, 61/5 (September/October 1983): 64-75.
5. For sheet steel see American Iron and Steel Institute, "Domestic Steel Producers Respond to Automakers' Demand: 'Quality or Else'," Quality Progress, 18 (1985): 57-59; for copiers see D. Kearns and D. Nadler, Prophets in the Dark (New York, NY: Harper Business, 1992); for automotive see W. Abernathy, The Competitive Status of the U.S. Auto Industry (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1982); for semiconductors see D. Okimoto, T. Sugano, and F. Weinstein, Competitive Edge: The Semiconductor Industry in the U.S. and Japan (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1984); for color TVs see J. Juran, "Japanese and Western Quality: A Contrast," Quality Progress (December 1978), pp. 10-18; for air conditioners see D. Garvin, "Quality on the Line," Harvard Business Review, 61/5 (September/October 1983): 64-75.
6. For sheet steel see American Iron and Steel Institute, "Domestic Steel Producers Respond to Automakers' Demand: 'Quality or Else'," Quality Progress, 18 (1985): 57-59; for copiers see D. Kearns and D. Nadler, Prophets in the Dark (New York, NY: Harper Business, 1992); for automotive see W. Abernathy, The Competitive Status of the U.S. Auto Industry (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1982); for semiconductors see D. Okimoto, T. Sugano, and F. Weinstein, Competitive Edge: The Semiconductor Industry in the U.S. and Japan (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1984); for color TVs see J. Juran, "Japanese and Western Quality: A Contrast," Quality Progress (December 1978), pp. 10-18; for air conditioners see D. Garvin, "Quality on the Line," Harvard Business Review, 61/5 (September/October 1983): 64-75.
7. For sheet steel see American Iron and Steel Institute, "Domestic Steel Producers Respond to Automakers' Demand: 'Quality or Else'," Quality Progress, 18 (1985): 57-59; for copiers see D. Kearns and D. Nadler, Prophets in the Dark (New York, NY: Harper Business, 1992); for automotive see W. Abernathy, The Competitive Status of the U.S. Auto Industry (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1982); for semiconductors see D. Okimoto, T. Sugano, and F. Weinstein, Competitive Edge: The Semiconductor Industry in the U.S. and Japan (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1984); for color TVs see J. Juran, "Japanese and Western Quality: A Contrast," Quality Progress (December 1978), pp. 10-18; for air conditioners see D. Garvin, "Quality on the Line," Harvard Business Review, 61/5 (September/October 1983): 64-75.
8. For sheet steel see American Iron and Steel Institute, "Domestic Steel Producers Respond to Automakers' Demand: 'Quality or Else'," Quality Progress, 18 (1985): 57-59; for copiers see D. Kearns and D. Nadler, Prophets in the Dark (New York, NY: Harper Business, 1992); for automotive see W. Abernathy, The Competitive Status of the U.S. Auto Industry (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1982); for semiconductors see D. Okimoto, T. Sugano, and F. Weinstein, Competitive Edge: The Semiconductor Industry in the U.S. and Japan (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1984); for color TVs see J. Juran, "Japanese and Western Quality: A Contrast," Quality Progress (December 1978), pp. 10-18; for air conditioners see D. Garvin, "Quality on the Line," Harvard Business Review, 61/5 (September/October 1983): 64-75.
9. For sheet steel see American Iron and Steel Institute, "Domestic Steel Producers Respond to Automakers' Demand: 'Quality or Else'," Quality Progress, 18 (1985): 57-59; for copiers see D. Kearns and D. Nadler, Prophets in the Dark (New York, NY: Harper Business, 1992); for automotive see W. Abernathy, The Competitive Status of the U.S. Auto Industry (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1982); for semiconductors see D. Okimoto, T. Sugano, and F. Weinstein, Competitive Edge: The Semiconductor Industry in the U.S. and Japan (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1984); for color TVs see J. Juran, "Japanese and Western Quality: A Contrast," Quality Progress (December 1978), pp. 10-18; for air conditioners see D. Garvin, "Quality on the Line," Harvard Business Review, 61/5 (September/October 1983): 64-75.
10. Cf. P. Tetlock, "Learning in U.S. and Soviet Foreign Policy: In Search of An Elusive Concept," in George Breslauer and Philip E. Tetlock, eds., Learning in U.S. and Soviet Foreign Policy (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1991), pp. 26, 44.
11. Ibid., p. 22.
12. A. Tversky, and D. Kahneman, "Rational choice and the framing of decisions," in Karen Schweers Cook and Margaret Levi, eds., The Limits of Rationality (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1990). Tetlock, op. cit., pp. 35-36.
13. A. Tversky, and D. Kahneman, "Rational choice and the framing of decisions," in Karen Schweers Cook and Margaret Levi, eds., The Limits of Rationality (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1990). Tetlock, op. cit., pp. 35-36.
14. G. Carroll, and J.R. Harrison, "On the Historical Efficiency of Competition Between Organizational Populations," American Journal of Sociology, 100 (November 1994): 746.
15. Tetlock, op. cit., p.26.
16. W. Starbuck and F.J. Milliken, "Executives Perceptual Filters: What They Notice and How They Make Sense," in D.C. Hambrick, ed., The Executive Effect: Concepts and Methods for Studying Top Managers. (Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1988), pp. 35-65.
17. Ibid., p. 45; K. Weick, Sensemaking in Organizations (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1995).
18. Ibid., p. 45; K. Weick, Sensemaking in Organizations (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1995).
19. D. Nadler, Organizational Architecture (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1992).
20. A. Robinson, "Perilous Times for U.S. Microcircuit Makers," Science, 208 (May 1980): 582-584.
21. The idea that high quality and low costs went together was not a foreign concept to a number of American experts. Armand Feigenbaum and Joseph Juran had long preached this message. These principles grew out of prewar and early postwar thinking in industrial engineering that if one concentrated on basic work elements and tasks, one could reduce costs by identifying what tasks could be reduced or eliminated if things were done right the first time. While such conceptualizations were part of the thinking of selected American scholars and practitioners, the advocates' voices were clearly whispers in the wind to which few companies paid attention. A partial exception was in those industries such as semiconductors where yield is one of the traditional quality measures. The connection between high yield and low cost is readily apparent to managers.
22. A. Schneiderman, "Optimum Quality Costs and Zero Defects: Are They Contradictory Concepts?" Quality Progress, 19 (November 1986): 28-31.
23. C. Fine, "Quality Improvement and Learning in Productive Systems," Management Science, 32 (October 1986): 1301-1315.
24. Y. Kondo, "Ningensei to QC (II)" ["Humanity and QC(II)"], Hinshitsu, 9 (1979): 5-10.
25. L. Ross and M. Lepper, "The Perseverance of Beliefs: Empirical and Normative Considerations," in Richard Shweder, ed., Fallible Judgment in Behavioral Research (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1980).
26. A. Stinchcombe, Information and Organizations (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1980), pp. 171-179.
27. Garvin (1988), op. cit., pp. 69-92.
28. Ross and Lepper, op. cit.
29. Ibid., p. 30.
30. P. Ingrassia and J. White, Comeback (New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1994), pp. 88-93.
31. M. Flynn and D. Andrea, "Corporate Learning from Japan: The Automotive Industry," Office for the Study of Automotive Transportation, University of Michigan, report number 94-14, Ann Arbor, MI, 1994.
32. P. Bourdieu, "Men and Machines," in K. Knorr-Cetina and Aaron Cicourel, eds., Advances in Social Theory and Methodology (Boston, MA: Routledge and Kegan, 1981), pp. 304-318.
33. Tversky and Kahneman, op. cit.
34. Stinchcombe, op. cit.
35. Conversations with Peter Kolesar who served as a quality advisor to Alcoa, January 1996.
36. N. Fligstein, "The Structural Transformation of American Industry: An Institutional Account of the Causes of Diversification in the Largest Firms, 1919-1979," in W. Powell and P. DiMaggio, eds., The New Institutionalism in Organizational Analysis (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1991).
37. Tetlock, op. cit., pp. 28-32.
38. Cf. J. Juran, (editor-in-chief), A History of Managing for Quality (Milwaukee, WI: ASQC Quality Press, 1995), pp. 584-585.
39. J. Groocock, The Chain of Quality (New York, NY: Wiley, 1986), p. 22.
40. R. Kanter, The Change Masters (New York, NY: Simon and Schuster, 1983), p. 249.
41. G. Easton and S. Jarrell, "Patterns in the Deployment of Total Quality Management: A Preliminary Analysis of Interviews with Twenty-Five Leading Companies,paper presented at the Workshop on Improving Theory and Research on Quality Enhancement in Organizations, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D.C., September 6-7, 1996.
42. John Byrne, "Business Fads: What's In - And Out," Business Week, January 20, 1986, pp. 52-61.
43. L. Dobyns and C. Crawford-Mason, Quality or Else (Boston. MA: Houghton Mifflin, 1991), p. 68.
44. Crosby sold off his interest in the firm in 1989.
45. R. Cole, "Large-Scale Change and the Quality Revolution," in A. Mohrman, Jr., et. al., Large-Scale Organizational Change (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 1989), p. 253.
46. I benefited greatly from conversations on these matters with Pascal Boyer, an anthropologist at the Center National de la Recherche Scientifique in Lyon France. Prof. Boyer was my colleague at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in 1996. Dr. Boyer worked for the Paris office of Philip Crosby Associates in the mid-1980s. The firm prided itself on teaching its materials in exactly the same way in every location.
47. E. Gellner, Spectacles and Predicaments (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979): 118-121.
48. Ibid., p. 138.
49. Detroit Free Press Staff, "Ross Perot: The Man Who Speaks His Mind on GM," Detroit Free Press, November 25, 1986, p. 4C.
50. These observations are not intended as a statement on the current activities of Philip Crosby Associates. Their approach evolved over time. In the 1990s, they were teaching business process reengineering, applied statistical quality control, and so on. The analysis here is intended only to capture the dynamics of much of the 1980s.
51. See J.P. MacDuffie, "The Road to 'Root Cause' Shop-Floor Problem Solving at Three Auto Assembly Plants," Management Science, 43/4 (April 1997): 479-502.
52. N. Reddy, J. Aram, and L. Lynn lay out the analytic framework for the institutional domain of technology diffusion. See N. Reddy et. al., "The Institutional Domain of Technology Diffusion," Journal of Innovation Management, 8 (1991): 295-304. See also L. Lynn et. al., "Linking Technology and Institutions: The Innovation Community Framework," Research Policy, 25 (1996): 91-106.
53. N. Reddy, J. Aram, and L. Lynn lay out the analytic framework for the institutional domain of technology diffusion. See N. Reddy et. al., "The Institutional Domain of Technology Diffusion," Journal of Innovation Management, 8 (1991): 295-304. See also L. Lynn et. al., "Linking Technology and Institutions: The Innovation Community Framework," Research Policy, 25 (1996): 91-106.
54. ASI isn't the only industry-wide organization active in the auto industry that is important for diffusing approaches that improve quality. In the late 1980s, the Automotive Industry Action Group became increasingly important for setting auto supplier standards. Working with the American Society for Quality Control, they began in the early 1990s the task of standardizing the Big 3's confusing, overlapping, and redundant quality systems as they relate to suppliers. By the end of 1996 they were on the way to implementing uniform reporting standards.
55. Byrne, op. cit., p. 35.
56. For semiconductors see United States General Accounting Office, "SEMATECH's Technological Progress and Proposed R&D Program," GAO/RCED-92-223BR, July 1992, p. 10; for autos, see Juran, op. cit., p. 582.
57. For semiconductors see United States General Accounting Office, "SEMATECH's Technological Progress and Proposed R&D Program," GAO/RCED-92-223BR, July 1992, p. 10; for autos, see Juran, op. cit., p. 582.