U.S. AIR FORCE TEACHES QUALITY PRINCIPLES
	Total quality is more than just a buzzword at the Quality Schoolhouse, a training center at the Aeronautical Systems Center at Wright-Patterson's Air Force Base in Ohio. "We encourage students to take a fresh look at their work processes--to ask themselves 'Are we doing this because our customers require it or because we've always done it this way?"' said Paul Keller, director of the schoolhouse "Reductions in our work force are driving us to look at our processes, to make sure we are doing the things that support our customers in an efficient, effective manner."
	The schoolhouse offers seven total quality courses to help students understand how to improve their processes, according to Sandy Staub, quality education specialist. Initially, students at tend a total quality orientation class.
	"We hope that the next time they return to the schoolhouse they will be actively involved in a process action team (PAT) effort," said Keller. "The focus of PAT training is twofold: to help groups gel as teams and to provide necessary tools for analysis of their activities. We also have some statistical process control and theory of constraints courses that help PAT teams evaluate their activities.
	"We encourage PAT teams to contact us if they are having trouble analyzing or dealing with a particular in-house work process. We bring them as a group to the schoolhouse for two or three days--or longer if needed--and begin to work on the process together, using the tools already mentioned.
	"We can help an organization become more efficient and effective if someone from that organization comes to us in advance and works with us to help understand the context or the unit culture that helps or hinders resolutions of that organization's problems. Plus, the training is better if the group can discuss a problem with which it is familiar."
	The PAT process works well, according to Staub. "When students graduate, they have the chance to step back and take an objective look at a recurring issue that has perhaps been causing problems for a long time. They also have time to apply some tools, determine problems' causes and effects, and come up with alternative solutions to implement with their co-workers and boss.
	"Because team cohesion and healthy group dynamics are vital to the success of PAT teams, our instructors work closely with each team's facilitator. The schoolhouse provides both initial training and follow-up consultations to facilitators who assist the teams through analysis efforts. Additional training courses for facilitators are currently being developed."
	The schoolhouse primarily serves Air Force Materiel Command customers but also accepts students from other Department of Defense (DoD) units.
	The schoolhouse was formally established in 1989 and has garnered kudos for its total quality education. "After the former Air Force Logistics Command won the 1991 President's Award for Quality and Productivity Improvement, we got a lot of attention from people within other major commands. They wanted to know how we did what we did," said Keller. "Even though we are not staffed or funded to do DoD-level work, we did the best with the
resources we had and, with backing from our hosts, we took the schoolhouse on the road--to the Pentagon, to McDill Air Force Base in Florida, and other bases--to help them get started."
	Even with all the exposure the schoolhouse has received and the fact that it has graduated 14,500 students in four years, Keller and Staub are both concerned that people still don't know what it offers. "This schoolhouse represents a long-term quality initiative--a distinct shift toward a new, better way of doing business--as opposed to previous total-quality-like programs. It is an ongoing, continuous process," said Staub.
	And the first step in that process, according to Keller, is awareness. "While the feedback we have received from our students has been tremendous, we know that we're not there yet," he said. "Once we make people aware of total quality, the next step is to help them learn to apply the concepts, skills, and tools that will help them solve real-world problems. If, through our training and encouragement, they can become personally vested in their organization's processes, especially in the ongoing success of those processes, then we will have met our objectives."
For more information, contact Aeronautical Systems Center, Office of Public Affairs, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, OH 45433-6503, (513) 255-2725.
[This item appears in the August 1993 issue of _Quality_Progess_.]