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Case 1-2 Granite Rock Company: Achieving Quality through Employees Granite Rock Homepage: www.graniterock.com Granite Rock, a California-based mining and construc- a resulting decline in customer satisfaction was inevita- tion company, was founded in 1900, but its journey ble and responded to this self-assessment by deciding it toward improved quality did not start until many needed to become more customer focused. At Granite decades later. The managers at Granite Rock knew that Rock, this meant not only learning more about the 24 Part I. Understanding Quality Concepts customer but also providing its employees the training employee, which is more than 10 times the average for and skills necessary to properly implement the compa- the mining and construction industries ny's new philosophy An equally important step in equipping its employ- At first this focus on HR management was ees to contribute to the firm's efforts was establishing an emphasized through employee training. As explained atmosphere of trust between management and the rank- by CEO Bruce Woolpert, you can't have employees and file employees. That effort has been pursued in a out telling customers "yes" unless everyone else in the number of ways, and the trust developed throughout the company knows how to follow up on "yes." As a company has resulted in the effective implementation of result, an aggressive training program was imple- employee empowerment and teamwork. In addition, the mented involving on-the-job training and classroom company has done away with its conventional perfor- time for the majority of the firm's employees. A pro- mance appraisal system (feeling that it was ineffective) gram called IPDP (Individual Personal Development and has incorporated performance appraisal into each Plan) was created to help each employee take respon- employee's IPDP. As part of this plan, at least once a sibility for his or her own training program. As the year, each employee meets with his or her supervisor to program gained momentum, remarkable things started discuss job responsibilities, review accomplishments, to happen. One employee indicated that he wanted to assess skills, and set skill and career development goals. learn to read better. As a result of that request, the Although the IPDP is not mandatory for the company's company initiated a reading program that has helped a unionized workers, overall participation stands at 83% number of Granite Rock's employees improve their Because the IPDP approach to training and appraisal reading skills. As part of the company's effort to prepares employees to assume greater responsibilities, reduce process variability and increase product reli- Granite Rock promotes heavily from within ability, many employees were trained in statistical pro Granite Rock, having won the Malcolm Baldrige cess control, root-cause analysis, and other Award and one of Fortune magazine's best 100 compa- quality-minded competencies. Today, Granite Rock nies to work for, is aggressively pursuing its quality ini- spends up to $1,600 per year for training of each tiatives, with the cooperation of its 700 employees