World Quality Day 2018 – Reputations to uphold

Trust is a vital component in building and sustaining an organisation’s reputation. The string of controversies that shook the public’s trust in multinational companies across industry, such as Facebook, Kobe Steel and BMW, drives home the important role that the quality function plays in keeping companies accountable to their stakeholders, customers and the public at large. ‘Quality: A question of trust’ is the theme for this year’s World Quality Day (WQD), which falls on 8 November.

This year’s theme resonates with Arvind Sharma, IRCA Lead Auditor, Quality Assurance and Quality Control Manager at Gulf Contracting in Qatar. “Trust is very hard to establish and very easy to lose. All stakeholders should get the quality that they expect, and it should be sustainable.”

For Sharma, quality plays a role in distinguishing good products and processes from negative ones. “I strongly believe that quality is everybody’s business, and everyone must be aware of [their] control points and monitor them to maintain the trust of stakeholders.”

He says that the quality function helps businesses understand the context of their organisation, practice fact-based thinking, use quality planning at the process level and provide training so teams across the business understand what quality means and how to motivate other team members to perform better. 

Sharma’s team plans to hold a ‘Quality Week’ from 3 to 8 November. Senior managers will be hosting various talks on the question trust throughout the week. A quiz will be held on the theme and Gulf Contracting’s quality management system. On the actual day, the company will hold a ceremony for their in-house quality awards, which will be categorised into operations, support and supply chain.

If your organisation has plans for WQD 2018, we’d love to hear from you. Share them on Twitter by using the hashtag #WQD18 and #AdvocatingTrust. You can also post your plans on our LinkedIn and Facebook pages, or email us at [email protected]