Creating a quality culture in your organization.

Service quality is the great differentiator of the 1990s. It means understanding and consistently meeting customer requirements. A lack of complaints is a poor indicator of customer satisfaction. Reliability is the most important factor affecting your customers' perception of quality. This article outlines a do-it-yourself process for creating and enhancing a quality culture in a clinical laboratory. This process requires understanding the nature and importance of quality; adopting quality goals and performance measurements; asking for customer input; rewarding satisfactory performance; creating self-managed teams that aim for continuous improvement; and encouraging unrelenting service directed at delighting customers. In a competitive marketplace, quality is the great differentiator that pays impressive dividends.