It’s a cliché but everything starts with and ends with Leadership. It’s from leadership that the vision comes, the inspiration for the formation, direction, energy and culture of the organization all originate. This is especially true in regard to quality. In a survey of Baldrige winning companies they cited that leadership support was a key issue to successful quality implementation and success.
Deming stated in his famous and foundational book on quality, ‘Out of the Crisis’ that “...
The NHQA criteria may look simple at first glance, just 8 headings, but this is deceptive, it has depth and complexity. Think of the range of issues involved in running a successful homebuilding business, can all of those issues be related to an aspect of the NHQA Criteria? Yes, for example, future planning, business plans and other issues fit under Section 2 Strategic Planning, issues relating to the design function fits in under Section 3 Performance (Process) Management where you have to...
Looking for a way to focus and coordinate improvement initiatives? A3, which is named after the size of paper it is meant to be printed on. The aim is to have a summary of your improvement project from background through resolution all communicated on one sheet of paper! A3 becomes a merger of a charter document and a DMAIC improvement process.
BACKGROUND:
Whether you are planning to or currently use Energy Star, NAHB National Green Building Standards, DOE’s Builder Challenge or another program, the key is conducting a gap analysis on your existing materials and methods of construction; selecting a program; planning transition; implementation; and sustaining (improving your performance in) the program. Quality tools and techniques can help you do this and ensure that all aspects of design and construction processes are conducted effectively...
Reinventing the wheel can take a lot of time. So why not consider benchmarking best practices. The 2011 National Housing Quality Award Winners featured in the October edition of Professional Builder give three wonderful examples. Wathen-Castanos Hybrid Homes, Charter Homes and Haseko Construction.
The 2010 October edition of Professional Builder Magazine features the three winners of the National Housing Quality Award.
Wathen...
What REAL bottom-line impact can Quality have on my business!
When we look at the cost of not having quality, quality quickly becomes an investment worth making. Consider the costs of poor quality that the industry suffered during the boom as described in this Business Week article.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_08/b4216020278215.htm...
When builders apply for Professional Builder’s National Housing Quality Award they receive much more than the chance to win an award — they get a detailed feedback report from industry experts and consultants on their business operations and practices. To offer an idea of the value of the report, I’ve calculated the total time spent on its development.
As many as four judges evaluate each application, and each judge spends up to six hours on each submittal to complete the scoring...
Whether you like checklists or not, there’s no denying the impact they can have on ensuring things get done right the first time, every time.
In a recently published book, “The Checklist Manifesto,” this impact was shown for the healthcare industry. For example, roughly 100,000 people in the U.S. die each year in surgery due to a “complication.” Driven by this unfortunate...
The NHQA consists of a set of eight criteria but how does it actually function?
The criteria does not consist of isolated standalone elements, they interact and support one another in a systems approach. The following model has been developed to articulate how the NHQA criteria functions and interacts. The model follows the logical flow already used in the order of the criteria.
Leadership is placed at the top of the model, the apex, it is from here that the...
CUSTOMER SATISFACTION
While it has been long established that organizations with a quality foundation have better leverage to achieve high levels of customer satisfaction, one key way to attaining this goal comes from being particularly focused on employee satisfaction. (1) You might hear this cited but its believe it or not so often overlooked. Also you may have heard this before but never actually seen any data to prove it. Well here is some evidence for you...
