The past two years I’ve read tons of books on construction quality, seeking answers to many of the questions I had about managing quality – questions such as how do we tangibly translate what our clients want into construction documents and further to the crews. Most of the books didn’t offer anything new or change my perspective and still left me feeling that something is missing from the industry standard approach to quality.
However, one of the books I came across did offer a few great insights: “The Management of Quality in Construction,” by J.L. Ashford. Written in 1989, I don’t feel that the writing or information is dated. (Two notes here, the first being that there are not many new books on construction quality – and second, it is interesting that given the amount of change, ideas on quality from 1989 and before – even those presented by Deming and the other fathers of quality – still resonate in 2023.)
In the section designated for quality manuals and corporate documentation, Ashford stated on page 75:
“It is an unfortunate fact that many excellent managers and supervisors baulk at the task of producing written instructions for work for which they are responsible. They know what has to be done and can tell people what to do, but they lack the ability to organize their thoughts on paper. Quality managers are often pressed to prepare instructions for line managers who plead lack of time or resources to produce them themselves. Such pressures should be resisted. A quality manager who produces and issues instructions in respect of work for which he is not responsible is not only usurping the role of the manager who should be responsible, he is also collaborating in an activity which will inevitably, weaken the work-force’s support for the system. It is a pre-requisite of success that production management should support the aims of the quality system and communicate this support to their subordinates. A production manager who, however unwittingly, portrays the attitude that procedures are the prerogative of some other person who is trying to impose additional burdens will soon find his work-force devising ways to frustrate the system rather than co-operating in making it work.”
This is somewhat mind-blowing. How many hours are spent by quality managers writing and re-writing their corporate quality systems, then additional time on top of that teaching and training production on the content? The number of jobsite visits and airfare on in-person instruction by an individual quality professional when the true responsibility should be on the regional leaders?
I imagine now the potential for shortening the implementation duration for a quality system if everyone who utilized it – project managers and superintendents – had to write the work instructions for themselves. The cost spent by corporate overhead developing training programs which spread knowledge of concepts and procedures like quality could be greatly reduced if there was a greater involvement from production based on what Ashford is proposing.
I need to reflect more on this, but an incredibly interesting idea – and extremely contrarian in many design and construction organizations.
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