Beyond TQM Programmes

Abstract

The failure rate of TQM interventions exceeds 75 per cent. Contends that it is missteps in the implementation of TQM – and other associated change efforts such as process re‐engineering – that undermine the likelihood that the intervention will contribute in a significant and lasting way to the competitive effectiveness of the organization. Using three case examples of TQM efforts, suggests that the implementation process must succeed in unhooking the organization from its traditional hierarchical and functional moorings and reattach it to horizontal, cross‐functional processes. To do this, the intervention process must address six distinct but interconnected stages of unhooking and reattachment and do so in a logical, sequential way.

Learning and Organizational Change in SPI Initiatives

“…Specifically in the context of quality improvement Spector and Beer [25] propose the following steps.…”

“…Maybe here the SPI literature could benefit from ideas presented in organizational learning on methods for advancing learning, such as in Fig. 1., and quality improvement steps proposed by [25].…”

Development of a measure to assess quality management in certified firms

“…Therefore, bearing in mind that experience has shown that some firms fail when they implement TQM (Boje and Winsor, 1993;Spector and Beer, 1994) and the implementation of TQM cannot be successful without the use of suitable quality management methods (Sitkin, Sutcliffe and Schoroeder, 1994;Wilkinson et al, 1998;Zhang, 2000) such as statistical techniques (Stuart, Mullins and Drew, 1996), managers of ISO 9000-certified small and medium firms that really want to progress towards a TQM culture, should implement the following factors, using the following methods: − Specialized training. Training cannot stop at an initial level, and must be of a continued nature (Ishikawa, 1985).…”

Regulating Systematic Occupational Health and Safety Management

“…An analogous problem has been identified in the TQM literature where management dedication and visible efforts to implement new routines are often emphasized. The failure rate for TQM efforts is high, and, according to Spector and Beer (1994), most of these failures can be attributed to management's half-hearted dedication and not having fully understood the dynamics of organizational change they are attempting to unleash. Some caution is needed in relation to this analogy since there are significant differences between IC and TQM.…”