Proactive vs Reactive Quality: Which Approach is Better

Proactive vs Reactive Approach

Building a culture of quality depends on reactive and proactive functions, processes, and workflows in the organization. However, the best approach to attain quality has always been debatable. In this post, we will look at the pros and cons of both reactive and proactive approach towards the quality issues to identify which one is better for quality management.

Though most of the companies today are equipped with advanced quality management systems; still only some of them are striving with excellence while others are still struggling for effective management of their quality issues. The only difference is their approach – some of them are leaning ahead with proactive approach while others are still relying on the reactive one.

Before any further arguments, let’s just understand both the approaches in depth that will help businesses to attain quality. It will help you have a clear choice of approach you should take your business ahead with.

Reactive Approach

The reactive approach manages the issues once they emerge or being encountered, without appropriate arrangements on how to, what to, when to, and whom to report. Possessing a reactive approach is not an adequate plan, preferably not a strategy. It resembles an issue that has happened as of now and you have no other alternative than to manage it.

Proactive Approach

The proactive approach includes planning for the future, taking into consideration the potential problems that on occurrence may disturb the orders of processes in the system. It is about recognizing the future threats and preventing them with requisite actions and planning so that you don’t end up getting into bigger trouble.

Characteristics of Organizations with Reactive Approach and Proactive Approach

Though it’s true that you cannot plan for every single issue in advance, planning for potential problems will help you save time, costs, and efforts that you can invest for unexpected problem occurrences. This implies that being proactive is a better way to win the race of quality management.

However, it doesn’t imply that being proactive is a perfect way to deal with quality issues. We must look at the common challenges that companies face for being proactive.

Challenges Companies Face with Proactive Approach

Major focus on Troubleshooting

Most of the companies are switching to the next-generation quality management software (QMS) that comes with strong capabilities and features to foster an environment of the proactive approach. However, such solutions are used for troubleshooting purposes only. The reason is a lack of resources and time to reap the complete advantages of proactive quality management to attain quality.

The best solution here is a QMS that not only helps to troubleshoot but also records and documents the activities for the future reference. One of the top-ranked software is Qualityze eQMS. It comes with a free demo and a 1-week free trial. Try and test it today!

Inception and Alerts

To be accurate and on-time is very significant especially when it comes to keeping the concerned teams notified about the potential problems for proactive management. Even if there is a delay of a few minutes, you will have no other option than to take the reactive approach for the same. It could lead to disturbances and delays in further processes as well, extending the product time to market.

You can deal with the problem of timeliness and accuracy by opting for quality management system software that allows you to schedule the alerts, notifications, and follow-ups in advance so that you don’t miss on important timelines.

Collaboration & Communication Between Production and Pre-Production Teams

There should be a collaborative platform to enable smoother communication between your production and pre-production teams. Once they are on the same page, the organizations will be able to identify the risks and potential problems before the production starts. It will help them have a higher success rate of problem prevention. But this is quite a struggle with the traditional systems of managing quality processes and issues.

The organizations should implement the quality system to enable their teams to work collaboratively, eliminating the communication gaps that can eventually become the quality gaps. A cloud-based quality management software is the best solution to facilitate collaboration.

Advanced Analytics

Proactive management is based on effective strategies built on the data collected from next-generation analytics. It helps organizations to evaluate different ‘What If’ situations and have a comprehensive analysis to detect possible anomalies. Failing to have such advanced analytics makes it difficult for the organization to identify the problems early and fix them before any bigger trouble.

For complete analytics report, you can rely on an audit management software that will help you conduct detailed audits in lesser time and generate more insightful reports to keep a check on evolving trends and need for improvements. An audit system in place can give you more improvement opportunities to embrace.

Keeping Track of Changes

Lastly, organizations face performance issues due to changes in usage patterns, application features, documentation, new technological infrastructure, and service delivery type. They often face resistance from their own employees due to improper planning, approach, and implementation. Hence, change management is a very critical process to tackle carefully in order to have a successful proactive approach.

The best way to escape the problems occurring due to change is by implementing a change management system that will make it simpler for your workforce to adopt new and advanced technologies, documentation, etc. Also, you should consider a training management system that will help you create a centralized training platform for the employees. It will help them learn new changes quickly and easily.

If organizations can overcome the stated challenges, they can look forward to continuous improvement and growth in today’s competitive market in a very proactive manner.

Related Article: The Difference between Proactive and Reactive Organizations

Why Not Try Combining Proactive and Reactive Approach?

As already discussed above, we cannot completely rely on proactive approach considering the unexpected events or errors. But we can certainly stay ready with both Proactive and Reactive Approach.

We can implement a proactive approach to prevent anomalies. Even if we fail at some point, we should make the best of the reactive approach to prevent the reoccurrences of the same problem.

How?

Simple, get a CAPA management software like Qualityze that will help you prevent the potential problems while keeping a track of unfortunate events to restrict their reoccurrences and attain quality.