Proceeding from its keenness to keep pace with the rapid-changing world and harmonize its outcomes with the country's development requirements and labor market, Umm Al-Qura University has set its sights on achieving total quality in all its administration, colleges and academic departments.

This interest was the driving force behind the University's going through several phases towards establishing an official body responsible for quality and accreditation. The fruit of such effort was establishing the Deanship of University Development and Quality. Special attention was paid to the development of structuring, naming and the duties relating to development and quality.

The following is a brief account of the phases which culminated in establishing the Deanship of University Development and Quality (See figure 1).

1. In 1410 A.H., the General Directorate for Information, Planning and Development was established. In this phase, attention was focused on building a database for taking informed decisions in view of it and extract quantitative and qualitative indicators from it.
2. In 1416 A.H., the Center for Information Technology and University Development was established. In this phase, attention was focused on establishing technical systems and equip all the University's colleges and administrations with an advanced technology network along with providing training courses on computer and its programming to the University's academic and administrative staffs.
3. In 1425 A.H., the University Development and Quality Unit which is the core of the administrative and regulatory entity responsible for quality, was established in this period. In its early days, the Unit's attention was focused on:

• Establishing quality systems and operations at the University.
• Developing the faculty members.
• Preparing developmental projects including the Deanship project.

1. In 1429 A.H., the Deanship of University Development and Quality was established.

The Deanship of University Development has taken significant steps and made great achievements in its endeavors to entrench the approach of total quality and the operations of quality assurance, development and improvement in academic, administrative and research systems.

It has always sought to firmly establish such approach in human resources' performance and learning resources at Umm Al-Qura University. Its goal has been to improve its outcomes and services in terms of education, scientific research and community service and to attain the optimal levels of performance bolstered by qualifying for national and international accreditations with an emphasis on its originality and Islamic identity and with its attention focused on continuous development to fulfill international standards in education and join ranks of the world's top universities.