Rebuilding Quality Assurance and a Management System
The Unitika Group regularly holds the Quality Assurance Committee, which is chaired by the Representative Director and President, Chief Executive Officer, as we keep working on strengthening our governance. In addition to thoroughly familiarizing all quality assurance workers with the Guidelines for Quality Assurance, which were enacted in 2019, we are also circulating an educational DVD on quality compliance in the 19 quality assurance departments within the Group in FY 2022. After watching the DVD, the employees of these departments discussed situations of “what it was me or my department?” with the aim of becoming more quality compliance aware.
In our management systems, we are strengthening the structure of the quality assurance departments within the Group, and continuously implementing quality audits as a part of our efforts to build and reorganize the quality assurance system. We are also using audits to ensure the reliability of data, make sure we are keeping our promise to customers, and check for any defects and irregularities in the quality assurance system. In these ways, we are striving to prevent inappropriate incidents, and to monitor and improve the state of our quality management.
We will move forward with reforming corporate culture and awareness in order to ensure employees thoroughly understand to “prioritize quality over cost and speedy delivery” as is specified in the Unitika Group Quality Policies, and to ensure there is a Group-wide awareness of compliance, including quality assurance.
Employees in each division and department learning about quality compliance
Unitika Group Quality Policies
- With our value of “prioritizing quality over cost and speedy delivery,” the Unitika Group provides products that our customers can use safely and with peace of mind.
- We comply with the laws and regulations concerning products and services, and adhere to the agreements we have with our customers.
- To meet quality requirements, we build quality into our products through repeated verifying and testing during design, development, and manufacturing.
- We continually maintain our quality assurance system, and work to improve quality.
Excerpt from the Guidelines for Quality Assurance
<Basic Action>
- Ensure all quality assurance workers comply with laws and regulations related to products and services, and that they are thoroughly aware and strongly motivated to “never do, or let others do, dishonest and falsifying actions.”
- Enter into agreements with customers that can be complied with, and successively check the compliance status.
- Share information related to quality assurance within business departments and among Unitika Group companies and departments with jurisdiction.
Ensuring Product Safety
Unitika has established the Product Safety Management Regulations designed to ensure that we always offer safe products to our customers. These safety management regulations contain detailed provisions on areas such as basic policy, responsibility areas, implementation systems, and bylaws on the implementation and application of manual procedures. Unitika and Unitika Group companies work to ensure that product manufacturing and sales are carried out safely and in compliance with these regulations.
When a new product is launched on the market, we hold a Product Liability Review Board to review the products safety, labelling, and other features from various perspectives.
We have set up the Central Committee on Product Liability as a company-wide organization. The Committee meets once a year to carry out a general review of the Product Liability Review Board’s product safety review results, and also to implement various initiatives such as raising awareness about product safety.
Information on the claims which may bring about an accident is shared by the Quality Assurance Committee and the Central Committee on Product Liability, and such information is used to prevent the recurrence of repeated claims, etc.