Quality means never having to say you are sorry

"In any relationship, business or personal, Quality means never having to say you are sorry." - Anand Shah, October 1987.

Storyline (Part 1 of a Three-Part series):

In the late '80s, a small semiconductor chipset company based in Northern California was acquired by a much larger company in the South. It so happened that both companies had one common customer, a very large Italian computer manufacturer.

A few weeks after the acquisition, the CEO of the large company was visiting the Italian customer. To his surprise, the customer executives expressed concern about the quality of his company's products, the item that was not on the original agenda. Thinking that it must be from his newly acquired company, the CEO assured the customer that he was going to pay immediate attention to the matter ... until the customer people explained that they were not happy with the quality of products from his other divisions, and extremely pleased with the quality from the acquired company.

Alarmed and delighted, the CEO sent asked his communications people to interview the small company's employees for the upcoming issue of their magazine.

When questioned, "What does quality mean to you as an employee?", the small company person replied, "In any relationship, business or personal, Quality means never having to say you are sorry."

He elaborated, "We are a small company trying to establish ourselves in the market. As you know, it is very hard to get inside customer's door in the first place and if we do, even one 'Sorry' situation can cause our demise. Our thinking is that we do not want to get into such situations in the first place so we are extra vigilant in all aspects (product, service, communication, internal relationships as well) of business."

Alarmed by the corporate wide exposure the small conquered company was getting in the magazine, the conqueror (the acquiring big company) sent a team of "benchmarking experts" to find out if there was any substance behind such a "Philosophical Vision".

NEXT WEEK: What "the experts" found.
Week After: "Power of Story Telling" and association technique

Comments

[Micro-CEO in training]

Good use of suspense. I'll "stay tuned":-)
Large Italian customer was Olivetti? That's the only Italian electronics company that comes to mind...

I wonder if there is any merit to an argument that smaller companies (or organizational units) are better at quality precisely because they are "small" (i.e. by necessity of survival, they are caring/responsible, efficient, non-bureaucratic, agile, committed). If we follow that line of argument, then the best way for large corporations to ensure good quality is to ensure that it's organizational sub-units are "small"... at least small at heart.

[Rich L]

Good article. I was debating this with a work mate.

"Never Having to Say You Are Sorry" doesn't mean "Never say No to your customer" or "Never point out issues that your customer is having". Especially for the small guy, setting clear expectations is of greatest importance and helps a lot with your credibility.

Extrapolate this back to your relationship analogy. It would not be a healthy relationship to expect your partner to never say "No" to you, and you'd be feeling like you were in an abusive relationship if you could never say "No" to your partner!

[Fred]

I found this blog via Y-Combinator. I liked the article but feel compelled to reply to the comment by Rich L. What a load of crap. Touchy-Feely attitudes like this will be the demise of Western businesses - we are all too busy having a group hug while competitors in other countries cut our throats.

Let's say I am a big company (like Wal-Mart, Microsoft or AT&T) and you are one of my suppliers. I'm the 800lb Gorilla of the industry that accounts for most of the spending.

You would love to have my business. You might even need it to survive. But you better be sure I have a second or third source for your product lined up, and they all more eager than you to have my money.

I will have no hesitation of dropping you an in instant for a better performing supplier if you screw up. That's just business. If you don't like it, become a social worker.