The Specifics of Quality Processes and Quality Management Principles Used in Emirates Airlines - Case Study Example

Quality Management Project Student’s Name Institutional Affiliation Quality Management Project Executive Summary The following paper aims at reviewing quality management at Emirates Airlines. The paper will analyze the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of the organization to determine its approach on quality management. One of the main findings is that Emirates enjoys increased customer satisfaction, but is under increased threat from competitors. The company has effectively aligned its quality management approach to the principle of Total Quality Management. However, the company lacks a process-approach strategy. The paper will also recommend the implementation of a process approach to enhance quality performance. Table of Contents Quality Management Project 1 Quality Management Project 2 Executive Summary 2 Table of Contents 3 Introduction/Academic Overview 4 Project Overview 6 SWOT Analysis 6 Strengths 6 Weaknesses 6 Opportunity 6 Threats 7 SWOT Key Findings 7 The Impact of Quality Processes and Quality Management Principles used in Emirates Airlines 8 Quality Management Principles 9 Conclusion/ Recommendation: Optimal Implementation Plan 13 References 14 Introduction/Academic Overview Quality management guarantees that a business, service or product is reliable (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). The field of quality management involves quality planning, control, assurance, and improvement. According to Goetsch & Davis (2014), there are different approaches to quality management including transcendent, product-based, user-based, manufacturing-based, and value-based. The transcended view focuses on an intangible claim of quality or that defines a brand, product, or company as reliable or consistent such as when supermarkets claim that shopping in their stores is a pleasure (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Product-based approaches focus on quality in terms of measurable or quantifiable attributes such as the features that come with a certain product. The user-based approach focuses on the personal values and products or services that best satisfy individual preferences or tastes, meaning that quality can be viewed as the features, services, or products that meet the needs of most people or consumers (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Another approach is manufacturing-based quality that is based on conformance to specifications or requirements that are established by design meaning any deviation is a decrease in quality (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Lastly, value-based approach is the combination of product features and costs of the product to offer a comprehensive value from the product or service being offered. Nonetheless, one approach encompasses all these approaches through the Total Quality Management (TQM) approach. TQM is a management tactic that aims at enhancing quality and performance in all processes, functions, and departments across the organization to offer products and services that exceed consumer expectations (Pries & Quigley, 2012). TQM is based several principles. The first principle is being customer focused. Whatever activities and efforts involved in quality enhancement, only customers can determine the degree or level of quality and whether the efforts are valuable. TQM also requires the organization to illustrate employee involvement by developing a suitable environment in the workplace (Pries & Quigley, 2012). Again, TQM is also based on communication, process thinking or being process-focused. TQM is also designed on an integrated system that requires the organization to have a mission and vision that is well known by all stakeholders (Pries & Quigley, 2012). Systematic and strategic approaches also underlie TQM as a quality management approach. Last, but not least, TQM is practiced on the principle of continuous improvement through the use of quality and analytical tools as well as creative thinking to become more effective and efficient (Pries & Quigley, 2012). Managing quality is a vital requirement of any organization seeking to become successful (Pries & Quigley, 2012). Quality enables the organization to achieve or accomplish customer expectations and needs. Therefore, organizations can enjoy long-term income and profitability by meeting their customer’s needs and exceeding their expectations. Quality also enables a business to develop its reputation and brand image through acquiring accreditation for quality standards such as the International Organization of Standardization ISO 9001. Furthermore, quality can determine the ability to enter new markets or gain new customers by meeting certain quality standards that are required especially in regulated markets such as food and healthcare. Quality is also important for efficient and effective running of the organization by reducing the costs of poor quality(Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Overall, quality is paramount for any successful business focused on being efficient and effective. Project Overview Emirates Airlines is the largest airline in the Middle East and the national carrier of the United Arab Emirates. The company operates about 2500 flights on a weekly basis to over 100 destinations across 60 countries globally (The Emirates Group, 2014). Emirates Airlines is a subsidiary of the Emirates Group and has over 50,000 employees. The organization is known for its success in the Middle East being ranked 10th globally in terms of revenue and passengers as well as fleet size (The Emirates Group, 2014). Moreover, the company has developed a strong brand internationally and set quality trends in the aviation industry specifically in terms of profitability, service excellence, and operations to become the 5th best airline in the world as ranked by Skytrax (The Emirates Group, 2014). SWOT Analysis Strengths Increased support from UAE government. Advantage of operating in a region with rich oil resources. Strong economic situation of Dubai. High customer satisfaction and ideal airline for customers. Strong workforce. Tremendous reach with over 60 countries. Weaknesses Reliance on international forward moving traffic. Increased competition. Opportunity New fleet. Increased destinations. New products and services. Threats Increased competition in the Middle East. Rising fuel costs. Political unrest in Middle East. SWOT Key Findings One of the main strengths of Emirates is their strong support from the government. Emirates gains increased steps from funding, management, and operations through support from the government. Additionally, being supported by the government ensures that it is the most preferred airline of choice by most consumers in the UAE. Emirates has surpassed customer service excellence by exceeding customer expectations (’Connell, 2011). The organization offers enhanced and comprehensive customer service through the use of leading technologies. The company effectively responds to consumer concerns on different communication channels enabling it to develop a strong brand name. Emirates is also mindful of their customer needs and offers Halal meals aboard flights, which is unique feature in the aviation industry (Hussain, Al Nasser & Hussain, 2015). In terms of weaknesses, Emirates airlines is at a disadvantage based on its recent tension after the airline was denied expansion of landing rights that resulted in a retaliation from the government by cancelling a military agreement to allow the Canadian military to operate a base near Dubai. Government involvement may prove to be a weakness expanding to new markets (Hussain, Al Nasser & Hussain, 2015). However, Emirates Airlines has an opportunity in increasing its fleet to meet the rising demand for air travels. Moreover, the company has an opportunity to develop new products and services. Since the airline is a premium airline offering mostly costly flights, it can venture into the low-range market to meet the growing demand for affordable air travel. One of the main threats Emirates faces is increased competition in the Middle East. Based on the wealth accumulated in the Middle East, Emirates Airlines faces harsh competition from other premium-focused competitors such as Qantas Airways, Etihad Airways, and Oman Air. Another major threat to the success of the organization is the ongoing political unrest in the Middle East that may influence the overall operations of the company. The Impact of Quality Processes and Quality Management Principles used in Emirates Airlines TQM is a management tactic that aims at enhancing quality and performance in all processes, functions, and departments across the organization to offer products and services that exceed consumer expectations. Emirates Airlines operates in the premium category of airline industry, thus quality is a key feature. The organization focuses on being bigger in quality and not in size. Therefore, the need for a TQM approach is vital for ensure quality performance. TQM has the ability to enable Emirates Airlines operate effectively and efficiently. All its processes and efforts can be strategically implemented to offer the greatest benefits through TQM. Achieving quality performance is a challenging process that has no definite effective solution. Nevertheless, quality performance can be achieved through systematic and strategic planning and implementation based on the situation of the organization. The first step to achieving quality performance is developing awareness, training, and knowledge on TQM principles and quality management principles. All top managers and management should be trained on TQM principles. The second step involves an assessment of the current organizational culture, customer satisfaction, and quality management processes and systems. Again, top management should utilize the assessment to develop the core principles and values of the organization. These values and principles should be communicated through the vision and mission. Quality performance can also be achieved by identifying and prioritizing customer needs and determining products and services that accomplish customer needs. Another step is determining the vital processes that produce these products and services. Teams should also be developed to enhance the identified vital processes and as improvement occurs standards are set and implemented. The next step should be evaluation of the process and appropriate adjustments implemented. Lastly, the organization should offer constant and frequent employee awareness and training as well as feedback and reward/recognition program. Overall, this systematic model can offer the solution to achieving quality performance in any organization, but may vary based on the situation of the company. Quality Management Principles Customer Focus: Emirates Airlines has illustrated increased focus on enhancing customer relationships (Hussain, Al Nasser & Hussain, 2015). The company developed its own Knowledge-driven Inflight Service (KIS) application that allowed the flight crew to take stock or note of what emerged on a flight and how to improve service and manage passenger expectations (McKeon, 2012). Before the service was introduced in 2004, the flight crew only took notes through pen and paper (McKeon, 2012). The new application was recently enhanced and made available on the tablet platform allowing the organization to take critical customer relationships information such as positive/negative customer feedback, complaints, recommendations, and suggestion among other information (McKeon, 2012). The application is designed to relay the noted information back to the organization’s headquarters and to its entire staff to ensure that measures can be taken to enhance customer relationships as well as quality. Emirates is also focused on communicating with consumers on social media (The Emirates Group, 2014). Nonetheless, there is an increased challenge faced by consumers when booking tickets through online services. Strategic Planning: Emirates has focused on strategic planning as it plans to fly an estimated 70 million passengers in the year 2020 (The Emirates Group, 2014). Currently, the company is working with partners in Dubai to ensure that the appropriate infrastructure is available to handle such traffic by 2020. The company developed a strategic growth plan back in 2010 and has constantly made orders for new aircrafts that are currently worth $138 billion (Emirates, 2014). The company has also focused on quality as its strategic pillar by implementing different programs and efforts to enhance quality especially through their Aviation IT developing unit (’Connell, 2011). The company has illustrated a strategic approach to quality through continuous enhancement especially in IT. Leadership: Emirates has a strong leadership especially after appointing Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid its chairman and CEO who also happens to be the Prime Minister of UAE and Ruler of Dubai The (Emirates Group, 2015). The numerous achievements of the CEO have helped to empower and inspire Emirates employees as well as the organization in line with his aspirations and vision for Dubai and the UAE. This is an exceptional of guiding the organization to reach greater heights. The company has a vision and culture of going further in their operations. The organization believes that their position on liberalization, competition and government financial intervention in the industry is greatly in the interest of customers (Emirates Group, 2015). Emirates also has developed the Emirates Foundation that enables it to give back to the community through numerous initiatives (Emirates Group, 2015). All these efforts illustrate a strong leadership culture communicated effectively to employees and customers. Employee Involvement: Emirates has a strong culture of employee involvement. The organization offers its customers increased autonomy to pursue creative and valuable technologies that can enhance service delivery. This has resulted in the development of numerous innovative technologies such as the first ever personal entertainment system for all passenger seats and a full bed. Again, Emirates has a culture of encouraging employees to brand or market the company through creative ways such as composing music videos to encourage their consumers and other people (Nigam, 2009). The company also offers increased training and development to its staff to develop effective and efficient working teams. Emirates spends about 6% of its revenue on training and development of its employees (Emirates Group, 2014). Again, the company also focuses on offering suitable working environments and tools that enable employees to make different decision and also get involved in the daily processes of the organization. The company believes that training its employees is part of continuously customer satisfaction enhancement. Nonetheless, the aspect of employee involvement is not strongly highlighted at Emirates. Process approach: This is a fundamental feature of TQM. Emirates Airlines relies on process-approach to ensure that it functions effectively and efficiently. The organization has developed a strategy to determine customer needs and work on the processes of continuously improving the processes that ensure customer satisfaction. Moreover, the company’s top management ensures that all the needed resources are available ensure increased quality is met and exceeded. The organization promotes this through different a division that ensures all the needed inputs are made available for the desired outputs. Continual Improvement: In line with its strategic growth plan, Emirates has strategized to continuously enhance its services and products. The organization is working on new ways to ensure enhanced customer relationships through use of emerging technologies (’Connell, J. F. 2011). Moreover, the company is investing in infrastructure and new programs aimed at enhancing continuous improvement and quality performance. Decision Making: Emirates Airlines makes its decision based on well collected and reliable information. The use of the KIS is a clear indication that information collected is reliable and significant. Such information allows the airline to make proper decisions for its quality improvement. The company also conducts employee surveys as well as customer surveys to collect proper information. Emirates is also works with partners to identify industry trends and acquire information on labor trends and process trends for enhanced quality performance. Mutually beneficial supplier relationship: Emirates has focused on long-term supplier relationships with aircraft manufacturer Boeing by placing long-term aircraft orders that enables mutual benefits. Conclusion/ Recommendation: Optimal Implementation Plan To achieve organizational excellence and expected goal of continuous customer satisfaction, Emirates Airlines should implement ISO 9000. The ISO 9000 requires that organizations implement a process approach as well as the top management to take up leadership by enhancing an awareness of this approach (Praxiom Research Group Limited, 2015). Having a process approach means that Emirates managers will rely on the process of critical thinking to develop the right processes using the relevant and reliable information. Moreover, the process approach will enable employee involvement to enable increased creativity and innovation (Praxiom Research Group Limited, 2015). Process approach will enable management and control of interactions between process as well as the inputs and outputs of the processes. Based on the quality standards set at Emirates Airlines, the company should focus on enhancing employee awareness and knowledge on quality performance. A key focus is changing their vision and mission to reflect the sense of quality performance. Through training and development, employees will also be able to gain increased knowledge and experience on quality performance and training. The organization must also reflect their commitment to change so as to accomplish the desired quality performance goals. Emirates will also rely on developing and implementing quality standards to better ensure that quality performance can be maintained after being achieved. Key performance measures are critical to evaluating, maintaining, and improving quality performance. Emirates Airlines should focus on customer satisfaction as one of its main performance measures. Measuring the level of customer satisfaction will enhance its quality performance and enable increased sustainability of quality performance. Moreover, the company should also focus on employee satisfaction and profitability. References ’Connell, J. F. (2011). The rise of the Arabian Gulf carriers: An insight into the business model of Emirates Airline. Journal Of Air Transport Management, 17(Selected Papers from the 13th Air Transport Research Society Conference), 339-346. Emirates, (2014). Emirates Growth Strategy on Track. Retrieved from http://www.emirates.com/ae/english/about/news/news_detail.aspx?article=1927233 Goetsch, D. L., & Davis, S. B. (2014). Quality management for organizational excellence. pearson. Hussain, R., Al Nasser, A., & Hussain, Y. K. (2015). Service quality and customer satisfaction of a UAE-based airline: An empirical investigation. Journal Of Air Transport Management, 42167-175. McKeon, A., (2012). Emirates Airlines creates a Windows 8 CRM application for the sky. Retrieved from http://searchcrm.techtarget.com/feature/Emirates-Airlines-creates-a-Windows-8-CRM-application-for-the-sky Nigam, S. (2009). Emirates engages employees through self-composed music video. Retrieved from http://simpliflying.com/2009/emirates-engages-employees-through-self-composed-music-video/ Praxiom Research Group Limited, (2015). ISO’s Process Approach. Retrieved from http://www.praxiom.com/process-approach.htm Pries, K. H., & Quigley, J. M. (2012). Total Quality Management for Project Management. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press. The Emirates Group, (2014). The Emirates Group Annual Report 2013-14. Retrieved from http://content.emirates.com/downloads/ek/pdfs/report/annual_report_2014.pdf The Emirates Group, (2015). Our Company. 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