Over 50 Studies: Total Quality Management (TQM) In Theory And Practice In The United States Government

Over 6,000 total pages!

Total Quality Management (TQM) is a management approach that
strives to achieve continuous improvement of quality through
organization-wide efforts based on facts and data. TQM also
focuses business processes on meeting the needs of customers,
both internal and external. Although TQM traditionally has
been associated with private sector organizations and their
efforts to remain competitive and profitable, in recent years
federal organizations have been attempting to implement TQM to
cope with budget restrictions and better serve the public.

These papers discuss the essential role that quality and
process improvement initiatives such as Total Quality Management (TQM)
must play in any serious effort to improve the effectiveness and
performance of the federal government. A look across the federal
government over the last decade clearly shows that there has been
widespread interest and effort on the part of Congress, the leadership in
the executive branch, and within the agencies in making dramatic
improvements in public management. TQM, with its customer focus and
concern with product and service quality, is one improvement approach
that has been widely used in the public as well as in the private sector.
My major point today is that if federal agencies are to make the major
improvements in their mission-related results envisioned by the
Government Performance and Results Act (Results Act), they must have
management and process improvement initiatives—including those that
employ the principles of quality management—in place to achieve those
results. Fortunately, TQM and the Results Act share a common and
mutually reinforcing focus on achieving program results and customer
satisfaction, measuring performance, and using performance data to
identify and select improvement opportunities.

These papers elaborate on these points by covering
three topics - first, the complex and challenging environment
facing governments at all levels that is encouraging a re-commitment to
many of the values of TQM and related efforts--efficiency, service quality,
customer satisfaction, and results; second, selected
aspects of the federal government’s response to this environment; and third, several areas where a results orientation and quality management share common approaches to improving organizational performance and suggest areas needing additional attention for both approaches to be successful. These comments are based on our ongoing and past work looking at management improvement efforts across the federal government and at high-performing organizations.