Over the last couple of weeks, I have been talking about the importance of defining quality in your organisation and understanding how it links to the customer experience.
Today I want to spend a bit of time looking at the quality role, what is it and who is the best person for the job.
Last week we talked about the importance of making sure the person or people to whom you delegate responsibility for quality, have the right skills and competence. But what are those skills? How can we measure competence in the quality role?
As a leader, being clear about the skills you require is important to make sure you get the right fit, as the person in the quality role understanding the skills and competence important in your role can help you communicate the value you provide.
The ISO Standard ISO 19011 outlines the skills, attributes and competence for auditors and in the absence of any other guidance, these are generally accepted as requirements for internal quality positions. The list is comprehensive however when you look at the diversity of tasks, role titles and position descriptions advertised you would be forgiven for thinking the quality person should do everything.
It’s not uncommon for the quality person to be responsible for human resources, training, risk, compliance, privacy, complaints, procedure development, audit and more. Looking at the list of possible tasks it can be hard to visualise the person that would fit this position.
So what skills and attributes should a person in a quality role have?
I believe there are three basic attributes each quality person needs. They need to be:
People in the quality role must be ANALYTICAL.
They should be systematic, and they must be inquisitive; searching for solutions to help solve the problems of teams and leaders.
They must be able to ARTICULATE their ideas.
It’s not enough to know the solution to a problem they must be able to communicate the solution in a way that builds support and buy-in, describing the value their work offers. People in a quality role are often a project manager, working across multiple teams to achieve a project outcome to benefit all.
As such, they need to be AFFABLE and good humoured.
People need to feel they are approachable and they need to be courteous in their dealings with all stakeholders.
It’s not enough to advertise for someone who can “do quality” or “write procedures”. You need someone who can build a community and culture of quality in your organisation. Someone who can inspire people to do better, someone who can work across teams and get buy-in.
It's ok to recruit to skill, but more importantly,
"Recruit to your values and get quality embedded across the team
not just in one position description"
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Connect with Rebecca:
If you are interested in working in an efficient customer focused business, here are a few ways I can help:
- Download a free chapter of my book [HERE]
Get a sample of DECIDE|DESIGN|DELEGATE the three-step guide to implementing a quality system.
- Ask me about attending the "Quality Networking Group"
Come for a FREE session and meet the tribe. [More info here]
- Work with me
If you would like to work directly with me to build an efficient enterprise reply with #lessbusy and we can arrange a time to have a chat about what you need.