"Managing Responsibility: What Can Be Learned from the Quality Movement?"
California Management Review
Fall 2004, pp. 25-37
A number of companies have focused their attention on the management of corporate responsibility. Pressures have been increasing to do so as a result of recent difficulties experienced by Enron, Nike, and others. This article argues that there are a number of similarities between the development of Total Quality Management and the current movement towards Total Responsibility Management. The authors define corporate responsibility as "the ways in which a company's operating practices (policies, processes, and procedures) affect its stakeholders and the natural environment."
The article compares quality management and responsibility management along the following dimensions:
- Multiple Meanings—Just as the word "quality" has had multiple meanings in the literature, the word "responsibility" also has multiple meanings, including "taking blame or accepting accountability for activities and actions", "taking charge of something", and "having the capacity for making morally acceptable decisions"
- Satisfying Stakeholders—Whereas the quality movement strives to satisfy customers, the responsibility approach strives to similarly satisfy stakeholders and engage them in dialogue.
- Measurement—In the early days of the quality movement, there were concerns about how to measure quality. How to measure responsibility has followed a similar pattern, and there are now a number of good measures.
- Making a Business Case—In the quality movement, some people questioned whether a focus on quality would generate more costs or profits. Similar questions are now being raised about responsibility management.
- Assurance Personnel—The separate quality structures eventually gave way to quality being seen as an essential role of everyone involved in production. A similar evolution is likely to occur for responsibility management.
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