Isn't 'doing it right' in the culture of an organisation?There have been various mutterings in the media over the last few months about the awarding of the Irish contract for the analysis of smear tests to the US firm Quest Diagnostics. A piece in yesterday's Sunday Times reports that Quest sent out thousands of potentially inaccurate results to American patients whose vitamin D levels had been tested. The Chief Executive of the National Cancer Screening Service is quoted defending Quest saying the problems were not relevant since they don't use Quest for Vitamin D tests. I'm not sure that he's right to view it like this. My father ran a cake making company at one stage in his career. Marks and Spencer was a customer and Dad used often tell the story of an inspection visit made by M&S personnel to the factory. They pointed out some drips of jam on the outside of a large container - imagine an oil drum full of sticky jam. When it was pointed out to them that the factory didn't supply cakes with jam to M&S their reaction was that it didn't matter. As far as they were concerned high standards needed to be in force throughout the organisation to be real. And this was in the 1960s! Add a CommentYour comment will appear once it has been approved. |