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Evaluating the Deming Management Model of Total Quality in Services *
Author(s) -
Douglas Thomas J.,
Fredendall Lawrence D.
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
decision sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.238
H-Index - 108
eISSN - 1540-5915
pISSN - 0011-7315
DOI - 10.1111/j.0011-7315.2004.02569.x
Subject(s) - total quality management , customer satisfaction , quality management , quality (philosophy) , service quality , quality management system , computer science , marketing , process management , service (business) , operations management , business , knowledge management , engineering , philosophy , epistemology
ABSTRACT This article uses the Deming management model developed by Anderson et al. (1994b) as an initial template to analyze total quality in services. While the literatures addressing quality management have developed separately for products and services, the founders of total quality portrayed this management philosophy as universally oriented. Our study first replicates two earlier studies that tested the Deming management model in manufacturing industries. Using hospitals as our unit of analysis, we realized findings similar to the earlier manufacturing studies. Next, we used contributions from the MBNQA literature to test an enhanced model. Our subsequent findings support the MBNQA concept that “leadership drives the system that creates results” and provides evidence of the ubiquitous importance of leadership for ensuring the success of a quality improvement program. Finally, an anomaly of this study and those published earlier is the inability to find support for the relationship between continuous improvement and customer satisfaction. Integrating the substantial work in the service quality literature focused on customer satisfaction measurement is recommended to future researchers to help resolve this issue and further enhance the model.