Support systems for total quality

The strategy of Total Quality Management (TQM) states that every organisation activity contributes to the final quality of the product as perceived by the customer, and thus requires that the quality of all elements of organisational activity be monitored and improved. It is not sufficient for the quality system to focus only on the production cycle, because quality, as evidenced by customer satisfaction, may be affected by a wide range of factors, over and above the mainstream of production activities. Thus it may be seen that all data available in an organisation may have potential for informing the quality improvement process. Hence, the quality system must be provided with the means of accessing any of the data held by the various information systems extant in the organisation. Indeed, a case may be made for significant data links between organisations throughout the supply chain.