Quality circles

Quality Circles as they are called in Japan, is a participative philosophy woven around quality control and problem solving techniques at the bottom level. It epitomizes the policy of people building, respect for human beings and conceives a participative management culture. This concept enables the grass-root level employees to play a meaningful and significant role in their organization. The responsibility for the attainment of Quality depends on all the departments of an Organization. The main purpose behind Quality Circles is to utilize the Human Resources effectively and to build the people and produce quality people towards making quality products or providing quality services. It is to make a ‘Man’ productive and knowledge worthy. Quality circles are an alternative to the dehumanizing concept of the division of labor, where workers or individuals are treated like robots. They bring back the concept of craftsmanship, which when operated on an individual basis is uneconomic, but when used in group form (as is the case with quality circles), it can be devastatingly powerful and enables the enrichment of the lives of the workers and creates harmony and high performance in the workplace. The major objective of this paper is to create an understanding for concept of Quality Circles and effective implementation of the same within the Organization.