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AJINKYA KORE
BUS 503D Foundations of Management
California Baptist University

Running Header: Impact of organization culture on TQM

Literature Review
Step #1
As an introduction to the study of the impact of organization culture on TQM, it is very
important to present the brief literature on each of these concepts to know main aspects in the
research that specifically examines this impact. Total quality management (TQM) is described as
a management tool which provides companies a competitive advantage and allows them to
generate higher profits. Organizational culture is one of the most important variables in the
success or failure of TQM implementation. Depending on several studies it is said that
organization culture and structural factors play very important role in the success of the TQM.
Organizational culture
Organizational culture is one of the key elements for implementing TQM practices.
Catanzaro, Moore, and Marshall (2010) described that the phenomenon culture exist at
different levels that comprises of both the national culture and organization culture. According to
Cameron & Quinn, (1999) organization culture is the set of norms, beliefs and values shared by
members of the organization. But, the concept of organization culture is very broad and vast and
it can be found at alternate levels such as values, rules and practices. Moreover, members of an
organization are affected by organization culture through influence of behavior and performance
outcomes and the external government of an organization. According to Martin (1985, p. 148):
Organizational culture is a set of commonly held attitudes, values, and beliefs that guide the
behavior of an organizations members. Multiple researchers including Frohman (1998),
O'Relly, Chatman, & Caldwell (1991), Schein (1996) have described that there are many types of
organization culture since this concept first appeared in the literature. To classify types of
cultures and their impact on TQM, it is very beneficial to use the competing values model of

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Cameron and Quinn (1999). This model defines a widely accepted typology of organizational
cultures that has been used in many empirical studies. Two dimensions of the 39 performance
indicators developed by Campbell (1977) are used to extract the definition of culture in this
model. The first dimension relates to the orientation of the company to stability versus flexibility,
according to the importance given to control and order (stability) or innovation and dynamism to
adapt to environmental changes (flexibility). The second dimension refers to the orientation of
the company, which may be external, when it is primarily concerned about customers,
competitors and the environment, or internal, when the focus is on the people, products and
processes of the organization. These two competing values in combination proposes four types of
organization culture namely group/clan, adhocracy, hierarchical and market/rational that impact
the TQM. Clan culture is based on flexibility and internal focus. In it, the organization acts like a
family, promoting teamwork, commitment and involvement. Adhocratic culture fosters
flexibility, but its orientation is external. Its objectives include creativity, risk taking,
individuality and initiative. The corporations dominated by the adhocracy culture type are
characterized by a vibrant, innovative and flexible tendency. The hierarchical culture is based on
stability and control along with an internal focus and such organizations fail to encourage
innovation and creativity among their employees (Zammuto, Gifford, & Goodman, 2000).
Market culture looks for an external perspective through which to differentiate it from
competitors, intended to produce a market leader, but uses stability and control to achieve its
goals of internal and external competitiveness and productivity. The organizations dominated by
the market culture, have a result-driven ethos. Consequently, the members of this kind of
organization are less likely to implement TQM.

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Step #2
Total quality management
TQM has been considered as an important mechanism for promoting the smooth running
of companies and attaining a competitive advantage. Hackman and Wageman (1995), suggested
that the philosophy was based on assumptions made about four organizational components:
quality, people, organizations as systems and senior management. These five were the
explicit identification and measurement of customer requirements, the creation of supplier
partnerships, the use of cross-functional teams to identify and solve quality problems, the use of
scientific methods to monitor performance and to identify areas for performance improvement
and the use of process management heuristics to enhance team effectiveness. Multiple
researchers including Flynn, Schroeder, and Sakakibara (1994), have described TQM as s an
integrated effort to achieve and maintain high-quality products based on the maintenance of
continuous process improvement and error prevention at all levels and in all functions of the
organization with the aim of reaching and even exceeding customer expectations.
TQM is considered as means to achieve a business performance, competitive advantage
and continuous success in international marketing competition (Lam et al., 2011). However,
many research studies have indicated a high rate of problems and failures in the process of
implementing TQM (Abdolshah & Abdolshah, 2011). Several researchers including Zu, Robbins,
& Fredendall (2010), Green (2012) have described that there is an increasing recognition of the
influence of organizational culture (OC) on the success or failure of TQM implementations.
TQM is a philosophy, management approach and culture of managing the organization, which
emphasizes mutual co-operation, involving everybody in the organization at each level and
improvement in all aspects of the organization. TQM aims at achieving customer satisfaction by

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not only producing products and services that fulfil customer needs and requirements, but also
exceeding them through continuous improvements.
Step #3
Although the importance of organizational culture for TQM has been widely suggested in
the literature, this relationship raises some questions. First, Cameron and Quinn (1999) point out
that those competing values that could help the organization to implement a TQM system could
be present in each culture: empowerment, teamwork, employee involvement, HR development,
open communication (clan culture); creating new standards, developing products, continuous
improvement, customer orientation, finding creative solutions (adhocracy culture); error
detection, control processes, systematically solving problems, apply quality tools, measurement
(hierarchical culture); measuring consumer preferences, productivity gains, involving customers
and suppliers, increasing competitiveness, creating collaborators (market culture). This implies
the need for all types of culture.
Irani, Beskese, and Love (2002), Anderson et al. (1994) and Detert et al. (2000) believe
that organizations with clan or group culture are the most favorable to implementing a TQM
program successfully. Many authors have found that group culture has a positive influence on
TQM implementation (Dellana & Hauser, 1999; Naor et al., 2008; Zu et al., 2010). Corporations
dominated by the hierarchy culture fail to encourage innovation and creativity among their
employees (Zammuto, Gifford, & Goodman, 2000). Thus, members working in such
organizations, are expected to be less likely to apply TQM.
It is argued by Cameron and Quinn (1999) that corporations dominated by the adhocracy
culture type are characterized by a vibrant, innovative and flexible tendency. According to the
findings of many research studies of multiple researcher including Dellana & Hauser (1999),

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Naor et al. (2008), Gimenez Espinet al. (2012) suggest that adhocracy culture has positive
influence on TQM implementation. Zammuto et al (2000) stated that the members of the
organizations dominated by market culture are less likely to implement TQM. The findings of
many research studies suggest that market culture has a negative influence on TQM
implementation (Dellana & Hauser, 1999; Gimenez-Espin et al., 2012).
Step #4
From the research of multiple researchers including Dellana & Hauser (1999), GimenezEspin et al. (2012), Zammuto et al (2000), Cameron and Quinn (1999), Irani, Beskese, and Love
(2002) hypothesis can be formulated that each type of organization culture has different effect on
total quality management and its implementation. Which type of organization culture impact the
total quality management in positive way and/or negative way? How is total quality management
affected with change in type or style of organization culture? How does the type of organization
culture impact the implementation of TQM in any organization?
With that literature, the research question is as follows, How does types of organization
culture impact the total quality management?

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