Throughout its rather steady development, the McDonald’s organization has adopted a rather responsible approach towards maintaining high quality standards of its production by incorporating the TQM model into the design of its quality assurance process. According to the description of the specifics of quality management within the organization, the TQM model is applied in the course of a twofold process. Particularly, the company works on the improvement of the ingredients included in products and on its human resource management so that the organization’s personnel could be highly qualified and provide the services of an outstanding quality. While the specified method has its problems, such as the lack of focus on other elements of the production process (e.g., logistics, customer relationships, etc.), it still can be viewed as a giant step towards facilitating sustainability within the organization. Indeed, a closer look at the phenomenon of quality assurance will reveal that it needs to address the areas such as the production process, the staff’s competency, the time consumed in the process, communication with customers and the process of budget planning. As far as the measurement of quality within McDonald’s is concerned, the tool such as regular audits needs to be mentioned. According to the company’s principles, a consistent check of the food quality needs to be carried out so that the customers could be provided with the finest product possible (Nakip & Kandemir, 2014).
Traditionally, several key quality assurance and management models are defined. These include Six Sigma, TQM, ISO 9000, to name just a few. Each of the specified tools has its benefits and problems. Particularly, the TQM model helps focus on the communicational aspect of work organization and quality improvement, which is an obvious benefit, deserves to be mentioned. However, the model also presupposes that quality management is viewed from the customer’s perspective most of the time (Karahan & Tetik, 2012). The Six Sigma approach, in its turn, offers efficient methodology statements. However, Six Sigma also has limitations in terms of management (Woodall & Montgomery, 2012). Excellent management control and enhanced marketability are the key assets of ISO 900; however, the strategy lacks clarity in its certification process (Asaad & Aziz, 2014).
When it comes to defining the approach for quality measurement and improvement, one must admit that the choice of an appropriate tool depends on the specifics of a company. While the Six Sigma model may be considered appropriate for a certain organization, it may lead to completely disastrous effects in another one. Therefore, the decision to use a specific approach must be based both on the specifics of the market environment and the needs of the organization. That being said, the principles of Total Quality Management should be considered as a prime example of an outstanding model. The reasons for choosing the specified model are quite basic; while offering a set of rather rigid rules for managing quality within an organization, it, nevertheless, offers more flexibility in terms of scheduling regular quality checks, defining quality standards based on the organization’s assets, etc. In other words, the specified model helps identify and allocate the resources that an organization has at its disposal and make the most efficient use of them possible. With the introduction of an appropriate quality management approach, any organization is likely to improve its performance impressively.
Reference List
Asaad, M. N. & Aziz, U. U. (2014). ISO 9000 soft factor and organizational performance: examining the relationship and level of implementation using Rasch model in Malaysian automotive companies. Web.
Karahan, M. & Tetik, N. (2012). The determination of the effect level on employee performance of TQM practices with artificial neural networks: A case study on manufacturing industry enterprises in Turkey. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 3(7), 133–142.
Nakip. M. & Kandemir, D. (2014). TQM excellence model to examine the role of strategic change and organizational. Epistemologia, 11(6), 64–68.
Woodall, W. H. & Montgomery, D. C. (2012). Some current directions in the theory and application of statistical process monitoring. Journal of Quality Technology, 46(1), 78–94.