Quality Council

A Quality Council is composed of the organization’s top executive and his or her direct reports. It may also be referred to as an Executive Council. The Quality Council acts as the steering group to develop the organization’s mission, vision, goals, values, and quality policy. These serve as critical input to process mapping, planning, measurement, etc. Some large companies opt for more than one level of Quality Council. When multiple levels exist, each organization’s mission and vision tie into that specified by the top council.

Management Committees

Management committees (also called Process Management Committees) are composed of middle managers and/or key staff personnel, and are responsible for deploying quality management practices throughout the organization. One or more committees may be needed depending on the organization’s size and functional diversity. Committees should represent all the skills and functions needed to work on the specific processes or activities.

Teams and Work Groups

Teams are formed under any number of names depending on their purpose. Common names and functions are:

Process Development Teams develop processes, standards, etc.

Process Improvement Teams improve existing processes, standards, etc.

Work Groups perform specific tasks such as JAD, inspection, or testing.

The process teams are composed of a representative group of process owners. Members of work groups will vary depending on the purpose, but suppliers and customers are likely to participateas team members or as reviewers. It may also be desirable for a QA analyst to participate on the team.

Process teams use standard approaches (such as flowcharts, checklists, Pareto analysis) to define, study, and improve processes, standards, procedures, and quality control methods. They may pilot new or revised processes help deploy them to the rest of the organization, and provide process training. They may also serve as process consultants to process owners and others using the process. Approaches and tools used by the team depend on its purpose.