total quality management (tqm) for sustainability
TRANSCRIPT
Total Quality Management (TQM) for Sustainability
Our research identified three dimensions, which are essential in translating
sustainability issues into strategic priorities for firms and managers:
1. Identify strategic sustainability issues – a material concept of sustainability,
must be understood in order to define risks and opportunities and their
relation with the firm´s business strategy, transforming them into a source of
competitive advantages.
2. Cascade strategic priorities in your supply chain – engage your supply chain
partners in order to leverage your financial, social and environmental
performance. Many of today´s sustainability issues show up at different stages
throughout a products lifecycle. Engaging with suppliers as well as customers
helps to manage these issues holistically.2
3. Involve corporate departments and corporate functions – promoting
sustainability in a company has to be a process that is shared amongst its
different business units. Only once each unit identifies its most relevant
activities their consolidated impact will benefit a company´s triple bottom line
performance.
These three dimensions seek to enhance the role of the firm in the global quest for
sustainable development and identify those issues with clear financial, social and
environmental impacts.
The tool for TQM for Sustainability aims to assist companies and their managers in
setting goals to pursue more sustainable performance of their businesses, by focusing
the “high yielding fruits” and managing them as ordinary corporate issues through key
performance indicators within the corporate management system.
With this model, we show a path that covers all important management stages: from
the sustainability assessment and prioritization to the proposition of corporate
priorities for different business units of the company in relation to sustainability,
culminating with a quality management system that incorporates aspects of
sustainability, supported by policies and guidelines.
In the creation of the tool, we conducted an action research with one of our associated
companies, MASB Desenvolvimento Imobiliário, a real estate development firm. The
first step was to define priorities for the company. Reflecting on what the company
considers a priority - by analysing the indicators and sustainability issues- we
experienced a gradual process of awareness, which was essential to develop a
management system, which is meaningful for corporate strategy and manager´s
decision-making.
After raising awareness, priorities for the different business units of the company were
defined, with the support of the Quality Management team. Why did we work with the
Quality Management sector? Because the system and its performance indicators are
broadly used throughout the company. Besides that, the quality management team is
working transversely in organizations, looking for continuous improvements in all
business units.
Once this initial definition was complete, we started to establish the sustainability
indicators and goals. In this phase, indicators were chosen for "low hanging and high
yielding fruit" that were easier to be applied. Since we wanted to follow up what was
going on immediately, the chosen indicators were very close to the reality of the
business units, what allowed us a fast and effective implementation and
measurement.
From this monitoring, we expect to generate a time series that allows us to assess how
each business unit performs on their self-selected indicators. With this evaluation it is
possible to improve the sustainability management of the organization as a whole, as
well as the incorporation of new indicators. Once again, Quality Management team is
important since it can foster improvement by exploration of synergies among business
units.
In our action research development we observed eight steps to build a sustainability
management system, which are summarized in Figure 1.
Figure 1. The eight steps for the inclusion of sustainability in the management
• Defining a reference that de-composes sustainability • Understanding the issues that compose the firm´s sustainability
1. De-composing sustainability
• Reflecting on the relation between the firm´s strategy and sustainability issues
• Identiftying priority areas for the firm
2. Defining corporate priorities
• Indication of representatives of each unit of the company• Define the priorities for each unit of the company• Classify them according to their contribution to the organization
3. Dividing sustainability
• Relate existing systems/indicators and sustainability indicators• Identify themes that are not monitored or managed• Suggest indicators to fill identified gaps
4. Reflections on sustainability management
• Validate the results of steps 3 and 4 within the unit• Set priority issues to be addressed by the unit
5. Setting priorities for each business unit
• Selecting unit-specific sustainability indicators for the priority themes
• Include indicators in the quality management system
6. Developing sustainability indicators
• Recommend indicators of sustainability to senior management• Construct missing policies, guidelines, and goals
7. Developing corporate policies and guidelines
• Constant evaluation• Make adjustments and improvements , when necessary
8. Continuous Improvement
The sustainability management system is still being developed, but we have already
implemented some improvements that make its implementation easier and reduce
risks.
One unexpected benefit that emerged in the pilot project was its capacity of pointing
out internal barriers to improvements in products quality and cost, as the method
promoted dialogue amongst relevant business units.
The methodology further enabled the inclusion of incentives for individuals and teams
for the performance of the business units aligning their actions towards sustainability
to corporate strategy, such as variable payments and profit sharing.
Having a clear and material sustainability strategy additionally enabled the firm to
transform the environment in which it operates, promoting sustainability along the
value chain, engaging government and civil society.
Even though the pilot project was developed in a real state firm (MASB), we consider
that it can be replicated in other sectors due to its parsimonious nature. It offers a
simple and effective way to promote change for sustainable management, with
general guidelines that can be easily adapted to different business realities.
Team NPS
Cláudio Boechat – Technical Coordinator
E-mail: [email protected]
Phone number: + 55 31 3589-7377
Maria Raquel Grassi F. Marques – Coordinator and Project Manager
E-mail: [email protected]
Phone number: + 55 31 3589-7293
Team CDSC
Heiko Spitzeck – Manager
E-mail: [email protected]
Phone number: + 55 11 3513-4717
Rafael Tello – Technical Coordinator
E-mail: [email protected]
Phone number: + 55 31 9246-5521
Brener Seixas – Intern
E-mail: [email protected]
Phone number: + 55 31 3589-7301