ABSTRACT
It is difficult to unravel the thread of W. Edwards Deming’s impact on the postwar industrial recovery of Japan and its transformation from a manufacturer of shabby copies of Western goods to a preeminent producer of high-quality goods. His name is woven, however, into the fabric of Japanese industrial history. Deming helped launch a campaign for institutionalizing “quality control” within the Japanese manufacturing sector, which adopted a number of the terms and concepts he advocated. In fact, his pedagogical approach dovetailed perfectly with, and helped to provide a philosophical basis for, the infusion of quality as an intrinsic part of the production process. Most importantly, Deming was conveying these concepts on the eve of the “electronics revolution” where unparalleled precision, cleanliness, and consistency of product were essential metrics determining success or failure.
