Ye olde total quality management

Quality Management and Its Role in Improving Service Quality in Public Sector

“…Comparatively more recently, however, at the end of the 13 th century, artisans started to form guilds in order to develop product quality and organise themselves formally (Juran, 1995). During this period, the products of these artisans were frequently inspected and high quality goods were marked with special symbols (Wolek, 1999), a method that was used continually until the Industrial Revolution at the beginning of the 19 th century. Other inspection techniques that originated in the medieval guilds have remained, however, and are still in use today, forming many of the current concepts of TQM.…”

“…Variance minimisation, for example, is one such idea that developed at around this time in order to ensure that the products created by different members of the guilds were consistent in quality and appearance. And while the fact that manufactured goods were produced by individual craftsmen on a single item basis and therefore, limited the ability of the guilds to develop a systematic QM approach, the presence of the basic principles of TQM were perceived as being present at this time (Wolek, 1999). Clearly, research on the medieval guilds indicates that TQM has a strong basis in historical business and professional practices, and that it developed out of a need to control the quality of goods at a time in history where most goods were hand-made rather than being massproduced.…”