Sri Lanka to host International Convention of Quality Control Circles 2014
Monday, 10 March 2014 00:00
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The International Convention of Quality Control Circles (ICQCC) 2014 is scheduled to take place from 12 to 15 October 2014 at the BMICH, Colombo with an expected participation of 1,200 delegates from 12 countries. ICQCC 2013 was held in Taiwan in October 2013 with the participation of 1,700 delegates which included 1,200 foreign participants from 12 countries.
The Quality Control Circle is a management concept which originated in Japan in 1960s which enabled factory workers to study systematic problem solving methods and encouraged them to form into small groups that followed a methodical procedure to identify, analyse, find root causes of defects and quality problems, and implement solutions.
The workers were trained to use simple QC tools such as Pareto chart and Cause and Effect Diagram, and also more advanced tools such as Quality Control Charts. QC circles started in many factories in Japan and began making significant strides in quality improvement. Japanese goods quickly changed its image from being “low quality” to “world’s best”. The philosophy of the Japanese is not only to use the hands of the Japanese workers, but the potential in their brains as well. Quality Circles utilise the knowledge and experience of workers with special training in QC tools. Quality Circles are very popular in many countries. The recently held Indian National Convention of Quality Circles attracted an astounding 7,000 participants from all over India and had stunning 1,800 presentations of case studies which included 30 to 40 presentations each from leading group of companies such as TATA and Birla.
The Japanese QCC Headquarters (Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers), the Korean QCC Headquarters (Korean Standards Association) and the Taiwan QCC Headquarters (Association of Pioneer Quality Control Research, PQCRA) came to an agreement in 1976 to take turns hosting the ICQCC with the objective of promoting it further in the respective countries. With the spread of QCC activities worldwide, excellent QC circles of other nations were also invited to join to broaden the international scope of QC activities.
Currently there are thirteen members: Taiwan, Japan, Korea, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. Today the scope of ICQCC has widened encouraging the presentation of papers on all subjects related to quality and encouraged presentation of case studies in any project related to quality, productivity, customer satisfactions etc. The 13 member Co-coordinating Committee approved the hosting of ICQCC in 2014 in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
A workshop is also being organised by the Sri Lanka Association for Advancement of Quality and Productivity (SLAAQP) on Lean Quality Circles in order to enhance the knowledge of QCC among Sri Lankan organisations in preparation for ICQCC 2014. This workshop, which is to be conducted by D.K. Srivastava, the Executive Director of Quality Circle Forum of India, would be held on 13 March 2014 at the Auditorium of the Post Graduate Institute of Management (PIM) in Colombo 8, Borella. More information could be obtained from [email protected].
