The comprehensive quality management theories of Deming, Juran, and Feigenbaum were widely accepted in Japan. Japanese enterprises created a quality management method known as Total Quality Control (TQC). Statistical techniques, especially the "seven old" tools including "cause-and-effect diagrams," "flowcharts," "histograms," "check sheets," "scatter diagrams," "enumeration charts," and "control charts," were widely used for quality improvement.
In the 1970s, TQC greatly enhanced the competitiveness of Japanese companies, allowing products such as cars, home appliances, watches, and electronic products to dominate large portions of international markets. This significantly promoted the great development of Japan's economy. The success of Japanese companies caused the theory of total quality management to have a significant impact worldwide.
In 1875, Taylorism was born —— marking the beginning of scientific management. Due to Dr. Taguchi's efforts and contributions, quality engineering began to form and developed significantly.
In the 20th century, humanity entered an industrial age characterized by "mechanized processing, scaled operations, and cost monopolization." Over the past century, the development of quality management roughly went through three stages:
Indeed, in the long river of human history, the most primitive quality management methods may be hard to find, but we can be sure that humans have always faced various quality issues since ancient times. Ancient food gatherers had to know which fruits were edible and which were toxic; ancient hunters had to understand which trees provided the best wood for making bows and arrows. Thus, quality knowledge gained through practice was passed down from generation to generation.
In 1987, the ISO9000 series of international quality management standards were introduced —— largely based on BS5750, quality management and quality assurance began to influence economic and trade activities globally.
In 1930, Dodge and Romig proposed statistical sampling inspection methods.
In the 1960s, behavioral science theory emerged in management, emphasizing improving interpersonal relationships, motivating people, and highlighting the importance of "valuing the human factor" and recognizing the role of people in management.
In 1980, Philip Crosby proposed the concept of "zero defects." He pointed out that "quality is free," breaking the traditional notion that high quality comes at the cost of low cost. He proposed that high quality would bring high economic returns to businesses.
Since the mid-1960s, NATO formulated the AQAP quality management standard series —— based on quality management standards like MIL-Q-9858A. The difference was that AQAP introduced design quality control requirements.
In the 1940s, the U.S. Bell Telephone Company successfully utilized statistical quality control technology.
This era saw the emergence of world-renowned quality management experts like Kaoru Ishikawa and Genichi Taguchi.
Due to these developments, it became apparent that simply relying on quality inspections and applying statistical methods could no longer guarantee or improve product quality, prompting the gradual formation of the theory of "Total Quality Management." The earliest proponent of this concept was Feigenbaum, the quality manager of General Electric in the United States. In 1961, he published a book titled "Total Quality Management." The book emphasized that implementing quality functions is the responsibility of all personnel within a company. He proposed: "Total Quality Management is the integration of research and development quality, maintenance quality, and improvement quality activities across all departments of a company into an effective system to conduct market research, design, production, and service at the most economical level while fully satisfying customer requirements."
With the rapid growth of competition, especially international competition, companies worldwide began to pay more attention to "product liability" and "quality assurance" issues, strengthening internal quality management to ensure that produced goods are safe and reliable for use.
As international trade expanded rapidly, the flow of products and capital became increasingly internationalized, leading to international product quality assurance and product liability issues. In 1973, the Hague International Law Conference passed the Convention on the Law Applicable to Product Liability. Subsequently, the Council of Europe signed the European Convention on Product Liability for Personal Injury and Death in Strasbourg, Denmark. Additionally, aimed at eliminating non-tariff barriers, the Technical Barriers to Trade Agreement negotiated by contracting parties made detailed provisions regarding product quality testing, certification, and technical regulations. Since many countries and regional organizations subsequently issued a series of quality management and quality assurance standards, the establishment of international quality management standards became an urgent need. For this purpose, after years of preparation by member states, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) established the Quality Management and Quality Assurance Technical Committee (TC176) in 1979, responsible for formulating international quality management standards. In March 1987, the ISO officially released the ISO9000-9004 series of quality management and quality assurance standards. These standards summarized the management experiences of advanced countries, standardized them, and attracted global attention upon release, adapting to the needs of international trade development and fulfilling the demand for international standardization in quality.
Japanese quality management scholars made significant contributions to the development of quality management theory and methods.
Since the late 1990s, Total Quality Management (TQM) has become a proven management strategy for many "world-class" companies, enabling them to gain core competitiveness. The concept of quality has evolved from narrowly meeting standards to aiming for "customer satisfaction." TQM not only improves the quality of products and services but also deeply impacts corporate culture reform and restructuring, granting companies lasting competitive advantages.
Initially, quality management —— inspection activities separated from other functions, with dedicated inspectors and independent inspection departments emerging.
In the early 20th century, people's understanding of quality management was limited to quality inspection. The means of quality testing involved various detection equipment and instruments, with the method being strict control and 100% inspection. During this period, the "scientific management movement" represented by Taylor appeared in the United States. "Scientific management" proposed the requirement for scientific division of labor among personnel and separated planning functions from execution functions. A key focus was adding an inspection step to supervise and check the implementation of plans, designs, and product standards. This meant that planning, design, production operations, and inspection supervision were each handled by specialized personnel, resulting in a dedicated inspection team forming an independent inspection department. Initially, emphasis was placed on foremen's role in ensuring quality, shifting quality management responsibilities from operators to foremen, hence referred to as "foreman's quality management."
In 1925, Shewhart proposed the theory of Statistical Process Control (SPC) —— using statistical techniques to monitor the production process, reducing reliance on inspections.
After Shewhart invented control charts, his colleagues published "Sampling Inspection Methods" in 1929. They were among the first to introduce mathematical statistics into quality management, contributing to the science of quality management. However, apart from the Bell System where Shewhart worked, only a few American companies began adopting these insights. Especially due to the severe impact of the economic crisis starting in the 1920s on capitalist industrial production, advanced quality management ideas and methods could not be widely promoted. After the onset of World War II, statistical quality control was widely applied due to the needs of war. With the rapid expansion of military production in the United States, despite the increasing number of inspectors, the situation of products awaiting inspection became increasingly serious. Sometimes inspections were carried out without scientific basis, resulting in alarming finished goods losses and frequent quality incidents of weapons and ammunition on the battlefield, such as shell explosions, which severely affected morale. In response, the U.S. military and government organized a group of experts and engineering technicians, who formulated and announced Z1.1 "Quality Management Guidelines," Z1.2 "Control Charts for Data Analysis," and Z1.3 "Quality Management Control Chart Method for Production Processes" between 1941 and 1942, mandating their implementation by manufacturers of weapons and ammunition. This achieved significant results. From then on, the methods of statistical quality control were adopted by many manufacturers, and the effects of statistical quality control were widely recognized.
Since the 1960s, Faganbaum's Total Quality Management concept has gradually been accepted worldwide. When applied, each country had its strengths; in Japan, it was called Company-Wide Quality Control (CWQC). Since China implemented Total Quality Management (TQC) in 1978, both practical and theoretical developments have occurred, requiring further exploration, summary, and improvement.
In the post-war period, many American companies expanded their production scale. Apart from factories producing military equipment continuing to implement quality management procedures, many civilian industries also began adopting these methods, achieving results. Countries outside the U.S., such as Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, and Japan, also successively implemented statistical quality control, achieving outcomes. However, statistical quality control had flaws, overemphasizing statistical methods for quality control, leading people to mistakenly believe that "quality management is statistical methods" and "quality management is the job of statisticians." This made it seem inaccessible and intimidating to most people. Simultaneously, quality control and management were limited to manufacturing and inspection departments, neglecting the work of other departments. This prevented the full play of the enthusiasm of various departments and employees, restricting its promotion and application. Solving these problems pushed quality management into a new stage.
Since the late 1990s, TQM has become a proven management strategy for many "world-class" companies, enabling them to gain core competitiveness. The concept of quality has evolved from narrowly meeting standards to aiming for "customer satisfaction." TQM not only improves the quality of products and services but also deeply impacts corporate culture reform and restructuring, granting companies lasting competitive advantages.
In 1994, the ISO9000 series of standards was revised —— the new ISO9000 standards became more complete and were adopted by the vast majority of countries worldwide. Third-party quality certification developed extensively, effectively promoting the popularization and improvement of quality management levels.
Quality management activities unfolded in many countries. Many countries, including China, the U.S., and Europe, established national quality management awards to encourage companies to improve productivity and competitiveness through quality management. Quality management was not only introduced into manufacturing enterprises but also into service industries, even hospitals, government agencies, and schools. Many senior executives began paying attention to quality management, and TQM entered companies as a strategic management model.
In the era surrounding improving quality, reducing costs, and shortening development and production cycles, new management methods have emerged continuously. Among them are Concurrent Engineering (CE), Business Process Reengineering (BPR), etc.
(1) Pre-industrial Era Quality Management
Before the Industrial Revolution, product quality was controlled by individual craftsmen or artisans themselves.
(2) Quality Management in the Industrial Era
As society developed, villages gradually expanded into commercial exchanges, and a new industry —— commerce appeared. Buyers and sellers no longer directly contacted each other but instead conducted exchanges and transactions through merchants. The almost instinctive recognition of quality in village markets no longer worked, so quality guarantees emerged, evolving from oral forms into written quality guarantees. The development of commerce required effective communication between distant connected manufacturers and distributors, leading to another invention: quality specifications or product specifications. This allowed relevant quality information to be communicated directly between buyers and sellers, regardless of distance or product complexity. Simple quality inspection methods and measurement tools also followed, representing the rudimentary quality management in the handicraft era. During this time, quality primarily relied on manual operators' skills and experience to control, thus also known as "operator quality management." In the mid-18th century, the Industrial Revolution erupted in Europe, producing "factories." Factories had incomparable advantages over handicraft workshops, leading to their collapse and the formation of the factory system. Mass production in factories brought many new technical issues, such as interchangeability, standardization, precision of tooling and measurement, etc. Addressing these issues prompted the birth of quality management science. Therefore, quality management as a science is a 20th-century phenomenon.
(3) Internationalization of Quality Management
As international trade rapidly expanded, the flow of products and capital became increasingly internationalized, leading to international product quality assurance and product liability issues. In 1973, the Hague International Law Conference passed the Convention on the Law Applicable to Product Liability. Later, the Council of Europe signed the European Convention on Product Liability for Personal Injury and Death in Strasbourg, Denmark. Additionally, aimed at eliminating non-tariff barriers, the Technical Barriers to Trade Agreement negotiated by contracting parties made detailed provisions regarding product quality testing, certification, and technical regulations. Since many countries and regional organizations subsequently issued a series of quality management and quality assurance standards, establishing international quality management standards became an urgent need. For this purpose, after years of preparation by member states, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) established the Quality Management and Quality Assurance Technical Committee (TC176) in 1979, responsible for formulating international quality management standards. In March 1987, the ISO officially released the ISO9000-9004 series of quality management and quality assurance standards. These standards summarized the management experiences of advanced countries, standardized them, and attracted global attention upon release, adapting to the needs of international trade development and fulfilling the demand for international standardization in quality.