Quality Readiness in Organizations: Literature Review and Proposal of a New Quality Readiness Index

Posted: 14 Aug 2012

See all articles by Maria Bakatsaki

Maria Bakatsaki

Technical University of Crete (TUC)

Leonidas Zampetakis

Technical University of Crete (TUC) - Department of Production Engineering and Management

Vassilis Moustakis

Technical University of Crete (TUC) - Department of Production Engineering and Management

Date Written: July 26, 2012

Abstract

Implementation of TQM tools to organizations (either private or public) is, more often than not, accompanied by initial success. However, as studies from different worldwide settings indicate, initial success does not last in the long-term. Companies or organizations fail to sustain success. Reasons of failure should not be attributed to tools and techniques, but rather can be seen as a problem of change and culture management. The environment of a TQM-oriented organization is dynamic and the need for change is inevitable. The greatest obstacle is the transformation of organizational culture to quality culture. Employees must be successfully led to embrace and to adopt change. Without effective leadership employees will tend to resist rather than to adopt change. Effective management of readiness to change represents a necessary condition to effective adoption of change. The behavioural model, which assesses the organizational change, is called readiness for change. This paper makes a literature review on the concepts of readiness for change and quality culture and proposes a new Quality Readiness Index. The proposed model differentiates from the 3 stages Lewin’s concept of unfreezing/ moving to change situation/freezing, where it is assumed that i) the changes happen to a stable, slowly moved environments and ii) organizational readiness is a matter of employees’ beliefs, attitudes and intentions. In a continuous improved organization, quality readiness is not only a personal characteristic or an evaluation of a person’s trait, values, age and so on, but is also the extent to which a person demonstrates the ability and willingness to accomplish a specific task. On the basis of this review and the proposed model, the authors conclude by drafting directions for further research and delineate the salient managerial implications of the research.

Keywords: quality readiness, quality culture, change management, readiness for change

JEL Classification: M12, M14, D03, D23, D73, H83

Suggested Citation

Bakatsaki, Maria and Zampetakis, Leonidas and Moustakis, Vassilis, Quality Readiness in Organizations: Literature Review and Proposal of a New Quality Readiness Index (July 26, 2012). European Business Research Conference Proceedings 2012, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2129067

Maria Bakatsaki (Contact Author)

Technical University of Crete (TUC) ( email )

University Campus
Kounoupidiana
Chania, 73100
Greece

HOME PAGE: http://www.pem.tuc.gr

Leonidas Zampetakis

Technical University of Crete (TUC) - Department of Production Engineering and Management ( email )

University Campus
Chania
Crete, 73100
Greece

HOME PAGE: http://dpem.tuc.gr

Vassilis Moustakis

Technical University of Crete (TUC) - Department of Production Engineering and Management ( email )

University Campus
Chania
Crete, 73100
Greece

HOME PAGE: http://dpem.tuc.gr

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