Quality cares

The third quality summit of the
Confederation of Indian Industry (CII),
held f rom November 2-4 at
Bangalore, focussed on several initiatives adopted by India and the
European Union to mark a significant
difference in the quality movement
of business in India.

Emphasizing heavily on quality as
a too[ for business excellence, R C
Bhargava, managing director of
Maruti Udyog, and chairman, Cil
National Committee on Quality, said,
'The rules of the game have dramatically changed in the last four years.
Indian industry could survive and
grow only if it focussed on quality
and total customer satisfaction."

One of the most significant initiatives of the summit was the proposal
for setting up of a National Quality
Council. The council would provide
impetus to make quality a national
priority.

Roy Peacock, representative,
European Foundation for Quality
Management, pointed out that business results and societal impacts are
essential to draw up a satisfactory
link between Total Quality
Management and business outputs.

Kozo Kouro f rom Asahi
University, Japan, said, "Customer
satisfaction comes first and business
excellence comes second. Profit is
very important but short profit is not
good. Customer expectation drives
quality and this contributes to long.
term profits."

Suresh Rajpal, president HewlettPackard India, provided a significant
perspective to the issue insisting that
"employee satisfaction drives customer satisfaction".