A Total Quality Improvement Programme Available to Purchase

In 1980 IBM's manufacturing facility at Havant, embarked upon an ambitious and fundamental programme to establish a new cultural attitude to quality across the whole workforce, at the same time introducing techniques, processes and management systems to facilitate the change. The programme, called EXCEL, has now been running for over four years and the results are dramatic. The workforce are demonstrably committed to 100 per cent defect‐free operations. The suppliers of parts and assemblies are achieving quality levels in excess of 99 per cent defect‐free, and the quality and reliability of Havant‐produced computers and peripheral equipment in customers' offices has improved by a factor of five times over the past three years. Most important of all, the performance of the Havant factory appears to be matching that of its Japanese counterparts — clearly, if it can be done in Havant it can be done in the rest of Western industry. The article describes how the programme was set up and managed, the major results, and the elements considered to be key to its success.