PAINTSQUARE BLOG

Having dispensed with human competence, can we hope for any better from its inanimate, intangible cousin ... quality?

Quality is one of those words, like gay, that stood many years ago for something that it no longer represents—except in the far recesses of happy memories.

Used in its normal context (“builders of quality motor cars”), quality once indicated and implied that the manufacturer built items to the highest possible standards, which were not compromised by the eternal driver of cost.

You paid your money and, as Aldo Gucci (“the quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten”) and his ilk understood, you got an item that was worth having.

The ABCs of TQM

Today, however, quality is a whole different ballgame. It seems as if the word is used to conjure up the meanings of the past to hide behind the dubious goings-on of today.

University of Texas

Human nature, greed and unrealistic programs will lead to problems without proper controls.

Companies use “Quality Management” and “Total Quality Management System”—descriptions that, to the untrained eye, give a warm feeling of comfort and reliability, when nothing could be further from the truth.

When we look at the models of many major companies, quality is described as an item meeting with the specification, and Quality Control/Quality Assurance is the system in place to ensure, on paper, such compliance.

Alas, this airy-fairy world is not quite so rosy in reality.

How Low Can You Go?

The first problem is the specification for the goods to be supplied. Unless this is written in a cast-iron way with unambiguous definitions of what is wanted and expected, unscrupulous contractors will be looking for any loopholes and will deliver goods of the lowest possible standard.

The next problem is the poacher/gamekeeper syndrome. With the advent of systems like ISO 9001, where contractors become self-certifying authorities, the guy doing the job is expected to inspect his own work, reject all the defective areas, re-work and then re-inspect until he is convinced that it meets the specified standard, and then fill out the documentation swearing compliance.

What did Aldo Gucci know that so many of us have forgotten—or choose to ignore?

I can just see a guy battling for hours to blast off the last scrap of mill scale after three inspections, after which he buries the evidence under a spray coat of primer.

Whom do we think we are kidding?

Paper Tiger

Copy and paste on a computer is the third source of trouble. How easy is it for an inspector or foreman (often the same person) to do QA/QC on a computer with a Word template that can easily be rolled from one day to the next with a quick change to just a few salient details?

These works of fiction are the result of a fatally flawed perspective on human nature, which will generally do the bare minimum it can get away with. So discovered one major company that had been presented with tons of lavishly bound QA/QC packages outlining the work undertaken in minute detail.

As it turned out, absolutely nothing had been done, but the company had paid out on the paper evidence for years until what was supposed to be a cursory audit showed otherwise.

The Big ‘But’

Don’t get me wrong. Plenty of people out there do not fit these stereotypes and do produce consistently excellent work in the face of adversity. But (and there is always a “but”) human nature, greed and unrealistic programs will always lead to problems unless proper controls are put in place.

Shopping for a company slogan? Make sure you have the meaures in place to stand behind it.

Until overall responsibility for Quality Assurance is taken away from the contractor and given to a third party who is unlikely to be corrupted (that is, paid enough so as not to be readily bought to turn the other way) and is competent to ensure that what he/she is seeing is compliant with a properly constituted specification, things will not change.

The word quality will continue to hang its head in shame and look back to that once-glorious time when its name meant something.

ABOUT THE THE BLOGGER Simon Hope Three decades as a self-employed coating consultant for the oil majors, military, offshore contractors and coating manufacturers—plus stints in shipping, power generation and other industries—have provided plenty of fodder for Simon Hope’s sharp observations. He welcomes “a healthy or unhealthy debate” on any coating topic, adding: “I never cease to be amazed at the messes that individuals manage to achieve—and, having reached rock bottom, seem to think that dynamiting is the way forwards.” SEE ALL CONTENT FROM THIS CONTRIBUTOR