The Quality Maturity Model

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The Quality Maturity Model

• (so far)

Frankie Wilson Brunel University, UK.
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Structure of this talk

• Initial premises
• Description of the research
• Results (so far)
• The emerging Quality Maturity Model
• Questions (for you)
• Open floor

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Definition

• Quality Total Quality Management, continuous
  improvement
• Culture the beliefs, behaviours, norms,
  dominant values, rules and climate in the
  organisation.
• Quality culture The way quality gets done
  round here. Influences PMs selected and attitude
  of library management, library staff and parent
  organisation to these measures.

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Assumption 1 Meta-Quality

• Agile environment - shifting goalposts.
• Quality of quality processes - can they cope?
• Not an alternative to many varied methods of
  quality assurance - next level of abstraction.

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Assumption 2 Performance Measurement

• The most important element of any library is the
  people who work there
• and people are people
• so the performance you get depends on what you
  measure.
• If all things talked about at this conference are
  important - why not ubiquitous? Some difficult to
  measure

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• If you dont know where you are going, any road
  will do.
• Chinese proverb
• If you dont know where you are, a map wont
  help.
• Watt S. Humphrey
• Aim of this research to develop a quantitative
  measure of this fuzzy (qualitative,
  non-evidenced) concept, and so promote wider
  engagement.

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The research context

• PM6 - presented research on long term impact of
  benchmarking, to which QMM was an aside - v
  positive response to QMM (so it is all your
  fault!)
• QMM presented was closely based on Capability
  Maturity Model of SEI.
• QMM presented was merely a proof of concept.

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The research design

• Research design Design Science (aka Design
  Research, Simon,1969)
• Alternative to Qualitative or Quantitative
• Design Engineering Architecture Information
  systems (and Librarianship, at its inception)
• Wicked problems
• Iterative
• Product is an artifact (thing)
• Not assessed against truth but by utility
• Perfect paradigm to bridge research and practice
  divide (but that is another story)

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Research iterations

• Phase 1 - QMMa from literature
• Phase 2 - QMMb from data
• Phase 3 - QMMbeta (amalgamated)
• Test for validity and utility of QMMbeta
• QMM fully characterised
• Online self-assessment tool

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Phase 1 - literature

• Atkinson
• Baldridge
• Crosby
• Deming
• EFQM
• Garratt
• Handy
• Juran

• McKinsey 7 S
• Oakland
• Peters
• Peters Young
• Senge
• Swieringa Wierdsma
• .

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Phase 2

• Grounded theory (from Straus Corbin)
• Semi-structured interviews (vertical slice) and
  documentary analysis
• Interview Qs from Phase 1 QMM
• 10 HE libraries so far (9 UK 1 SA)
• From data - categories properties (specific or
  general attributes of categories) dimensions
  (location of property on range).

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Results (so far)

• Central construct is culture
• 35 elements - group together into 7 facets
• 6 facets from both literature and data (8 facets
  in total)
• Elements stable - it is how they group that
  differs

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Quality Culture

• A culture of quality is
• Doing things right
• Doing the right thing
• Learning
• Suited to the business environment (change
  seeking in an agile environment)
• Explicitly and appropriately aiming to improve
  quality
• The culture is created by
• Strong leadership
• The people of the organisation

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Alignment is the glue
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(No Transcript)
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Management of the organisation

• Strategic plan generation
• Management alignment (achieving SP)
• Progress monitoring
• Performance measurement
• Project management processes

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Environmental sensing

• Customers (bottom up)
• Gathering feedback
• Collation of feedback
• Action as a result of feedback
• Organisation (top down)
• Gathering feedback
• Influencing organisation

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• Wider context (inside out)
• Gathering feedback
• Involvement of staff in profession
• Contribution to profession

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Learning organisation

• Staff empowerment
• Staff involvement in change
• Nature / level of learning
• Attitude to mistakes
• Attitude to risk
• Staff encouragement to innovate

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Attitude to change

• Attitude to change
• Perception of drivers for change

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Attitude to quality

• Definition of quality (inc locus of control)
• Attitude to quality improvement
• Perception of responsibility for quality
• Type of quality improvement initiatives (sexy
  vs. vanilla)

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Leadership

• Vision and value setting
• Trust
• Inspiration and motivation

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Investment in staff

• Attitude to staff (as an asset)
• Training provision
• Development of staff
• Recognition of staff

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Alignment

• Vertical alignment
• Horizontal alignment
• Consistency
• Communication flow
• little cogs - staff see where they fit
• Structure
• Alignment of attitude to quality
• Alignment of attitude to change

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The Quality Maturity Model
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Research into practice

• Aim is to make tricky-to-measure concepts
  measurable.
• Cant just be theoretically interesting - has to
  be useful to practitioners.
• Testing this utility is part of the research
• so over to you

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Questions - general

• Would you find the QMM useful?
• How should I tell?

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Questions - specific 1

• What would you find most useful as a measure of
  performance
• a single number (3)
• An average - mean (3.245) mode (3) median
  (3)
• A profile (management of organisation 3
  attitude to change 4 alignment 2 etc)
• A total out of 40 (8x5)

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Questions - specific 2

• What do you think of the 8 facets?
• Management of the organisation
• Environmental sensing
• Learning organisation
• Attitude to change
• Attitude to quality
• Investment in staff
• Leadership
• Alignment

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Your thoughts / comments
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Thank You

• for taking part in my research
• frankie.wilson_at_brunel.ac.uk
• Any thoughts / ideas / suggestions / criticisms
  very gratefully received.