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    Customer-driven companies

  • Customer-driven companies focus on customer satisfaction. If the customer asks for or is satisfied with a lower quality product, then this is an acceptable result for this type of company as opposed to a quality driven company which would stand fast with the higher quality product.
  • Managers and engineers: roles and participation : Managers make decisions on financial matters. But engineers are expected to "go to the mat" for engineering standards when these form all or part of the decision. Hence the distinction between managers (playing the line role) and engineers (playing the staff role) weakens, and engineers play a much more active role (advocates for engineering standards) in decision making. (Engineering standards include engineering ethics standards.)
  • Centrality of Ethics and Values : While customer satisfaction plays the central role, ethical considerations are still important, especially regarding the ethical treatment of customers and reflecting the ethical values held by the customers. In many cases, it is difficult to distinguish quality and customer driven companies as the role ethical standards play gets closer to a central, constitutive one.
  • Allocation of Praise and Blame : Responsibility in customer driven companies is tied closely to individual performance and contribution. This is because customer satisfaction is a more objective criterion than the internal political standards that dominate finance driven companies. Responsibility is closely alligned with contribution.
  • Withholding Information : Information enhances control and responsibility. (The more you know, the more reponsibly you can act.) Since praise and blame are allocated according to contribution, there is less incentive to withhold information. If communication gaps arise between engineers and managers, these are much more likely to hinge on disciplinary differences. Engineers may have trouble communicating technical information to managers, or appear condescending by "dumbing down" the information. Managers may have difficulties communicating financial constraints to engineers who focus on quality standards. But these are minor, resolvable gaps.
  • Treatment of Dissent : Dissent and disagreement are not only tolerated but actually expected. Managers expect engineers to advocate for issues in their sphere as they pertain to the decision making process. This process itself is adversarial because it is assumed that this is the best way to get all the information out on the table. Bad news and professional dissenting opinions are not interpreted as disloyalty; in fact, disloyalty lies in refusing to expose flaws in the choices proposed by one's supervisor. Managers expect their engineers to "go to the mat" when advocating technical positions based on their professional judgment.

    Quality-driven companies

  • Quality-driven companies stand out for the emphasis they place on achieving high engineering standards and on elevating the participation of the engineer in the decision making process. As is implied by the name, the central focus of these corporations is the achievement of high quality in products and services.
  • Managers and Engineers: Role and Participation : In quality-driven companies, the distinction between the manager and engineering roles drops out. For example, while engineers play the staff role and provide expert engineering advice, they also participate fully in the decision making process. The locus of decision making moves from individual managers to small interdisciplinary groups. These groups, in turn, carry out consensus-based decision making procedures.
  • Centrality of Ethics and Values : In quality-driven companies, ethics and values are central to the organization's objectives, charter, and identity. This has a decisive impact on the role of the engineer in the decision-making process. In customer driven companies, engineers are expected to advocate engineering and ethical standards precisely because these are not central to the organization's identity. But the centrality of ethical concerns in quality driven companies changes the engineer's role from advocacy to channeling technical expertise toward realizing ethical value.
  • Allocation of praise and blame : In customer-driven companies, blame avoidance procedures no longer dominate the decision making process. In quality driven companies they disappear completely. Decisions are made by interdisciplinary groups in which engineers and managers participate fully and equally. Responsibility (praise and blame) then is allocated to the group. If it is distributed to members inside the group it is done so on the basis of contribution. But the primary target of responsibility ascriptions is the group, not the individual. And the response to untoward happenings is not targeting individuals and groups for blame but taking measures to learn from mistakes and avoiding them in the future.
  • Withholding Information : The open, consensus-based decision process ensures that the needed information is brought forth and integrated into the decision. This results from removing a primary motivation to withholding information, namely, blame avoidance. Quality-driven corporations aggressively move to prevent untoward occurrences and, should prevention fail, make adjustments to ensure they do not reoccur. The motive to withhold information does not arise in this moral ecology.
  • Treatment of Dissent and DOPs (dissenting professional opinions) : Engineers and managers work toward consensus by gathering information, discussing the problem and continuing the discussion until consensus is reached. Thus, dissent does not stand alone but is considered to be an essential and healthy component to the decision-making process. When consensus is not immediately reached, participants seek more information. If consensus is still not reached, the decision is postponed (if this is possible). The most viable strategy to reach consensus is to continue the discussion. For example, an engineer and manager might approach a supervisor; in this way they bring a new perspective into the decision-making process. They might consult other experts. The crucial point here is that disagreement (really non-agreement) is not a bad thing but a necessary stage in the process of reaching agreement and consensus.

Questions & Answers

A golfer on a fairway is 70 m away from the green, which sits below the level of the fairway by 20 m. If the golfer hits the ball at an angle of 40° with an initial speed of 20 m/s, how close to the green does she come?
Aislinn Reply
cm
tijani
what is titration
John Reply
what is physics
Siyaka Reply
A mouse of mass 200 g falls 100 m down a vertical mine shaft and lands at the bottom with a speed of 8.0 m/s. During its fall, how much work is done on the mouse by air resistance
Jude Reply
Can you compute that for me. Ty
Jude
what is the dimension formula of energy?
David Reply
what is viscosity?
David
what is inorganic
emma Reply
what is chemistry
Youesf Reply
what is inorganic
emma
Chemistry is a branch of science that deals with the study of matter,it composition,it structure and the changes it undergoes
Adjei
please, I'm a physics student and I need help in physics
Adjanou
chemistry could also be understood like the sexual attraction/repulsion of the male and female elements. the reaction varies depending on the energy differences of each given gender. + masculine -female.
Pedro
A ball is thrown straight up.it passes a 2.0m high window 7.50 m off the ground on it path up and takes 1.30 s to go past the window.what was the ball initial velocity
Krampah Reply
2. A sled plus passenger with total mass 50 kg is pulled 20 m across the snow (0.20) at constant velocity by a force directed 25° above the horizontal. Calculate (a) the work of the applied force, (b) the work of friction, and (c) the total work.
Sahid Reply
you have been hired as an espert witness in a court case involving an automobile accident. the accident involved car A of mass 1500kg which crashed into stationary car B of mass 1100kg. the driver of car A applied his brakes 15 m before he skidded and crashed into car B. after the collision, car A s
Samuel Reply
can someone explain to me, an ignorant high school student, why the trend of the graph doesn't follow the fact that the higher frequency a sound wave is, the more power it is, hence, making me think the phons output would follow this general trend?
Joseph Reply
Nevermind i just realied that the graph is the phons output for a person with normal hearing and not just the phons output of the sound waves power, I should read the entire thing next time
Joseph
Follow up question, does anyone know where I can find a graph that accuretly depicts the actual relative "power" output of sound over its frequency instead of just humans hearing
Joseph
"Generation of electrical energy from sound energy | IEEE Conference Publication | IEEE Xplore" ***ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7150687?reload=true
Ryan
what's motion
Maurice Reply
what are the types of wave
Maurice
answer
Magreth
progressive wave
Magreth
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Muhammad Reply
fine, how about you?
Mohammed
hi
Mujahid
A string is 3.00 m long with a mass of 5.00 g. The string is held taut with a tension of 500.00 N applied to the string. A pulse is sent down the string. How long does it take the pulse to travel the 3.00 m of the string?
yasuo Reply
Who can show me the full solution in this problem?
Reofrir Reply
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Source:  OpenStax, Introduction to business, management, and ethics. OpenStax CNX. Aug 14, 2016 Download for free at http://legacy.cnx.org/content/col11959/1.4
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