Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Fast Quality

In his latest blog this month, Paul Borawski talks about the change in quality to meet customer's needs faster and faster. In order keep up with the rapid changes in customer needs, companies must be innovative and listen to those needs very carefully. If they are not doing it, somebody else will. As needs change, perception of quality changes as well. Why is that? Because technology is rapidly changing. Products are now more complex with tons of cool features. We are not using cell phones that are only used for talking anymore. As soon as we see that one of the features is not working right, we start looking for something better out there with higher quality and more features. Companies that continually listen to their customers, innovate and pursue perfection before anyone else are the ones that will win us over at the end. All this sounds to me like continuous improvement. Wouldn't you agree? For example, what are the 5 lean principles? Value in the eyes of the customer, elimination of waste, empowered employees, continuously improve in pursuit of perfection.. If an organization adapts these principles and embraces continuous improvement, its products and services will always be top quality which is what customers pay for.