Welcome to our first post on the power of LEO blog! This post is the first step toward increasing the awareness of quality in our daily lives.

The awareness of quality is noticing the negative effects of poor quality on our lives. The term “quality” is holistic. “Quality” applies to goods, services, our behavior, and relationships with others.

That awareness of quality develops the realization that quality is my personal responsibility. Quality isn’t something that I can delegate. Criticizing the quality of others isn’t productive until I have done everything in my power to assure that the quality of my behavior, relationships, work, goods, and services is of the highest caliber.

Poor quality is a critical issue in our society. Poor quality causes injuries, lost wages, lost jobs, and a 1000 delays and aggravations in our daily life and work. Consider:

1. The low-quality subprime mortgage investment products directly contributed to the 2008 recession.
2. “Food-borne diseases cause 76 million illnesses, 325,000 hospitalizations, and 5,000 deaths in the United States each year.” (Center for Disease Control)
3. “Americans spend twice as much as residents of other developed countries on healthcare, but get lower quality, less efficiency and have the least equitable system, according to a report released on Wednesday. The United States ranked last when compared to six other countries — Britain, Canada, Germany, Netherlands, Australia and New Zealand, the Commonwealth Fund report found.” (Rueters, June 23, 2010)

Or, consider just a few of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission recalls for this year (2011).

• 165,000 office chairs recalled because “the front seat support part of the chair can crack and fail, posing a fall hazard to consumers.”
• 540 large fire alarm control panels recalled because “the recalled fire alarm control panels can fail to send a signal to alert monitoring centers in the event of a fire.”
• 5,700 convertible irons recalled because “the iron can overheat and cause a fire because of a wiring issue, posing a risk of burn injury to consumers.”
• 58,000 video baby monitors recalled because “the battery in the handheld video monitor can overheat and rupture, posing a burn hazard to consumers.”
• 4,600 children’s playsets recalled because “the swing seats on the playsets can crack and break in half, causing the user to fall to the ground.”

Blaming companies or individuals for poor quality is not the objective of this blog.

The objective of this blog is to encourage discussion about:

• How can quality awareness increase?
• How can quality awareness be converted into a quality mindset?
• How can a quality mindset improve quality to the benefit of society?

Please join in our discussions.