Food Safety and Quality Professionals Shouldn’t Work Alone

Editor's Note: This article originally appeared in the print edition of QA under the headline "We Shouldn't Do This Alone!"

I saw a meme the other day, and it was simple. It showed one person digging a hole while numerous people were standing around watching this person digging the hole, all alone. The meme had labels hovering over the individuals pictured, which made the obvious seem even more relatable to the struggles that a quality function deals with every day.

© Sanjay Nadarajah

The hole that was being dug was simply labeled as the “Deviation.” The sole individual digging that hole in the ground was labeled as “Quality.” All the bystanders hanging around and watching the excavation had labels linking them to our partners in manufacturing. They went down the list of so many to include “Regulatory,” “Production,” “Procurement,” “Legal,” “Finance,” “Supply Chain,” “IT,” “HR,” “R&D,” “Maintenance” and “CEO.” The individuals were not helping. They were fine to stand back and allow “Quality” to do the work, to do the digging, and to find the answers to what went wrong.

I saw a meme the other day, and it resonated with me. Maybe it was because it reflected what I’ve experienced so much of in my career in manufacturing, and maybe it reflected simply the reality of where we still are at in this journey to be better. We strive to be better at ensuring our products are safe to consume. We strive to be better at building a quality culture, and we strive to be better at providing nutritious and high-quality foods for humans, young and old. But sometimes I wonder if we, the food safety and quality professionals, are the only ones really “striving.” Just like the meme I saw the other day, we shouldn’t do this alone, and we can’t do this alone.

This visual illustration was something I ponder quite often as I observe the same challenges and battles that I recall having five, 10 and 20 years ago. I’d like to think we’ve come further with building our food safety and quality cultures, but have we driven the total ownership of food safety and quality into everyone’s role in the supply chain? I cannot honestly answer that we have.

Food safety and quality professionals can’t do it alone, even though sometimes it feels that way.

As food safety and quality professionals, we are the cheerleaders and technical experts for our organization when it comes to the choices that are made. Sometimes it feels like we are the only ones dying on that food safety hill while everyone cannot understand why we are stunting innovation, adding cost with testing or making processes more cumbersome because the rules and regulations have changed. We are adept at leading investigations, digging into the details and demanding we do better, but why aren’t our functional partners there digging that hole with us? How do we adjust our focus and spread the ownership so that we are not doing it all alone? That is the burning question.

When we go to food safety conferences, it’s great. All of us like-minded people who already have a passion for food safety gather in one place, our echo chamber, to remind of us what we already are passionate about and committed to. We hear the stories, we learn the latest, and we get re-energized to go back to our organizations to again carry the load that is not evenly distributed. We need to move the food safety and quality messaging to other areas, and only then will we see faster progress. Why aren’t we (food safety and quality) headlining the supply chain conference? The food manufacturing conference? The food R&D conference? Isn’t the core of our business to produce safe food? The message needs to resonate further, and then perhaps we can help shift the load.

I want to be positive like all food safety and quality professionals, but many times, I get pulled back to reality just like that meme. We have made the progress that has been made in the food industry to drive adoption of a food safety culture deep into organizations; but we also must face the challenges that are still clearly present and do not seem to be going away any time soon. We must continue to be creative and innovative in how we drive ownership not only in our factories, but across our entire supply chain. Decisions are constantly being made at each step. Decisions that can impact food safety and quality, without someone even knowing that it does.

I saw a meme the other day, and it made me realize that we cannot do it alone. We need our partners to have the same passion that we do for food safety and quality. We need them to carry this responsibility as an equal partner. How we do this effectively is still a major undertaking, just like digging that hole, all alone, while everyone stands around and watches us work.