Factors Influencing Implementation of Total Quality Management in Leather Articles Industries

Abstract

Most manufacturing companies are now adopting Total Quality Management and other new philosophies to become more effective in their way of conducting business. However, studies in the leather manufacturing sector in Tanzania have not focused on knowledge of TQM on boosting their performance hence existence of a knowledge gap. The intention of this paper was to assess factors influencing implementation of TQM in leather manufacturing industries. Specifically, the study intended to examine the influence of top management commitment towards the implementation of TQM, to determine whether employees training affects the implementation of TQM, to assess the influence of effective communication on implementation of TQM and to assess employees’ perceptions on outcomes of existing TQM practice in leather articles industry in terms of products quality based on standards and employee’s satisfaction. A descriptive research design was adopted whereby purposive and stratified random sampling techniques were used to select a sample of 135 respondents out of 212 target population. Questionnaires were used to collect data. Data was further analysed through descriptive analysis and ordinal regression analysis. The findings revealed that top management commitment and effective communication were positive with a few variables indicating implementation of TQM. Therefore, clear communication of the mission, vision and quality policy by the top managers was found to have influence on TQM implementation, and application of effective positive feedback mechanism in effective communication was found to have positive effect in implementation of TQM. The study concludes that top management commitment to quality and effective communication in leather articles' manufacturing industries influences TQM implementation by increase in product quality and employees' satisfaction. The study further concludes that sociodemographic factors such as age, education level, working period and departmental involvement to TQM have an influence in boosting up the implementation of TQM. Thus, the study recommends manufacturing firms to be self-motivated in adopting TQM in their areas of expertise focusing on top management commitment to quality management effective communication so as to improve products' quality and employees' satisfaction which turns to customer satisfaction and conformities to regulatory requirements.