Virgin

Quality circles

An important element within the concept of continuous improvements is the idea that improvement can be represented by a literally never-ending process of repeatedly questioning and requisitioning the detailed working of a process or activity. This cyclical nature of improvement is usually summarized by the idea of the improvement cycle. There are many improvement cycles used in practice but important ones are, plan-to-do-check-act (PDCA) and the define-measure-analysis-improve-control (DMAIC), or six sigma approach.

The PDCA Cycle is a checklist of the four stages which you must go through to get from `problem-faced' to `problem solved'. The four stages are Plan-Do-Check-Act, and they are carried out in the cycle. The concept of the PDCA Cycle was originally developed by Walter Shewhart, the pioneering statistician who developed statistical process control in the Bell Laboratories in the US during the 1930's. It is often referred to as `the Shewhart Cycle'. It was taken up and promoted very effectively from the 1950s on by the famous Quality Management authority, W. Edwards Deming, and is consequently known by many as `the Deming Wheel'. It can be used to coordinate company’s continuous improvement efforts. It both emphasises and demonstrates that improvement programs must start with careful planning, must result in effective action, and must move on again to careful planning in a continuous cycle. It starts with p stage which involves an examination of current method or problem area being studied. This involves collecting and analysing data so as to formulate a plan of action which is intended to improve performance. Once plan for improvement has been agreed, the next stage is D stage. This is implementation stage. This stage may it itself involves a mini-PDCA cycle as the problem of implementation are resolved. Next comes the C stage where the new implemented solution is evaluated to see whether it has resulted in the expected performance...