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What is the difference between TQM and Six Sigma?

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Question added by Mohamed Gaber , Quality & Development General Manager , International Company For Food Industries
Date Posted: 2013/08/13
abdul latif mohamed sorour Abdul latif
by abdul latif mohamed sorour Abdul latif , Senior Food Trade Hygiene Officer , Dubai Municepality

TQM is started before the Six Sigma. Why this happens? For example you can consider ISO as a good TQM example. But after ISO also companies not getting all the required result and profit.This not happen because there is any problem in ISO standard. This happens because after implementation of ISO quality becomes quality departments roll all the customer requirements etc were forgotten by people implementing it. And ultimate result of this is lack of team work. If ISO implemented properly involving all people with the continual improvement principle we will get very good results.To overcome all this issue management decided one reference for defect and they started implementing six sigma to improve the result from business.    Good answer

Mohamed Elkhatim Hamada
by Mohamed Elkhatim Hamada , Supply Chain Manager , Central Advance Digitech

TQM ( Total Quality Management ) & Six Sigma are concepts & approaches of continuous improvement by several ways.
While TQM approaches improvement through the strategy adopted by an organization in all level and linking functional areas together.6 Sigma on the other hand concentrate a single process and try to reduce defects and eventually reducing the total cost.
  

saleh mostafa abdel alkawy
by saleh mostafa abdel alkawy , Commercial Project Manager , Sola style

Six Sigma seeks to improve the quality of the production process outputs by identifying and removing the causes of defects (errors), and variability in manufacturing and business processes.
It uses the standard set of methods of quality management, including statistical methods, and the creation of infrastructure especially from people within the organization ("Black Belts," and "green belts", etc.) who are experts in these methods each project to Six Sigma implemented in the organization followed by a series of specific steps, and the amount of financial goals (such as reducing costs or increasing profits) Six Sigma began in the manufacturing sector at Motorola in the1980s.
It then became popular starting at General Electric, where it was adapted for use in service applications.
Total Quality Management (TQM) is a comprehensive and structured approach to organizational management that seeks to improve the quality of products and services through ongoing refinements in response to continuous feedback.
TQM requirements may be defined separately for a particular organization or may be in adherence to established standards, such as the International Organization for Standardization's ISO9000 series.
TQM can be applied to any type of organization; it originated in the manufacturing sector and has since been adapted for use in almost every type of organization imaginable, including schools, highway maintenance, hotel management, and Mosques, and churches.
As a current focus of e-business, TQM is based on quality management from the customer's point of view.
 

darrell peebles
by darrell peebles , Senior Manager for Quality , Dyncorp Int'l

This is an "Oh no! " question.
The answers so far are proof that the quality arena is still a mystery to it's own inhabitants.
Some say that one is customer focused, one is problem focused? Complete nonsense.
If you are working on any problem that does not have customer impact, you're wasting time.
What is the purpose of becoming more efficient, more effective and producing less waste? to benefit the customer, period.
Somoe imply that one is more technical and one is not.
That had traction some years ago, but no more.
I have taught collegiate seminars on TQM, wrote papers on it, and preached it (argued its merits with executives).
I advocated using the TOOLS of Six sigma far longer than there was a Six sigma.
I have come to rely on the gurus of the20th century to answer that there is no difference anymore.
TQM was an idea that tried to sell corporate leaders on the neeed to invoke attention to 'soft' skills, such as teambuilding, employee empowerment, brainstorming, and such, all having to do with building respect and dignity into the workplace.
Why, because the Frederick Taylor ( reflected in the original Henry Ford) method of doing business was failing our competitiveness.
I was on the front lines of that battle (to share at another time).
Well, TQM as we all know didn't sell good enough.
There was confusion in the ranks on who owned it, Quality or HR.
quality slammed the data driven side of it into the argument until it was made a hard and fast part of TQM.
It became diificult to distinguish between TQM and TQC.
I refer you to the work of Armand Feignebaum and his company, General Systems Corp.
He has been hailed as the father of Total Quality Ssystems, writing a book called Total Quality Control.
After you google him, you will get the point.
In any event, as he noted in an interview in July1994 "Industry Week",  companies still weren't gettting it.
The Quality world, never one to refuse a chance to add more confusion (everyone else does it, right?) fought so that this dire situation of loss of competitiveness have a quality solution, and we heralded in "zero defects", then maybe just .005% is ok, and named it Six Sigma.
Corporate bosses can see that we are not the softies, because we are stats driven.
Well, this bored the heck out of stockholders at General Electric, and they manuevered Six Sigma into teams, invoking quality circles into Six sigma, and thus a whole new industry was born, to boot.
Jobs were created, new homes were built as a result of this industrial savior. 
In short, ok, you don't like TQM?We can serve it up to you as Six Sigma.
Why do you think Six Sigma projects are done in teams, and require sponsors and report outs?  That's all TQM stuff folks.
As Feigenbaum, Juran, Deming, Shainan and others will tell us that may need to be reminded, it's all about the commitment.
After reading Feignebaum, ask yourself what happens if you take the word Quality out of TQC? What happens if it is taken out of TQM? you get the same thing.
Management's total control of the processes, products, etc.
Anything less doesn't get it done as well as can be.
This is why many comapnies are committing full attention to Six sigma, to gain total control of their processes, total amangement of their products.
I would porefer we not waste time confucing our industry any further, and refer back to our gurus.
There is really nothing new in quality since the awakening to the competitive threats of Japan in the late1980s forward.
If you think this is not true, ask yourself which Six Sigma MBB would try to show Drs, Feigenbaum, Deming, Shainiin or Juran a thing or two? I love TQM because it created real cultural change.
I like Six sigma because it gives a name to tools being used by quality for decades, such as MSA and SPC, DFM/DFA, (now DFSS), etc.
Either way, it all about commitment and the customer.
Regards,   Darrell

TQM is started before the Six Sigma.
Why this happens? For example you can consider ISO as a good TQM example.
But after ISO also companies not getting all the required result and profit.This not happen because there is any problem in ISO standard.
This happens because after implementation of ISO quality becomes quality departments roll all the customer requirements etc were forgotten by people implementing it.
And ultimate result of this is lack of team work.
If ISO implemented properly involving all people with the continual improvement principle we will get very good results.To overcome all this issue management decided one reference for defect and they started implementing six sigma to improve the result from business.

Aftab Ahmed
by Aftab Ahmed , QHSE Manager , NSCC International Ltd., Abu Dhabi, UAE

The basic difference between6sigma & TQM are follow in comparision: TQM was invented well before Six Sigma, and as such, Six Sigma broadly inherited many of TQM’s principles.
The focus of TQM is general improvement using collaborative and cultural approach to a problem, while Six Sigma is more statistical and data driven.
TQM emphasizes increased performance levels; Six Sigma stresses acceptance requirements and minimum standards.
TQM’s quality definition is where a product meets set company standards, while Six Sigma’s quality definition is, to a larger part, determined by the customer.
 

Rajive Gupta
by Rajive Gupta , Project Manager , Huawei technologies Nepal Pvt. Ltd.

TQM Recognize customers and discovers their needs, Setting standards  which are consistent with customers requirements.
It Controls process and improves their capability, establishing systems for quality.
Empowerment of people at all levels in the organization to act for quality improvement.
Six Sigma is a structured application of the tools and techniques of total quality management on a project basis to achieve strategic business results.
It extends the use of the improvement tools to cost, cycle time and other business issues.
It keeps a subset of tools that range from the basic to the advance.
It keeps a subset of tools that range from the basic to the advance

The vital difference between Six Sigma and TQM is the approach.
While TQM views quality as conformance to internal requirements, Six Sigma focuses on improving quality by reducing the number of defects.

Yasser Qutub
by Yasser Qutub , Board Member of Industrial Engineering chapter , Saudi Council of Engineers

Six Sigma is a relatively new concept as compared to Total Quality Management (TQM).
However, it is not intended to be a replacement for TQM.
Both Six Sigma and TQM have many similarities and are compatible in varied business environments, including manufacturing and service industries.
While TQM has helped many companies in improving the quality of manufactured goods or services rendered, Six Sigma has the potential of delivering even sharper results.

Mohamed Attia Ibrahim Attia
by Mohamed Attia Ibrahim Attia , quality and food safety manager at SEDRA group , سدرة للحلويات والمعجنات
Luminis India
by Luminis India , General Manager - Sales & Operations , Luminis Consulting Services Pvt Ltd, IN

That TQM offered very little of interest to a CEO; there were seldom explicit financial results that could be linked to a CEO’s annual or strategic goals. Many TQM efforts were implemented on blind faith that 'things would get better' if quality improved. The problem was not the people, it was the process.

 

Six Sigma has changed all this with its emphasis on financial results that make it clear what executives will gain and have gained through their continued involvement. As with TQM, however, the results are self-evident: the biggest gains have been made in companies where executives are an integral part of Six Sigma deployment and vice versa.

 

Six Sigma is strongly rooted with the objective of bottom-line benefits, and that's why it scores over TQM heavily.  Also, because it makes a very serious call for embedding a Six Sigma culture: an infrastructure needed for success anchored by strong management involvement.

 

Quality initiatives such as TQM & BPR were deployed at an operational level in organizations where they are designed to bring about incremental results. They were intended to cut costs and/or improve operations. On the other hand, Strategic Six Sigma is intended to work at a transformational level, enterprise-wide in organizations.

 

Not only does it changed how work gets done at the everyday level in the organization. It is also capable of generating quantum leaps in business performance, customer satisfaction, innovation, supply chain efficiency, and so on.

 

 

This results from the exponential benefits to process improvement that occur when there is a process management structure in place, enabling improvements to be leveraged across an entire organization.

 

With thanks,

 

Luminis India

 

READ :  Lean Six Sigma Black Belt Training Program

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