TQM is a philosophy of incremental improvement. In the attempt to remain competitive, many companies realized that no amount of fine-tuning to their current processes could produce the gains necessary to be successful. For example, Ford Motors once had 500 people in their accounts payable department in North America. They knew they had to become more cost-effective, and originally looked to TQM efforts to reach a 20% improvement goal. Then they looked at Mazda - which ran their accounts payable function using only 5 people! Even accounting for the differences in company size, Ford concluded that its accounts payable organization was five times the size it needed to be in order to compete with Mazda. This required a solution much more radical than TQM offered.

The answer lies with reengineering, a strategy for fundamentally rethinking and redesigning one or more aspects of an organization in order to achieve dramatic improvements. In reengineering, organizations break way from the old ways of doing things and create new methods from the ground up. This exercise offers a unique chance to challenge long-held paradigms, take into account new ways of working that have been introduced to the industry or which spring from the creativity of the people in the organization, and most importantly, organize work around the outcomes desired rather than around rigid functional structures. Using these techniques, Ford went from 500 people down to 125 while actually improving the effectiveness of their accounts payable function.

Reengineering is not just being used by huge organizations like Ford. For example, many small software developers have used this strategy to create entirely new ways of building high quality commercial software in less time, using the latest in computer technology. Also, it should be noted that headcount reductions are not the goal; the goal is to do a better job much more efficiently.

It must be emphasized that reengineering involves radical transformation of some or all of the organization. It requires skill, commitment, discipline, and investment. As Michael Hammer put it in his pioneering article on the subject: "Reengineering triggers changes of many kinds, not just of the business process itself. Job designs, organizational structures, management systems - anything associated with the process - must be refashioned in an integrated way. In other words, reengineering is a tremendous effort that mandates change in many areas of the organization."

In the business world, most companies started with TQM and gained whatever benefits they could, then looked to reengineering as a means to either leapfrog the competition or simply catch up with others who were already far ahead in their quality or cost structures. This same evolution is likely to occur in human services. Innovative programs that produce substantially more cost-effective models for addressing social issues will not only garner substantial support, they will set the standard for other providers in their community. In fact, organizations such as the United Way and the American Red Cross have undertaken successful reengineering efforts to position themselves better for the future.

The main point here is for human service managers to understand the potential for reengineering, meaning the potential to get dramatically better results through new "out-of-the-box" thinking that does away with business-as-usual and focuses on designing everything in the organization around achieving the best possible client outcomes. This is not a strategy for the squeamish, since large risks come with large rewards as indicated earlier. It is a strategy that can work spectacularly if done well.