Tokyo (December 21, 2010) – Bridgestone Corporation held its First Bridgestone Global TQM Conference on Thursday, December 16, at the Bridgestone Technical Center in Kodaira, Tokyo.

This conference was held with the goal of building a foundation for the development of the best quality management systems on a global basis. To this end, the slogan of the conference was “Improving the ‘customer first’ mentality through good standards and good workplaces.” At the conference, examples of improvement activities from various Bridgestone operations were introduced to encourage the sharing of these activities throughout the Group. Bridgestone hopes that this event will help enhance its continuous improvement culture, motivate its employees, and improve its human resources development.

In the past, the Bridgestone Group has held TQM conferences for specific operating areas in Japan, including tires, internal manufacturing, and chemical and industrial products. The Group has also held global conferences for manufacturing divisions in the tire business. The recent Bridgestone Global TQM Conference consolidated all of these smaller conferences into one event. This global conference will help spread the winning improvement activities throughout the Group on a global scale.

This memorable event was attended by over 400 Bridgestone employees from around the globe, including Japan, the United States, Brazil, Spain, Turkey, Thailand, China, and the Philippines. A total of 16 examples of improvement activities from various divisions, such as production, sales, and service, were presented. These examples were judged from a range of perspectives, such as how the improvement activities addressed and solved problems. The best examples won awards. A total of six awards were presented: four TQM Awards and two Awards of Impression.
Operating sites that received awards are listed below.

Going forward, the Bridgestone Group will remain responsive to the needs of its customers. At the same time, the Group will focus on the important issue of expanding the range and increasing the effectiveness of its quality management activities. To this end, the Group will further accelerate the development of quality management activities that will result in a higher level of quality assurance.

Bridgestone Global TQM Conference