The achievement of total organizational excellence takes considerable time and ability. It must be given the status of a senior executive project because of the need for full integration with the organization s strategy, operating philosophy and management systems. It may require an extensive review and maybe substantial revision of existing systems of management and ways of operating. Fundamental questions may have to be asked, such as: Do the managers have the necessary authority, capability, and time to carry this through?

Any review of existing management and operating systems will inevitably open many cans of worms and uncover problems that have been successfully buried and smoothed over perhaps for years. Authority must be given to those charged with following through with actions that they consider necessary to achieve the goals. The commitment will be continually questioned and will be weakened, perhaps destroyed by the failure to delegate authoritatively.

The following steps are suggested in general terms. Clearly, different types of organizations will need to make adjustments to the detail, but the component parts are the basic requirements.

A disciplined and systematic approach to organizational excellence may be established in an executive steering committee which should meet at least monthly to review strategy, implementation progress and improvement. It should be chaired by the chief executive and the members should include the top management team and the chairs of any site steering committees, or core process teams, depending on the size of the organization. The objectives of the...