Joseph M.

Juran
Joseph Moses Juran (December 24, 1904 – February 28,
2008) was a Romanian-American engineer and management Joseph M. Juran
consultant. He was an evangelist for quality and quality
management, having written several books on those subjects.[1]
He was the brother of Academy Award winner Nathan Juran.

Contents
Early life
Personal life
Department chief
Japan
Contributions
Pareto principle
Management theory
Born December 24, 1904
The Juran trilogy
Brăila, Romania
Transferring quality knowledge between East and West
Died February 28, 2008
Juran Institute (aged 103)
Retirement Rye, New York, U.S.
Later life and death Occupation engineer and
See also management
consultant
Bibliography
Books Spouse(s) Sadie Shapiro (born
Published papers 18 March 1905 – died
In Japanese 2 December 2008,
103 years & 259 days
References
old) (marriage: June
External links 5, 1926 – 28 February
2008 his death.)

Early life Children Robert (b. 1928)

Sylvia (b. 1930)
Charles (b. 1931)
Juran was born in Brăila, Romania, one of the six children born
to Jakob and Gitel Juran; they later lived in Gura Humorului. He Donald (b. 1941)
had three sisters: Rebecca (nicknamed Betty), Minerva, who Parent(s) Jakob and Gitel Juran
earned a doctoral degree and had a career in education, and
Charlotte. He had two brothers: film and art director Nathan Juran, and Rudolph, known as Rudy.
Rudy founded a municipal bond company.[2]:6–7 In 1912, Joseph Juran emigrated to America with
his family, settling in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He excelled in school, especially in mathematics. He
was a chess champion at an early age,[3] and dominated chess at Western Electric. Juran attended
Minneapolis South High School where he graduated in 1920.
In 1924, with a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the University of Minnesota, Juran
joined Western Electric's Hawthorne Works. His first job was troubleshooting in the Complaint
Department.[2]:79 In 1925, Bell Labs proposed that Hawthorne Works personnel be trained in its
newly developed statistical sampling and control chart techniques. Juran was chosen to join the
Inspection Statistical Department, a small group of engineers charged with applying and
disseminating Bell Labs' statistical quality control innovations. This highly visible position fueled
Juran's rapid ascent in the organization and the course of his later career.[2]:110

Personal life
In 1926, he married Sadie Shapiro. Joseph and Sadie met in 1924 when his sister Betty moved to
Chicago, and Sadie and he met her train; in his autobiography, he wrote of meeting Sadie, "There and
then I was smitten and have remained so ever since." They were engaged in 1925, on Joseph's 21st
birthday. Fifteen months later, they were married. They had been married for nearly 82 years when
he died in 2008.

Joseph and Sadie raised four children (three sons and a daughter): Robert, Sylvia, Charles, and
Donald. Robert was an award-winning newspaper editor, and Sylvia earned a doctorate in Russian
literature.

Department chief
Juran was promoted to department chief in 1928, and the following year became a division chief. He
published his first quality-related article in Mechanical Engineering in 1935. In 1937, he moved to
Western Electric/AT&T's headquarters in New York City, where he held the position of Chief
Industrial Engineer.

As a hedge against the uncertainties of the Great Depression, he enrolled in Loyola University
Chicago School of Law in 1931. He graduated in 1935 and was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1936,
though he never practiced law.[2]:142

During the Second World War, through an arrangement with his employer, Juran served in the Lend-
Lease Administration and Foreign Economic Administration. Just before the war's end, he resigned
from Western Electric and his government post, intending to become a freelance
consultant.[2]:204–205

He soon joined the faculty of New York University as an adjunct professor in the Department of
Industrial Engineering, where he taught courses in quality control and ran round table seminars for
executives. He also worked via a small management consulting firm on projects for Gilette, Hamilton
Watch Company and Borg-Warner. After the firm's owner's sudden death, Juran began his own
independent practice, from which he made a comfortable living until his retirement in the late 1990s.
His early clients included the now defunct Bigelow-Sanford Carpet Company, the Koppers Company,
the International Latex Company, Bausch & Lomb and General Foods.

Japan
The end of World War II compelled Japan to change its focus from becoming a military power to
becoming an economic one. Despite Japan's ability to compete on price, its consumer goods
manufacturers suffered from a long-established reputation of poor quality. The first edition of Juran's
Quality Control Handbook in 1951 attracted the attention of the Japanese Union of Scientists and
Engineers (JUSE), which invited him to Japan in 1952. When he finally arrived in Japan in 1954,
Juran met with executives from ten manufacturing companies, notably Showa Denko, Nippon
Kōgaku, Noritake, and Takeda Pharmaceutical Company.[2]:250–257 He also lectured at Hakone,
Waseda University, Ōsaka, and Kōyasan. During his life, he made ten visits to Japan, the last in 1990.

Working independently of W. Edwards Deming (who focused on the use of statistical process
control), Juran—who focused on managing for quality—went to Japan and started courses (1954) in
quality management. The training began with top and middle management. The idea that top and
middle management needed training had found resistance in the United States. For Japan, it would
take some 20 years for the training to pay off. In the 1970s, Japanese products began to be seen as the
leaders in quality. This sparked a crisis in the United States due to quality issues in the 1980s.

Contributions

Pareto principle

In 1941, Juran came across the work of Vilfredo Pareto and began to apply the Pareto principle to
quality issues (for example, 80% of a problem is caused by 20% of the causes). This is also known as
"the vital few and the trivial many." In later years, Juran preferred "the vital few and the useful many"
to signal that the remaining 80% of the causes should not be totally ignored.[4]

Management theory

When he began his career in the 1920s, the principal focus in quality management was on the quality
of the end, or finished, product. The tools used were from the Bell system of acceptance sampling,
inspection plans, and control charts. The ideas of Frederick Winslow Taylor dominated.

Juran is widely credited for adding the human dimension to quality management. He pushed for the
education and training of managers. For Juran, human relations problems were the ones to isolate,
and resistance to change was the root cause of quality issues. Juran credits Margaret Mead's book
Cultural Patterns and Technical Change for illuminating the core problem in reforming business
quality.[2]:267 His book Managerial Breakthrough, published in 1964, outlined the issue.

Juran's concept of quality management extended outside the walls of the factory to encompass
nonmanufacturing processes, especially those that might be thought of as service related. For
example, in an interview published in 1997[5] he observed:

The key issues facing managers in sales are no different than those faced by managers in
other disciplines. Sales managers say they face problems such as "It takes us too long...we
need to reduce the error rate." They want to know, "How do customers perceive us?"
These issues are no different than those facing managers trying to improve in other fields.
The systematic approaches to improvement are identical. ... There should be no reason
our familiar principles of quality and process engineering would not work in the sales
process.

The Juran trilogy

Juran was one of the first to write about the cost of poor quality.[6] This was illustrated by his "Juran
trilogy," an approach to cross-functional management, which is composed of three managerial
processes: quality planning, quality control, and quality improvement. Without change, there will be
a constant waste; during change there will be increased costs, but after the improvement, margins
will be higher and the increased costs are recouped.

Transferring quality knowledge between East and West

During his 1966 visit to Japan, Juran learned about the Japanese concept of quality circles, which he
enthusiastically evangelized in the West.[7] He also acted as a matchmaker between U.S. and
Japanese companies looking for introductions to each other.[2]:260

Juran Institute
Juran founded the Juran Institute in 1979. The Institute is an international training, certification, and
consulting company that provides training and consulting services in quality management, Lean
manufacturing management and business process management, as well as Six Sigma certification.
The institute is based in Southbury, Connecticut.[8] Their mission statement is to "Create a global
community of practice to empower organizations and people to push beyond their limits."[9]

Retirement
Juran was active well into his 80s, and gave up international travel only at age 86. He retired at age
90 but still gave interviews. His activities during the second half of his life include:

Consulting for U.S. companies such as Armour and Company, Dennison Manufacturing
Company, Merck, Sharp & Dohme, Otis Elevator Company, Xerox, and the United States Navy
Fleet Ballistic Missile System.,[2]:276–286 Steve Jobs.
Consulting for Western European and Japanese companies such as Rolls-Royce Motors, Philips,
Volkswagen, Royal Dutch Shell, and Toyota Motor Company.[2]:307–324
Pro bono consulting for Soviet-bloc countries (Hungary, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Russia,
Poland, and Yugoslavia).[2]:313–316
Founding the Juran Institute[2]:325–336 and the Juran Foundation.[2]:337–342

Later life and death

Juran began writing his memoirs at 92. They were published two months before he celebrated his
99th birthday. He gave two interviews at 94 and 97.

In 2004, at age 100, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Luleå University of Technology in
Sweden. A special event was held in May to mark his 100th birthday.

Sadie and he celebrated their 81st wedding anniversary in June 2007. They were both 102 at the time.
Juran died of a stroke on 28 February 2008, at age 103, in Rye, New York. He was active on his 103rd
birthday and was caring for himself and Sadie, who was in poor health, when he died. Sadie died on 2
December 2008, at age 103. They were survived by their four children, nine grandchildren, and ten
great-grandchildren.[10][3] Juran left a book that was 37% complete, which he began at age 98.

See also
Quality by Design

Bibliography
Juran cites the following as his most influential works:[2]:261–275

Books

Quality Control Handbook, New York, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1974, OCLC 1220529 (http
s://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1220529)

Eventually published in six editions: 2nd edition, 1962 (http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/64292

499), 3rd edition, 1974 (http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/213513128), 4th edition, 1988 (http://
www.worldcat.org/oclc/17546189), 5th edition, 1999 (http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/228361
688), 6th edition, 2010 (http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/700458804)

Managerial Breakthrough, New York, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1964

Management of Quality Control, New York, New York: Joseph M. Juran, 1967,
OCLC 66818686 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/66818686)
Quality Planning and Analysis, New York, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1970
Upper Management and Quality, New York, New York: Joseph M. Juran, 1980,
OCLC 8103276 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/8103276)
Juran on Planning for Quality, New York, New York: The Free Press, 1988,
OCLC 16468905 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/16468905)

Published papers

"Directions for ASQC", Industrial Quality Control, Buffalo, New York: Society of Quality
Control Engineers, November 1951
"Universals in Management Planning and Control", Management Review, New York, New
York: American Management Association, pp. 748–761, November 1954
"Improving the Relationship between Staff and Line", Personnel, New York, New York:
American Management Association, May 1956
"Industrial Diagnostics", Management Review, New York, New York: American Management
Association, June 1957
"Operator Errors—Time for a New Look", ASQC Journal, New York, New York: American
Society for Quality Control, February 1968
"The QC Circle Phenomenon", Industrial Quality Control, Buffalo, New York: Society of
Quality Control Engineers, January 1967
"Mobilizing for the 1970s", Quality Progress, New York, New York: American Society for
Quality Control, August 1969
"Consumerism and Product Quality", Quality Progress, New York, New York: American
Society for Quality Control, July 1970
"And One Makes Fifty", Quality Progress, New York, New York: American Society for
Quality Control, March 1975
"The Non-Pareto Principle: Mea Culpa", Quality Progress, New York, New York: American
Society for Quality Control, May 1975
"Khrushchev's Venture into Quality Improvement", Quality Progress, New York, New York:
American Society for Quality Control, January 1976
"Japanese and Western Quality—a Contrast", Quality Progress, New York, New York:
American Society for Quality Control, December 1978

In Japanese
 Planning and Practices in Quality Control, Japanese Union of Scientists and Engineers,
1956

a collection of Juran's 1954 lectures[2]:260

Lectures in Quality Control, 1956

Lectures in General Management, 1960

References
1. Phillips-Donaldson, Debbie (May 2004), "100 Years Of Juran" (http://www.asq.org/data/subscripti
ons/qp/2004/0504/qp0504juran.html), Quality Progress, Milwaukee, Wisconsin: American Society
for Quality, 37 (5), pp. 25–39, retrieved 2008-06-01
2. Juran, Joseph M. (2004), Architect of Quality: The Autobiography of Dr. Joseph M. Juran (1 ed.),
New York City: McGraw-Hill, ISBN 978-0-07-142610-7, OCLC 52877405 (https://www.worldcat.or
g/oclc/52877405)
3. Bunkley, Nick (2008-03-03), "Joseph Juran, 103, Pioneer in Quality Control, Dies" (https://www.ny
times.com/2008/03/03/business/03juran.html), New York Times, retrieved 2008-06-01
4. "Pareto Principle (80/20 Rule) & Pareto Analysis Guide" (https://www.juran.com/blog/a-guide-to-th
e-pareto-principle-80-20-rule-pareto-analysis/). Juran. 2019-03-12. Retrieved 2021-02-27.
5. Paul H. Selden (1997), Sales Process Engineering: A Personal Workshop, Milwaukee, WI: ASQ
Quality Press, pp. xxi–xxii
6. Bergman & Klefsjö (2007), Kvalitet från behov till användning, Studentlitteratur, ISBN 978-91-44-
04416-3
7. "The QC Circle Phenomenon", Industrial Quality Control, Buffalo, New York: Society of Quality
Control Engineers, January 1967
8. "Management Consulting - Juran Global" (http://www.juran.com/). juran.com. Retrieved
23 November 2015.
9. "ASQ: About: Joseph M. Juran | ASQ" (https://asq.org/about-asq/honorary-members/juran).
asq.org. Retrieved 2019-04-03.
10. "Joseph Juran, pioneer of quality control, dies at age 103" (https://web.archive.org/web/20080314
211645/http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/03/01/business/NA-FIN-US-Obit-Juran.php),
International Herald Tribune, March 1, 2008, archived from the original (http://www.iht.com/article
s/ap/2008/03/01/business/NA-FIN-US-Obit-Juran.php) on March 14, 2008, retrieved April 5, 2008

External links
The Juran Institute's official web site (http://www.juran.com)
ASQ Juran page (https://asq.org/about-asq/honorary-members/juran)

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