After some initial learnings, the City’s implementation was carefully structured to ensure success. A phased approach was taken using the City Council’s strategic priorities as a guide for selecting improvement activities. The initial focus of the implementation included training a core group of employees and launching a total of ten process management and problem-solving quality teams. Team design utilized principles from the "Stuff Americans Are Made Of" (Hammond & Morrison, 1996) to increase overall effectiveness. By May 1997, the work of all teams will be nearing completion with mature results available to share with other agencies.

In 1993 the Tacoma City Manager appointed a mid-management staff team to investigate the use of total quality principles and practices in the public and private sectors. During 1993 and 1994, preliminary quality training was provided by a variety of vendors to a cross-section of the organization. The City also developed a four-hour total quality basic awareness course that was presented by department managers and staff to their employees. Early results were positive. The training resulted in a number of improvement efforts and generated an estimated one-time savings of $274,750 and annualized savings/cost avoidance of approximately $295,000. However, the techniques used were not consistent, incremental improvements were scattered throughout the organization, and momentum was difficult to sustain.

To move the quality implementation forward, the City changed its approach. The implementation responsibility was shifted from the mid-management to the executive level, resulting in a greater organizational commitment to the quality process. The executive team was identified as the "Quality Council." After much debate about the merits of a City-wide incremental activity approach versus a targeted approach, the Quality Council developed an implementation plan that aligned total quality efforts with the City’s Strategic Plan.

Tacoma’s Strategic Plan addresses four key areas: public safety, economic development, neighborhood enhancement, and government performance. Strategic goals include such critical items as:

• Reducing incidence of violence in Tacoma.
• Improving public safety services to citizens.
• Increasing criminal justice system capacity.
• Strengthening and expanding economic development efforts.
• Enhancing and increasing citizen participation in City government.
• Improving communication between City government and citizens.

The decision to address problems in these areas gave high visibility to the City’s quality effort while supporting the City’s mission and goals. This ensured that staff and financial resources were used well. This emphasis also was helpful in convincing elected officials that the staff’s quality activities were important to the organization.

The implementation of Tacoma’s total quality implementation plan began in October 1995. Initial efforts focused on the creation of interdepartmental total quality teams to address strategic priorities. Two improvement methods -- problem solving and process management -- were used. Priority was given to training employees to work with teams and train others, and to the establishment of the first quality teams.

The City’s team design used information from the "Stuff Americans Are Made Of" (Hammond & Morrison, 1996) to leverage the work of the teams. This book defines the seven cultural forces that characterize Americans. These include the following:

• Insistence on choice
• Pursuit of the impossible dream
• Obsession with big and more
• Impatience with time
• Acceptance of mistakes
• Urge to improvise
• Fixation on "whatsnew?"

From this research, specific elements were included in the team implementation strategies. These included:

• Use of coaches who interact with, rather than facilitate, teams.
• Development of a personal goal statement for each team member to allow individuals to identify how team activities would benefit them as well as the team.
• Use of specific milestones to break team tasks into smaller pieces to maintain momentum.
• Exposure to the seven cultural forces to help team members understand and address the desire to jump to solutions rather than analyze problems.
• Recognition and cultivation of the style, strengths and character of each team member to move the team forward.
• Selection of major processes to redesign, giving teams an opportunity to address large tasks.
• Identification of the team’s work as a learning process subject to revision, correction and innovation.

These elements enhanced the teams’ work and added a valuable dimension to the implementation.

Process management involves redesigning key business systems including implementation of performance tracking systems, customer needs analysis and collection of benchmark data from other similar organizations. As part of the initial implementation, five process management teams were formed. The charge of these teams was to redesign key business processes of the City.

The processes to be addressed were selected by a sub-group of the Quality Council. This group identified all the major business processes of the City in the critical strategic plan focus areas. These processes were analyzed and the five key business processes that would have the most significant impact on the achievement of strategic plan objectives were selected. These processes and their relationship to strategic plan priorities are shown below:

These areas are large and address items that critically impact the operations of the City. Positive results in these areas will drive the achievement of critical strategic plan objectives. The missions of the five teams identify the specific focus of each process and the relationship to the strategic areas each supports.

Mission: To provide customer-driven crime response that results in an increased sense of security and livability in our community through citizen education, consistent crime reporting, interdepartmental coordination, and the establishment of accurate and usable performance indicators/benchmarks.

Mission: To critically analyze the crime and fire incidence prevention process and recommend ways to prevent juvenile crime and continuously improve the quality of life for our customers/community.

Mission: To guide the City of Tacoma toward a business climate built on reliable, efficient public services, operated in a competitive and business-like manner that will result in the attraction and retention of a variety of businesses.

Mission: To determine how City government can better work with its citizens, neighborhoods and business communities to improve Tacoma’s livability and solve mutual problems.

Mission: To develop a clear and understandable Human Resources Management and Development System that meets customer needs, is financially responsible, supports organizational goals and attracts, motivates and retains a quality work force.

Problem solving was one of the more familiar areas to City government. However, the staff was not familiar with using a ten-step process for analyzing problems, identifying root causes and developing solutions that eliminate the problem.

To focus on problems that critically hindered City operations, City employees were asked to identify problems that caused them the most frustration. These problems were reviewed by a sub-group of the Quality Council and selected based on their correlation with Strategic Plan objectives and the magnitude of their impact on City operations.

The five problems selected are listed below along with their strategic focus areas:

Their missions are shown as follows:

Mission: To ensure that all necessary information and documentation is available to accomplish Tacoma Municipal Court arraignment activity in a timely and effective manner.

Mission: To improve communication between the City of Tacoma and Neighborhood Council Board Members.

Mission: To develop a process that provides a timely, predictable, consistent and enforceable land use code for customers.

Mission: To develop and implement innovative, efficient and fiscally responsible improvements to the bill-paying procedure that will provide quality, cost-effective service to the City’s customers.

Mission: To simplify the contract process in order to facilitate the writing, approval, monitoring and amending of contracts in a timely and cost-effective manner.

To date, 23 employees have been trained in problem-solving and process-management techniques. Ten of these individuals were assigned to coach the first quality teams and five were named to a staff team to coordinate the implementation. The other members of this core group are assisting with the quality implementation or supporting departmental improvement activities. In addition to this original group, the approximately 60 individuals currently serving on teams have been trained on a "just-in-time" basis on total quality tools and methods as required by the work of the team.

Process management teams currently are completing their needs analyses. This preliminary phase involves clearly defining the needs of customers and the environment for the process. To date the teams have analyzed the market for the process, determined internal organizational capabilities, studied competitor strengths and weaknesses, and documented supplier capabilities. In addition, customer needs for the current and near term, as well as the future, are being verified and prioritized.

Information from the needs analyses will be used to redesign the City’s key processes in the areas of public safety, economic development, neighborhood enhancement and government performance. New processes will be developed and implemented to deliver services. In many cases, these processes will need to be coordinated with other City activities to result in an integrated system. Measurement systems to ensure effective execution of the new processes also will be created during this phase. By the end of 1997, the work of the teams will be implemented and ongoing monitoring and evaluation of each process will begin.

The original problem solving teams have identified the root causes of their problems and are in the process of developing, testing or implementing solutions. In many cases, the problems they tackled were larger and more complex than anticipated. Some teams have made a number of different improvements as they worked through to root causes. Other teams decided to scale back their efforts to focus on the main customer priority addressing one specific area of concern. In addition, two more problem-solving teams have been launched and other teams are being phased in over time.

Based on the City’s experience with its first teams, changes have been made to speed up the team’s work. These include the following:

• Refine the problem statements to clearly identify the gap between current and expected performance.
• If data is not available, make data collection the first priority of the team’s work.
• Modify the meeting schedule to complete tasks in larger blocks of time.
• Clarify participation expectations for team members to ensure adequate time for team tasks.

Additional changes are anticipated as the City becomes more experienced with total quality.

In City government, as in the private sector, understanding the needs of the customer and finding better ways to meet them provide the keys to effective operations and accountability. Early results have shown the value of this philosophy and its applicability to government practices and activities. Through the strategic implementation of total quality, Tacoma expects to improve its services while containing costs. Through the use of quality practices, the City also will be able to shift resources, both financial and human, to high priority strategic areas.

Tacoma’s problem-solving and process-management improvement efforts will continue as new issues are identified. The impact on the organization will grow as the original core group of employees involved in the first phase of the implementation begin to train others. Over time, the financial benefits of these activities are expected to far exceed the City’s initial investment. And, the community will benefit immeasurably by a government responsive to changing needs and market conditions.

Tacoma’s total quality implementation efforts have been enhanced by its selection as the site for the W. Edwards Deming Institute’s^® Partnership for Continual Learning. Through this partnership, the City will work with the Institute to apply Dr. Deming’s principles to Tacoma and the surrounding area. The learning that occurs through the partnership will create more awareness of quality in the community and fuel expectations and support for further improvements in City operations and services. The partnership also will help City staff see City government as part of the broader community system in which it operates.

Hammond, Josh and James Morrison. 1996. The Stuff Americans Are Made Of. New York: MacMillan Press.