Thinking about Quality.

This is a fascinating and useful exposition of what we have come to call Total Quality Management

A powerful but frequently misunderstood means to organizational transformation. Like such other current management buzzwords as "reengineering" or "collective empowerment," TQM has been enthusiastically and uncritically embraced by managers eager to make profound changes in their organizations.

The results have been mixed. In a series of carefully detailed case studies Dobyns and Crawford-Mason chronicle the very real achievements of TQM when properly implemented, and argue that the equally notable failures are due not to any deficiency in the theory, but to a misunderstanding of the core philosophy that underpins it.

According to the authors, TQM is not a panacea for companies selling the wrong products in the wrong markets, nor was it ever intended to be. Neither is it a quick checklist of useful questions a company or organization needs to ask itself periodically in order to stay on course. Rather, it is a coherent philosophy of continuous systemic improvement, requiring a firm commitment from top management if it is to succeed at all, and likely to take years of implementation before results are demonstrable.

The organizational commitment to make such changes in the face of inevitable resistance from middle managers threatened by new ways of doing things frequently flags, and TQM too often ends up either as an empty slogan or a short-term fix doomed to fail. They conclude with an interesting and provocative look at how TQM might profitably be applied to a variety of other contexts, including health care, public education, and Defense Department procurement.

Steve Brzezinski