Essay Writing Examples: Total Quality Management

Total Quality Management and Its Implementation in the UAE

Since the last few years, Total Quality Management (TQM) has received a great deal of attention and importance due to a challenging and highly competitive business environment. Though previously many large as well as small businesses in all parts of the world have adopted and implemented various quality control measures, but the concept and practice of TQM is quite recent. At the same time, organizations in the UAE have started focusing on TQM lately. This essay demonstrates the concept of TQM and provides an analysis of effective TQM practices in various organizations with specific attention to the UAE market.

Concept of Total Quality Management

TQM is a continuous quest for excellence that aims to improve the efficiency as well as the flexibility of any organization by integrating the different processes within the organization. This system makes the prevention of defects in the early stages and is highly customer oriented. It is an activity which takes place in all parts of the organization. It mainly focuses on the continual improvement in areas pertaining to costs, quality, reliability, innovativeness and competency of the business. TQM provides organization with an action plan that helps to produce and deliver goods and services which are consistent with the needs of the consumer. It also helps the organization in producing it cheaper, faster and better than its competitors.

Analysis of Total Quality Management Practices in Organizations

TQM has been accepted across a large number of organizations in all parts of the world. A large number of researches have been carried on the efficient implementation of TQM across organizations where effective TQM led to the financial improvement, increased satisfaction of customers and also in the quality of products. However, at the same time, some studies have also reported high failure of TQM implementation as well.

A study carried by AL-Neyadi (1999), in which he invested the various TQM practices in the service organizations of UAE found huge differences in the manner in which different initiatives of TQM were implemented across private and public firm. The study showed a correlation between the organization’s size and the number of TQM practices adopted. The Jordan Banking sector was analyzed by Belbessi (2000) in which the relationship between TQM and performance was analyzed. The study demonstrated commercial banks in Jordan which had adopted TQM across all their functions showed strong improvements in profitability. As stated by Al-Dabal (2001), that Saudi Arabia organizations should conduct a complete analysis of the application of the new change measures in order to check its suitability with its culture.

In all of the studies conducted, there were some basic success elements identified for successfully implementation of TQM in an organization. The important success measures were management commitment, teamwork, training and education, communication, strong focus on customers, employee involvement and participation and organizational culture. In the UAE, a large number of studies were conducted in which nineteen quality factors were regarded as being very much vital for TQM implementation which further was cut down to nine critical ones such as active responsibility by senior management, customer satisfaction, continuous process of improvement, consistent communication, commitment towards goals, etc.

Thus we can conclude by saying is TQM is very much vital for the organizational competitiveness and its profitability. Top management commitment and a focus towards customer satisfaction are very much essential for the success of this system. In UAE a large number of organizations have adopted various TQM initiatives. However we cannot let pass the failure rates which can be eliminated by successful assessment of the various organizational factors and its strengths and weaknesses.

References

Gherbal, N. (2012). Critical success factors of implementing total quality management in Libyan organisations.
Jabnoun, N., & Sedrani, K. (2005). TQM culture and performance in UAE manufacturing firms. ASQ, 12 (4), 8-16.
Lakhe, R., & Mohanty, R. (1993). Total quality management. International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, 11(9), 9-34.
Smadi, M. S., & Al-Khawaldeh, K. A. (2006). The adoption of total quality management (TQM) in Dubai. Jordan Journal of Business Administration, 2 (4), 627-642.