Quality Management in Everyday Life and Work

From housework and childcare to socializing and yoga, quality management strategies can help you find focus and be more productive.

Here are some ways that you can use quality management tools and methods in everyday situations.

Benchmarking

In business, benchmarking is all about comparing products and performance to top competitors to discover areas for improvement.

At home, benchmarking can help you discover the best ways to do things – whether it’s potty training your child or improving your French lessons.

Comparing your approach to others’ or looking up tips online will help you narrow down inefficiencies and form better habits.

Reporting

Reporting may be a lot stricter in a business environment, but a version of reporting can be very helpful in other aspects of life.

It can help you determine what is working and what isn’t, and how you can improve things moving forward.

Self-reflection exercises like journalling could also be considered a form of reporting.

Waste elimination

Lean management in the workplace helps organizations minimize waste and improve performance to create better value for the customer.

At home or in your personal work a more organized approach is to cut down on unneeded products, activities and other waste so that you have a more organized environment.

A lean approach saves time and money and streamlines processes for more efficient productivity.

Checklists are a lifesaver for holidays, homework management, chores, packing for a holiday, meeting agendas and many other domestic and work situations.

In the quality world, checklists help to provide a snapshot of key tasks, which in turn serve as a reminder of goals to meet through the completion of such tasks.

In everyday life, they work much the same way – helping to get things organized and visible.

In corporate environments, the mention of audits conjures images of lengthy meetings and endless paperwork, but audits don’t have to be daunting – they can be a useful tool.

Audits help to identify current strengths and weaknesses and determine what changes may be required to improve a situation – whether it’s at home or at the office.

Whether it is a daily schedule for kids or an in depth look at your own time management, audits help identify potential problems and areas for improvement.

Document control is also a big part of quality management for businesses. Even using less specialized file sharing systems such as Dropbox or Google Drive counts as document control.

These kinds of tools are also popular outside of the office with many people using them to manage and securely store their personal documents such as bills, mortgage documents, deeds and tax returns.

Even if you don’t rely on digital tools or apps, most people have some sort of system to keep their documents neat and organized. Understanding the importance of document control in quality management can help you organize documents in your personal life.