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Total Quality Management and Employee Involvement

The document discusses the compatibility of Total Quality Management (TQM) programs and employee involvement. It questions whether employee involvement is best thought of as supporting TQM, or if TQM practices best support employee involvement programs. The choice between these approaches could have important implications for how an organization is structured and managed. To answer this, the history and effectiveness of both TQM programs and employee involvement programs must be examined.

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Anil Namoshe
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235 views

Total Quality Management and Employee Involvement

The document discusses the compatibility of Total Quality Management (TQM) programs and employee involvement. It questions whether employee involvement is best thought of as supporting TQM, or if TQM practices best support employee involvement programs. The choice between these approaches could have important implications for how an organization is structured and managed. To answer this, the history and effectiveness of both TQM programs and employee involvement programs must be examined.

Uploaded by

Anil Namoshe
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Total Quality Management and employee involvement: Are they compatible?

1. Edward E. Lawler III

Executive Overview
Total Quality Management (TQM) programs are an important and prominent approach to management. With the creation of the Baldrige award and the competitiveness challenges which many corporations face, they have become extremely popular in (he United States during the last decade. Despite the recent Hurry of studies questioning their effectiveness, most large corporations have a program that incorporates some of the practices and principles of total quality management.1 One of the most important principles of TQM concerns employee involvement or, as it is often called, empowerment. It is common for a TQM program to state that employee involvement is very important to its success. There is a long history of research and writing on employee involvement and how it can affect organizational performance.2 It, too, has become increasingly popular. One possibility, as suggested by TQM programs, is that employee involvement is best thought of as an activity which supports these programs. Another possibility is that TQM practices are best used in support of employee involvement programs. Is the difference between TQM as a part of involvement and involvement as a part of TQM more than just a difference in phrasing? Does the choice between these two alternatives have important implications for the way an organization is actually managed and structured? The answers to these two questions contain important clues about when and why TQM programs tail and how they and employee involvement programs can be made effective. To answer them we need to look briefly at the history of both TQM and employee involvement programs. MANAGEMENT -- Employee participation

TOTAL quality management EMPLOYEE empowerment

CORPORATIONS -- United States PERFORMANCE -- Management

ORGANIZATIONAL behavior -- Research

MANAGEMENT science PROBLEM solving

COMPETITIVE advantage

BUSINESS intelligence -- Management

GROUP decision maki

Managing human resources in small organizations: What do we know?


Abstract
While much of our knowledge concerning traditional HR topics (e.g., recruiting, compensation, or performance management) in large firms may also apply in small or emerging organizations, evidence suggests that new ventures are different and that management of people within them may not clearly map to management within larger, more established organizations. This paper reviews extant research on managing people within small and emerging ventures and highlights additional questions that have not yet been addressed. Our review suggests that as scholars, our understanding of the HR issues important to small and emerging firms is limited. While we have begun to understand how these firms should hire, reward, and perhaps even motivate their employees, we lack much of the theory and data necessary to understand how small and emerging firms train their employees, manage their performance, promote or handle organizational change, or respond to potential labor relations and union organization issues. The existing literature presents an often-confounded relationship between size and age, between the issues important to small firms and the issues important to young ones. Given the potential early HR decisions have to impact the organization's downstream success, it is important that we understand how these functional areas of HR (as well as their integration and evolution) affect small and emerging firms, and how the HR decisions made during the formative stages of firm development impact the firm's long-term goals.

Keywords
Human resource management; Entrepreneurship; Small firms

The Impact Of Human Resource Management Practices On Turnover, Productivity, And Corporate Financial Performance
1. Mark A. Huselid1 +Author Affiliations 1. 1Rutgers University

Abstract
This study comprehensively evaluated the links between systems of High Performance Work Practices and firm performance. Results based on a national sample of nearly one thousand firms indicate that these practices have an economically and statistically significant impact on both intermediate employee outcomes (turnover and productivity) and short- and long-term measures of corporate financial performance. Support for predictions that the impact of High Performance Work Practices on firm performance is in part contingent on their interrelationships and links with competitive strategy was limited. PERSONNEL management

INDUSTRIAL management

LABOR turnover LABOR productivity

INDUSTRIAL relations -- Economic aspects FINANCIAL performance

STRATEGIC planning

JOB performance

ORGANIZATIONAL behavior

ORGANIZATIONAL sociology EMPLOYEE motivation

INDUSTRIAL psychology

The Challenge of Innovation Implementation


1. 2. Katherine J. Klein1 and Joann Speer Sorra1 +Author Affiliations 1. 1University of Maryland at College Park

Abstract
Implementation is the process of gaining targeted organizational members' appropriate and committed use of an innovation. Our model suggests that implementation effectivenessthe consistency and quality of targeted organizational members' use of an innovationis a function of (a) the strength of an organization's climate for the implementation of that innovation and (b) the fit of that innovation to targeted users' values. The model specifies a range of implementation outcomes (including resistance, avoidance, compliance, and commitment); highlights the equifinality of an organization's climate for implementation; describes within- and between-organizational differences in innovation-values fit; and suggests new topics and strategies for implementation research. INNOVATION adoption

ORGANIZATIONAL change ORGANIZATIONAL behavior

ORGANIZATIONAL effectiveness EMPLOYEE motivation

EMPLOYEES -- Attitudes INDUSTRIAL management

TECHNOLOGICAL innovations DECISION making

BUSINESS models

Managing employee separations with the reward system


1. David B. Balkin1 +Author Affiliations 1. 1University of Colorado

Executive Overview
While executives in many companies find it necessary to reduce the size of their workforces, some are starting to rethink their approach. Instead of forcing certain employees deemed redundant to quit, more participative approaches are now being used to influence certain employees to leave the firm. The pivotal aspect of these voluntary workforce reductions is the reward system which can provide incentives for workers to quit. This article explains how employee separations can be managed through designing and administrating specific pay and benefit policies. It also shows that by using the reward system to make employee separations a participative decision, management can avoid the potential threat of unwanted litigation.

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