Eugene L. Grant Medal – Noriaki Kano
The Eugene L. Grant Medal is presented to an individual for outstanding leadership in the development and presentation of meritorious educational programs in quality.
“For his exemplary professional career as an educator, lecturer, writer, and consultant in the field of quality management, whose sage advice has improved the quality of performance of global organizations, influenced the quality of life of business leaders, and enhanced the capability of the world’s quality professionals.”
Acceptance Speech:
It is a great honor for me to be awarded the 2006 E.L. Grant medal. I understand that this award is for leadership in education. Therefore, let me share with you the experiences I have had from the viewpoint of education.
1. Education as Field Scholl Scholar
We can very roughly dichotomize quality scholars into the library school and the field school. The former are those who do research based on literature, while the latter are those who primarily carry out research based on filed work: I’m sure I fall in the later category. The following are some of the works developed in such a way:
- Attractive Quality Theory, the so called Kano Model
- Take-Achieving QC Story
- Daily Management, and
- House of TQM
I made my lecture content based on these research works with practical examples. I believed that this method was useful for students to be interested in quality practices and understand the necessity of theory for practices.
In addition with the universities, as a field school scholar, I have done various quality education with societies and industries not only in Japan but also in overseas countries. In this point, I was very lucky because the first half of my professional career coincided with the development stage of quality in Japanese industries, and the second half coincided with quality dissemination in oversees countries, including the United States. Then I could transfer with I experienced in Japan to the overseas.
In this context, let me refer to two organizations – the Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) and the Association for Overseas Technical Scholarship (AOTS) – with thanks to their staffs for providing me so many opportunities for being engaged in various quality education programs.
2. Driving Experience and Change of Education Behavior
The students who learned from me during the first half of my 35-year teaching career talked about “Kano cannot drive a car,” while the students of the last half remember me as “a car driving maniac.”
My big change happened when I was invited to the University of Miami as visiting professor in 1988. I had no choice by to get a driver’s license. I failed the driving test four times, and finally passed on my fifth try. As it was my best understanding that my skill as so primary, I was very surprised when my examiner passed me. If I were him, I may not have considered passing such a poor applicant. At the beginning, I bumped my car here and there, and my car got scratches and dents all over. But as I gained experience, my driving got smoother and then I drove 49 of the 50 U.S. states. By having the ability to drive a car, I could enrich my life with various new possibilities that I wouldn’t have even imagined.
My driving greatly influenced my behavior toward education. I used to demand perfection from my students, because of my belief that work will not be successful unless everything is 100% perfect. However, based on the insight gained from my driving experience, I reflected on my perfectionism.
A teacher who is engaged in education for many years naturally becomes very familiar with his/her lecture contents. And then he/she is apt to be frustrated with poor students who have some difficulty to understand his/her lecture, wondering why they cannot understand such easy things. I was more or less like this before testing for my driver’s license. Then, I realized that I might have taken future possibilities away from the students, rather than adding to their potential. This definitely influenced my policy for scoring. And then my students began to evaluate me as a merciful professor like Buddha, instead of a rigid professor like a Demon!
In addition I learned how difficult it is for everybody to master something [in which they are] inexperienced and that the challenge of something new is very helpful for a teacher to share with his/her students. Because of this thinking, in the past few years, I have forgotten my age and been challenging myself with the Chinese language. Incidentally, I very successfully conducted my first lecture in Chinese in China last week.
3. Asian Network for Quality (ANQ) as New Learning Opportunity
It is no question that, today, Asia is “the Plant of the World.” In this situation, I feel extremely honored to be involved in establishing and developing the Asian Network for Quality (ANQ) as its first chairperson and, today, as honorary chairperson. I keenly with that ANQ will create various learning opportunities for young Asian quality professionals and will contribute to further developing Asian quality.
4. Epilogue
In being awarded the E.L. Grant medal, I could not fail to express how lucky I was to be guided for a quarter century by such a great pioneer as Professor Kaoru Ishikawa, who was the recipient of the 1971 Grant Medal.
Last but not least, let me express my sincere gratitude to the members of the ASQ E.L. Grant Medal committee including the chairman, Dr. Lennart Sandholm, and to Gregory H. Watson, Mohamed Zairi, Kenneth E. Case, Spencer Hutchens, Bob King, and Blanton Godfrey, for their kind recommendation of me to the committee for this award.
Many thanks.
