Brentwood Trucking Ltd Executive

Summary

Brentwood Trucking Ltd. is a holding company for the largest

Canadian transportation group. It works on the simple philosophy

that is providing the good services and being completely honest and

to treat one another fairly and with respect.

It was started in central Ontario with the first job of transportation

of by-products from chemical valley to Toronto. Between early

1950’s and 1985’s, the firm as extended its services to other places

and also subsidizes different transportation companies.

The firm today operates modern terminal in all major Canadian

cities, towns and remote areas. The firm operates over 1500

vehicles moving freight from shippers across Canada to the

customers. It is also providing its subsidiary companies with the

fundamental services such as, human resource, account receivables

and payables, training and quality development, etc.

Mr. John Moser who was the vice president of training and quality

Development for the company was to give the presentation on Cost

of Quality to Mr. G.K Alexander who was the President of Brentwood

trucking Ltd. The executive of the company had given approval to

Mr. John on instilling quality thinking throughout the organization.

Mr. John has come up with three things that can b applied with in

the activity of firms to have the concept of quality and that are

meaning of quality defects, determination of cost associative with

quality defects and development of strategy for addressing quality

that will provide competitive and sustainable advantage for the firm.

A Steering committee was formed for the purpose of deciding how

to differentiate Brentwood Trucking Company from its competition.

Mr. John was the member of the committee and he used Deming

quality concepts. He also set up QMTs as a mean of introducing

them to the “quality way of thinking.” John also asks the executives

to provide the information regarding the three things he had come

up with.

Terminals operations involved the loading and unloading of

shipments at central locations. The cost and expense of these

terminals is approximately $5.3 million per annum. The cost

includes re-deliverance, cost associative with location and layout,

extra travels, salaries, hire external cartage, etc.

The transportation department handles the highway operations of

Brentwood Trucking Company to carry shipments from customers to

their destinations. Here John here found many facts. The cost

occurred per annum is approximately $1 million and it includes

accident costs and fines, drivers cost, cost of blocking dock, salaries,

etc.

The maintenance department was responsible for the repair and

servicing of all equipments for the firm. It also deals with the spare

part inventory. The cost associative with maintenance department is

approximately $0.3 million. The cost includes packing slips and

receipts cards, additional maintenance, etc.

The quality department consists of one and half full time people.

The task is to act as consultants for various units with in the firm.

The cost associated with the Quality department is $0.27 million.

The cost includes travel, manuals, salaries, etc.

Training department consists of two and half people who were

responsible for the development of training programs with in the

firm. The cost is $0.14 million and it includes production cost, wages

and benefits.

The sales and marketing department was charged with the

responsibility of quoting rates for services to customers, getting new

business, retaining established accounts and etc. the total cost of

this department is around $5.4 million.

Claim department was responsible for settling all claims from

customers that resulted from error made by the company in

handling the customers’ shipments. The cost per year of this

department is approximately $2.1 million. The cost includes cost of

damages sustained, travel, salaries and etc.

Administration department deals with the account receivables. The

cost of this department is something like $0.86 million. The cost

includes cost of reprocessing, fees, bad debts, salaries and wages.

Mr. John now had data about the errors and problems within the

different operations of the firm and he can now use this information

to asses the current situation and make strategy to guide the

implementations of the quality development process.

Question/Answer

1- What do you think of the process that has been employed

at Brentwood trucking company to introduce the “Quality

Thinking” throughout the firm? What would you do

differently? Why?

Implementation:

The process that has been in use at the Brentwood Trucking

company to introduce the ‘quality thinking’ throughout the firm to

incorporate, effectively measure and enhance the total quality

management. There have been several errors and flaws currently

running in and around the company and to eliminate them to

maximum extent, Mr. John (vice president of training & quality

development in Brentwood Company) is initially grooming

employees, management and directors about this process and after

that planning to apply the total quality management all over the

firm.

Terminal location:

If I had to implement the quality thinking process strategy in the

company by using a different way, the first step that I would be

taking in order to minimize the maximum losses is to alter the

location of terminals. The losses that has been incurred from the

other heads that has been mentioned in the case are far lesser then

the losses generating through the terminal because of their location.

The cost of errors and flaws of terminal are in millions of dollar

where as the other departments are not contributing such losses in

the firm. The strategic location should be determined in order to

minimize this risk and to cover the maximum cost and losses.

Introduce HRM department:

Another strategy that is to be prioritized in my opinion is the

implementation of proper human resource department. As I have

gone through the case of Brentwood Company, another main issue I

had figured out is that there is no proper channel for the grooming

and training of all the employees. All the hiring firing issues are

dealt under the sales and marketing department which is a major

source of losses to be generated. If there would be HR department it

will motivate the employees throughout their session. There is a

need of proper collaboration between HR and quality department in

order to keep employees pro-active and efficient all the time.

2- Examining the various examples of issues raised by

various managers which ones should be classified as related

to quality? Can we classify these items into some form that

allows management to understand where their quality

efforts are being placed and what is being achieved?

The first issue that is related to quality is the tallying of the sheets

by the dock men. If this could be reduced to maximum level the

best quality of service could be achieved. The reason is that these

are the errors which are taking so much time on checking that

which shipment is for which destination or area.

Secondly picking up the right shipment will also help in maintaining

the quality of the service. Because this will save their time in

handling the nest correct shipment and deliver it to the correct

destination.

Another issue to be handled is the tracing of orders and shipments

within the system once they are entered in it. At the moment 12

people are deployed there for this purpose and still it is a problem.

So if this issue would have been solved, it will defiantly help in

providing the best quality.

Although each and every issue is of the same importance but the

mentioned above are the key issue which must be addressed by the

company management so that they could maintain their best image

in the regions as ones who are providing the best quality to its

valued customers.

3- What action plan or strategy do you suggest to John

Moser to move Brentwood Trucking forward in its efforts to

improve quality within the firm?

Well according to my understanding they should make the strategy

of Just-In-Time concept that every task must be processed on its

own time so that the very next activity could not get disturbed. For

this all the employees must know that what type of best effort their

work is demanding from them.

Secondly they must remove the communication gap within the firm.

Every employee must be clearly communicated his particular task

and the time required to execute it. With this they will be able to put

their maximum efforts in the given time to complete it.

Management strategy is also must for Brentwood to implement so

that every shipment can be handled in an organized manner without

any error. As they have to handle thousands of shipments, so there

must be a very systematic and organized way to handle them and

deliver them to their respective destinations.

Brentwood Trucking Company is indeed a very successful business

that is offering their services in different areas to their customers

but even then they have to consider their problems very seriously

and do investment on them to sort them out so that they could keep

on giving their services to their customers.