Is Your Housekeeping Quality Control Program Working?

A Housekeeping Quality Control Program is one of the most critical process assets within any cleaning operation. Your quality control processes are the backbone of your operation and, when properly developed and implemented, they provide the necessary inspection and corrective action routines to ensure that you are meeting the cleaning requirements of your organization.   An effective Program would cover the following:

Alignment with Goals and Specifications

Your Program should be aligned with your internal organizational goals and cleaning specifications and frequencies.

A Program that is not well aligned with organizational goals and that does not adequately reflect the cleaning specifications will, at some point, likely fail on both counts. Your Quality Control Program should work for your cleaning operation, not against it.

Inspection Types

Most Programs have provisions for scheduled and unscheduled inspections:

• Scheduled: These routine inspections occur at a predetermined frequency. The frequency of routine inspections is often stipulated within the individual Housekeeping requirements.  Scheduled inspections are typically carried out by Housekeeping Supervisors and Managers. 
• Unscheduled: These are "surprise" or unannounced inspections that can be carried out at any time. These inspections should be conducted by a Quality Control Representative outside the Operations department.

All inspections should be supported by clear instructions and pictures. Web- based inspection and scoring tools should be used when possible.

Multiple Layers of Inspection

An effective Housekeeping Quality Control Program will contain multiple layers of inspections. Typical layers include:

·       Weekly: Conducted by on site Supervisors

·       Monthly: Conducted by Operations Managers

·       Quarterly: Conducted by Quality Control personnel

Each layer of inspections should contain specific instructions with respect to responsibility, inspection techniques, tools, reporting routines and follow-up.

Consistent Scoring Process

Your inspections should be supported by a scoring process that is well-defined and consistent. The scoring process will reflect individual requirements as stipulated by your customers. The scoring should be straightforward and easily understood and communicated.  A typical four-tier scoring approach would include scorings/ratings such as:

1. Meets or Exceeds Expectations
2. Approaches Expectations
3. Needs Improvement
4. Immediate Action Required

Many Housekeeping organizations are also adopting the APPA’s Custodial Service Levels as their scoring system.

 

Closed-loop Corrective Action Process

A Housekeeping Quality Control Program is only as good as its Corrective Action Process. Inspections that do not result in the successful completion of required corrective actions are of little value. It’s important that you have a closed-loop process. If an inspection results in scores of "Needs Improvement" or "Immediate Action Required" the process should call for the generation of a Work Order to address the identified problems.  Once the Work Order has been fulfilled the work should be inspected and validated by appropriate inspection personnel. The Work Order can then be closed.

Key Performance Indicators (KPI's) 

Having your KPI's connected to your Quality Control Program is an excellent way to foster a mindset of continuous improvement. Setting aggressive, but obtainable, targets for inspection results will help drive your operation toward improved performance.

An effective Housekeeping Quality Control Program will lead to improved cleaning performance and higher levels of customer satisfaction.