Dr. H. James Harrington is a very successful entrepreneur and performance improvement specialist. Background: 40 years project manager with IBM, 10 years plus principal with Ernst & Young, member of 14 different board of directors of successful and not successful organizations.

Typical accomplishments:

• Served in the US Navy, serial number 785-92-27
• CEO of Harrington Hurd, and Rieker until it was (sold to Ernst & Young)
• CEO, Systemcorp, Montréal Canada project software developers (sold the company to IBM)
• CEO, Harrington Middle East (retired from a successful running business)
• CEO, Define Property designed and constructed 30-50 story buildings until (sold to a competitor)
• Led the redesign of the operating systems for African Capacity Building Foundation in association with the World Bank
• Appointed in 1984 as the first honorary official advisor to the Chinese government on quality.
• William Clinton Past President of the U.S. assigned him to serve as The Investigator of Goodwill.
• Led the redesign of City Government for Dubai to make it more customer centric
• Author of over 60 books on performance improvement and innovation
• Past President and Chairman of the Board for American Society for Quality and the International Academy for Quality. Lifetime Honorary President of the Asian Pacific Quality Organization.
• Chairman of the Board and President of the Walter L. Hurd Foundation
• Seven performance improvement and/or student grants named after him.
• Harrington is one of the few people who were licensed the government to be a professional quality engineer – license number QU 2180 6/30/87

The presentation will explain why the Pacific rim countries will play such an important part in the future of innovation. It will explain why all organizations need to be upgrading their innovations efforts in order to take case with the fast changing customer expectations. And will provide an example of maturity grid analysis of a sample of healthcare providers are performing in comparison to a top-notch healthcare provider.

Dr. Watson is an internationally-recognized authority on quality, reliability, and engineering. His academic fields are industrial and statistical engineering and he has served as a consultant and an executive to some of the world’s leading technology firms. He has been recognized by ASQ as the designer and developer of their Lean Six Sigma Black Belt and Master Black Belt programs and has delivered the first lecture on this subject in Japan where he is the only Westerner to have been recognized with a Deming Medal awarded by JUSE (the Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers) – the Deming Distinguished Service Award for Dissemination and Promotion (overseas). Dr. Watson has been named an Honorary Member of 19 national or regional quality-related associations and has received 16 medals, including both the APQO Armand Feigenbaum Lifetime Achievement Medal and the Harrington-Ishikawa Medal.

The foundations for modern quality were established almost 100 years ago as concepts of process and statistics were merged using the scientific method to address problems of controlling quality and improving performance. The presentation provides a historical context for current-state-of-the-art of managerial engineering in the quality discipline. It describes how profound knowledge can be used to reformulate and renew processes of organizations based on the emerging technologies of Industry 4.0 and adjust its supply chain management to the new realities that have been exposed from global responses to logistic crises that were set into motion during the coronavirus pandemic. Refreshed approaches to managing for quality will be based on a reexamination on core tenants of quality that were identified over the past century as a new model emerges to help guide its future applications. This will be the final public speech in the career of Dr. Watson as he concentrates on his writing and documentation of these life-long quality lessons.

Carew is the Managing Director of The International Quality Management Group based in Auckland (New Zealand) with operations in Malaysia, Singapore and Australia. Currently Secretary and Board Member of the New Zealand Business Excellence Foundation. Worked with UK Ministry of Defence, US Department of Defence and United Nations around the world. Carew is a Lead Auditor at 9001, 14001, 27001, 45001 and Class A Asbestos removal. He is an enthusiastic ISO auditor trainer and author of the Exemplar Global Audit Manager's Course for Quality Assurance Managers. He was elected Fellow of the Institute of Leadership & Management in 2011 and is currently a New Zealand representative in Geneva for Information Security and Data Privacy.

Academic Qualification:

Carew has a Master’s Degree from Cranfield University in Defence Technology, a Post Graduate Degree in Leadership & Management, a Diploma in Neurolinguistic Programming and in March 2022 finished the Harvard Business School Course “Data Privacy and Technology”.

Carew’s presentation will focus on the Global and Asia-Pacific Regional issues confronting us as we move into the post-COVID period. He will then touch on relationships, processes, transformation and fundamentals before explaining why in an uncertain world the need for Quality is greater than ever.

Lars Sorqvist is President-elect (president 2023-2024) and board member of the International Academy for Quality (IAQ). He is CEO of Sandholm Associates, a leading provider of training in quality management and excellence in Europe founded in 1971.

Sorqvist is also an associate professor in quality management at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and a past professor at the Shanghai University in China. He is a member of the Advisory Committee within the Shanghai Association for Quality (SAQ) and a past board member of the American Society for Quality (ASQ).

As an advisor and educator, Sorqvist has conducted training and management seminars in a large number of companies and organizations in many countries on most continents. He is also acting as a mentor and coach for executives, leaders, and quality professionals worldwide.

As an author, Sorqvist has written many articles and books on quality management, continual improvements, Lean, and Six Sigma.

Academic Qualification:

Professor at the Shanghai University
Associate Professor at the Royal Institute of Technology
Ph.D. in Quality Management
Master of Science
Master of Economics

People and organizations all over the world today realize that a more sustainable development not just is very important for future generations, but also for our own generation. Environmental, social and economic effects, more and more affect our lives and the society around us. The understanding that something has to be done increases. Despite the actual situation real actions often are missing. There are many nice statements and promises, but far too little happens in reality. The need for a more fact-based and improvement-driven sustainability work is because of this high. By linking quality and systematical improvement activities to sustainability, the progress needed can be achieved.

The focus of this speech will be to explain the correlation between quality and sustainability and give an understanding of how quality and fact-based improvement work can become the main driver of a future more sustainable development. Examples will be given from companies the speaker personally has been supporting in different countries and experiences from the winners of the IAQ Quality Sustainability Award.

Benito Flores serves as Director of Development at the Universidad de Monterrey - UDEM (Mexico), where he also teaches. Previously, he served at UDEM as Quality Director, Human Resources Director, Full Time Faculty, Dean of Graduate Studies and Research and Dean of the School of Engineering. In 2019, he served as Chairman of the Board of Directors of the American Society for Quality. He has been teaching in higher education institutions for 30 years and served as Quality Engineer, Quality Manager or Quality Director in four different organizations. He holds a BS in Industrial Engineering, a MS in Quality Management and a Ph.D. in Management (EdAd). He is a member of associations such as ASQ, AFP, ASEE and SHRM, and serves or has served in the Board of Directors of several non profit organizations including the Asia Pacific Quality Organization (APQO), the Santa Catarina Polytechnic High School (Mexico), the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACSCOC) and the American Society for Quality. He and his wife Alejandra live in Monterrey Mexico with their three children.

Presentation describes the knowledge, skills and attitudes required to be a successful quality professional –or a successful professional that uses quality concepts to improve the performance of his/her area of responsibility. Profession is analyzed and described from what it was, is and will be. Findings are based on the results of original research carried out by the author with 400 quality professionals.