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A comprehensive model for implementing total quality management in higher education

Ramona Kay Michael and Victor E. Sower
College of Business Administration, Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, Texas, USA, and

Jaideep Motwani
Department of Management, Grand Valley State University, Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA
Introduction Total quality management (TQM) has become a mainstay in the manufacturing industry. Many major companies have embraced the concepts of total quality and have made these concepts work for them. TQM can be defined as a general management philosophy and set of tools which allow an institution to pursue a definition of quality and a means for attaining quality, with quality being a continuous improvement ascertained by customers contentment with the services they have received (Blow, 1995; Brown and Koenig, 1993; Greenbaum, 1993; Harris and Baggett, 1992; Seymour, 1993a; Shaw, 1993). Education, however, has just started to see the importance of quality in its field and has begun to apply TQM in one or more forms. A recent survey (Rubach, 1994) showed that 415 educational institutions in the USA are implementing either quality improvement practices in their administration or quality-related courses in their curricula, or both. This total represents a 43.1 per cent increase from last year. TQM can indeed be applied to higher education but it must be modified to fully recognize some unique aspects of education: namely, that education is a service industry with no visible, tangible product, per se (as in manufacturing) and that it serves multiple customers. This paper reviews the available literature and proposes a general definition of customer specifically for higher education. A basic TQM model is developed for higher education to consider when trying to implement TQM at individual colleges and universities. This paper also recommends a list of things to do and problems to look for when implementing a TQM project. Review of the literature Quality is what the customer says it is, particularly in the case of higher education because the product generated by higher education is not a visible, tangible product that can be held, analysed and inspected for defects. If the

Benchmarking for Quality Management & Technology, Vol. 4 No. 2, 1997, pp. 104-120. MCB University Press, 1351-3036

customers are perfectly happy with the service provided to them by the institution, then quality is acceptable. This is the reason that the definition of an institutions customer is such an important and necessary task. You must know your customer to be able to determine the success or failure of your commitment to quality (Brown and Koenig, 1993; Marchese, 1993; Motwani, 1995). There are many advantages and disadvantages to pursuing a total quality programme in any business, whether it be a product-oriented business or a business providing services, as is the case in higher education. For many universities, a selling point for a quality programme is the leaner budgets and higher efficiency and productivity inherent in certain quality programmes (Cyert, 1993). As budgets continue to tighten from the federal government down to state and local levels, and as individual grants and gifts dwindle, higher education will have to be more vigilant and tenacious in its pursuit of providing quality education at a lower cost. In 1991, for the first time in over 30 years, state funding for higher education dropped. Three-quarters of the university and college presidents in the USA believe mounting operating costs and shrinking revenues are the largest problems they are having to contend with in the 1990s. Growing costs, decreasing enrolment totals, and economic-induced slashes in funding from the legislatures have produced a decade of scarcity (Coate, 1992) in which colleges and universities are having to trim their budgets and raise tuition to meet their financial needs. By the year 2000, tuition for four-year state colleges could be as high as $4,624 annually (compared to $2,334 for the academic year 1993-94). Survival is questionable: six colleges ceased to exist in 1991. This grisly situation has forced many colleges and universities to downsize in order to eliminate anything that is non-essential or too costly to justify. This downsizing has included cutting course offerings and even whole departments and has indeed touched universities that would not previously have envisaged such a fate: Harvard University eliminated more than 850 positions from its staff in 1991 (Coate, 1992; Ewell, 1993; Gales, 1994). These predicaments have forced many institutions of learning to begin to consider ways to make the change to a leaner and meaner organization as easy as possible. This is one of the many reasons that higher education has begun to turn to TQM programmes as a source of relief. If one follows a quality programme completely and intently, the business will inevitably run on a lower budget and make more efficient use of manpower due to the nature of the beast that is total quality. Other benefits of implementing TQM include heightened employee morale, better teamwork among departments, providing a bridge between faculty and staff/administration that may not have existed before, increased quality (as perceived by more content customers), and the continuous development of everyone who is a part of higher education (including students, faculty, staff and administration) to the advancement of the institution (Harris and Baggett, 1992; Lewis and Smith, 1994; Shaw 1993). In addition, problems that previously plagued the institution are permanently solved when they are addressed in a TQM programme. This helps to provide a much better working environment (Hubbard, 1994b).

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Many colleges or universities that have attempted to follow a strategy of total quality have found just the opposite, however. There is a substantial initial outlay of resources (including cash and employee time) and personnel required to implement any new programme, especially the total quality programme. The outlay involved when an institution decides to plunge the whole organization into the total quality plan at one time, requiring a complete and systematic change to the culture, can be overwhelming or unjustifiable to sceptics and legislative bodies. This is the reason that many institutions choose to take the slow-implementation route. This entails starting a few departments at a time on the total quality plan and adding to them until the whole institution is involved in the total quality plan over a period of time. This plan enables the institution to garner some success, invest a little at a time in the plan, and wean the other areas of the institution from the old ways of doing things slowly but surely (Assar, 1993; Hubbard, 1994a; Shaw, 1993). Faculty also may feel that total quality means an increase in committee work, which is true in that more time must be invested, for which there is no direct professional benefit for the faculty members individually (Brown and Koenig, 1993). Another drawback to total quality could be the inability to define outcomes and standards in an educational setting, thus making total quality unmeasurable and groundless (Seymour, 1993a; Spanbauer, 1987). On top of all of this, most people who become involved with TQM expect to see results immediately, and this is usually not the case. It takes time to plan, organize and implement a total quality plan (Babson College, 1994). Some additional negatives to considering the implementation of TQM might be that defining the students as customers, and thus allowing them to have what they want, may not necessarily lead to high-quality education because there is a huge difference between providing what students want and education based on informed judgments about individual student needs (Chickering and Potter, 1993). Acknowledging these wants and needs entails defining complicated differences between short-term satisfaction and long-term gains in education. Along these lines, faculty tend to believe that they know what is best for the students, because they do not yet realize what they should be learning or need to be learning, so the students should rely directly on the faculty to determine the things that they need to learn. This could be a hindrance because pleasing the customer is the foremost task in implementing and maintaining total quality. Matthews (1993a) believes there are many downsides to TQM in higher education. Namely, that a climate of mutual dependency is encouraged because management motivates employees to form quality circles and to regard one another as clients to be served and satisfied with the student being the most important link in this client chain. She also feels that TQM is founded on an aggressive business culture that believes success is defined almost exclusively in terms of profit. Many believe that the increased competition among universities will lead to a higher standard of educational excellence. However, Matthews (1993b) believes this will not be the case since funding partially depends on enrolment totals and because of this, students could be placed in

unsuitable courses just to fill the empty seats to keep faculty jobs safe. She finds TQM to be the equivalent of wishing turkeys a Merry Christmas. Fisher (1993) also has some concerns about implementing TQM in higher education. He believes that holding workers responsible for their work is important, as opposed to the general idea of TQM, where problems are held to be in the processes, not people. Fisher states that this new approach represents a quick fix, and it may only be the most recent attractive way to forestall the conflict that inevitably comes from difficult decision making, individual accountability, and change (p. 16). He also discusses how, in several TQM organizations, executives now complain of excessive paper work, timeconsuming meetings, and a lack of accountability. Workers complain that the TQM emphasis on charts, graphs, and reports takes too much time away from production and service (p. 19). These pitfalls should be addressed and answered before attempting a total quality plan so as to avoid them in the implementation phase of the plan. Defining the higher education customer The question of customer for higher education poses a very sticky problem. No college or university seems willing or able to settle on a specific definition of customer. There appears to be something inherently ominous about defining a higher education customer as the student. This poses all kinds of dilemmas for administrators. Faculty balk at the idea of having a student as the customer, as in the customer is always right. This tends to enrage faculty to boiling point because they believe that giving the students what they want will not necessarily lead to higher quality education. This belief is based on the assumption that a happy student is one who merely passes classes and graduates, so students are only concerned with short-term satisfaction (making the grade), as opposed to actually learning and growing (long-term gain). Faculty and administrators tend to hold the belief that they know what the students need, whereas the students may not necessarily be privy to this information at the early stages of their educational development. Consequently, most colleges and universities choose a less defined, softer definition of customer so as not to offend (Anonymous, 1994; Blow, 1995; Chickering and Potter, 1993; Ewell, 1993; Harris and Baggett, 1992). Examples of this fear of using the student alone as the customer are reflected in the definitions used by the leaders of the TQM movement in higher education. Samford University defines its customer as the student customer but states that many contemporary academics feel the term customer is too crass a commercial term, denoting a cash exchange (Harris and Baggett, 1992, p. 2). Harvard University states that the customer is defined as anyone to whom we provide information or service (Hubbard, 1994b, p. 21). Oregon State University, perhaps the most highly touted TQM follower in higher education, considers its customer in this light: Our students are our purpose for existence (Coate, 1992, p. 11). It goes on to divide its customer base into external and internal groups (Coate, 1990a) to encompass every possible consumer. Northwest Missouri State bases its customer focus on the following precept: in the classroom, the students

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along with the instructor are suppliers who produce a product (knowledge) that future customers (employers or graduate schools) will evaluate (Hubbard, 1994a, p. 95). Syracuse University does call the student its customer; however, some balked at the term customer. Their fear was that by serving students, we might risk relinquishing control of the academic experience (Shaw, 1993, p. 26). Fox Valley Technical College believes the customer to be students who use our services and employers who are ultimate consumers of our graduates (Spanbauer, 1987, p. 179). Based on these definitions of customer, as well as the many others found in the literature (see Table I), one can see the myriad problems with defining the student as the customer. None of the universities or colleges cited, however, can exclude the student from the final definition of customer. No matter what term one chooses to use, the student is the foremost component of the clientele served by higher education. Still, there are additional entities that must receive recognition and respect in the provider/consumer chain. In summary, it appears that all of the above-mentioned colleges and universities believe that their customer consists of either the student or employer or both. There are two universities that chose to broaden their
Employer/ Graduate school x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x

Student Babson College (Babson College, p. 21) Colorado Tech, (Stein, 1994, Section 3.2) DCCC (Entner, p. 31-2) Fisher (1993, p. 18) Fox Valley Technical College (Spanbauer, 1987, p. 179) Georgia Institute of Technology (Seymour, 1993b, p. 19) Harvard University (1994, p. 21) Hittman (1993, p. 78) Kansas Newman College, (Froiland, 1993, p. 56) LeHigh University (Likins, 1993, p. 23) Marchese (1993, p. 11) MCCCD (Assar, 1993, p. 33) North West Missouri State (Hubbard, 1994a, p. 52; 1994b, p. 95) Northern Arizona University (McNeil, 1993, p. 92) Oregon State University (Coate, 1990b, p. 11) Penn State University (Seymour, 1993b, p. 22) Samford University (Harris and Baggett, 1992, pp. 1-6) The Simon School (Froiland, 1993, p. 56) St John Fisher College (Pickett, 1993, p. 6) Syracuse University (Shaw, 1993, p. 26) University of Maryland (Seymour, 1993b, p. 26) University of Tennessee (Mahoney et al.,1993, p. 40) Western Michigan University (Haas, 1993, p. 2) Table I. The customer defined Note: anot in class/just on campus x x x x x x x x x x x x xa x x x x x x x

Others x x x x x x x x x

definition to include everyone everywhere. After sifting through the numerous versions of definitions, the basic definition of the customer of higher education proposed by this paper is as follows: the customer of higher education is the student as a consumer of knowledge and services, the future employer or graduate school as a consumer of the student product, and society as a whole as taxpayers and beneficiaries of the educational operations of the institution. TQM implementation at universities: success stories Throughout all of the literature reviewed for this study, the success or failure of an institution of higher education to implement total quality plans was based for the most part on numerical data showing the increases in enrolment, decreases in administrative costs, the amount of money shifted from administration to curriculum, and so forth. These statistics all add up to what the individual institution believes is customer satisfaction. For example, Oregon State Universitys Coate states:
But so far, we consider TQM a real success at OSU. We now have 15 teams operating and the results have been spectacular. Time has been saved, costs have been reduced, people have been empowered at all levels, and morale has skyrocketed (Coate, 1990a, p. 21).

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Oregon State University is regarded as one of the fledgling leaders of the TQM in higher education movement. OSU has gone so far as to develop success criteria (Coate, 1990b, p. 17) as part of its ongoing TQM programme. The criteria are as follows; (the numbers in brackets represent relative importance of criteria as evaluated by TQM team leaders and facilitators): changes recommended by teams are implemented (16); satisfied customers (15); improved work quality (shorter time) (14); provide better service through elimination of wasted effort (14); greater process knowledge (13); improved employee morale (12); improved communications (11); overt, visible actions by top-level management in support (11); people have positive attitude towards TQM (10); more effective utilization of resources (9); customers notice the changes (9); improved processes (8); management encourages employees to ask how and why (7); greater communication with customers (7); improved teamwork (6); broader participation in processes (5); university/employee orientation (information about function who does what?) (5); funding commitments (4); freedom to get on with work (fewer meetings) (4); handle problems better (3); clearer understanding of how TQM process will work beyond the pilot project (3); natural for people to be sensitive to customers (3); ownership by the workers (3); and improved image (2). Another leader in the TQM in higher education movement, Northwest Missouri State University, has had its success at implementing TQM defined as:
enrolment is now at capacity; the budget is balanced; faculty salaries are higher than average; and about 10 per cent of the budget has been shifted from administration to instruction (Anonymous, 1994, p. 52).

As previously stated, OSU and Northwest Missouri are two universities who believe they have successfully implemented TQM programmes at their respective institutions (noting, of course, that TQM is a continual process of

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never ending improvement and growth). Syracuse University, a relative newcomer to TQM, has begun to implement total quality in its processes and reports success based on the following:
the teams ... have sustained a high level of enthusiasm ... the number of calls to the bursars office has dropped dramatically, and so has the incidence of standing in line to register ... the financial aid area ... busy signals ... dropped to 64 [from 14,000 in a one-week period] and have developed a new focus on customers needs and requests (Shaw, 1993).

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Harvard (Hubbard, 1994b) has also joined the TQM bandwagon and touts its success. The programme, which began with its Office for Information Technology, has resulted in a $70,000 per year savings on software licences from the elimination of unused or unnecessary software packages, a $120,000 credit from New England Telephone from reconciling reporting processes, a 40 per cent reduction in paper used for billing, new billing formats, a reduction in Harvard Universitys copy centre data entry training time from two days to oneand-a-half hours, and the creation of a telephone service, among other things. Other success stories of TQM implementation programmes at universities include: Boston, Columbia, LeHigh, Northern Arizona, and Tennessee (Entin, 1993; Kolesar, 1994; Likins, 1993; McNeil, 1993; Mahoney et al., 1993; Pickett, 1993). So, success is not a narrowly definable measure, but an amalgamation of many different small goals reached with the implementation of total quality tools, and attributable to TQM as a whole. The success or failure of TQM hinges on the goals set by the TQM teams and the degree to which they are attained. Development of basic TQM model for higher education There are currently over 200 universities and colleges around the country engaged in a TQM plan (Lewis and Smith, 1994). Thus, it is important to review some of the top programmes and try to extract the major steps in each that could lead to a successful quality programme for any institution in higher education. GOAL/QPC, a non-profit Massachusetts-based TQM research company, states that there are six basic implementation models currently being used (Coate, 1990a, p. 7): (1) The TQM element approach. This approach, used in the early 1980s, employs elements of quality improvement programmes such as quality circles, statistical process control, quality functional deployment, etc., rather than full implementation of TQM. (2) The guru approach. This approach uses writings of a guru such as Deming, Juran, or Crosby, as a benchmark to determine what the organization lacks, then uses the gurus systems to make changes. Use of Demings 14-point model is an example. (3) The Japanese model approach. Organizations using this method focused on study of the Japanese Deming prize winners as a way to develop an implementation master plan. This approach was used by Florida Power and Light.

(4) The industrial company model approach. In this approach, people visit a US industrial company using TQM, identify its successes, and integrate this information with their own approach. This method was used in the late 1980s by many of the Baldrige National Quality Award winners. (5) The Hoshin planning approach. This approach, developed by a Japanese firm, Bridgestone, was used successfully by Hewlett-Packard. It focuses on successful planning, deployment, execution and monthly diagnosis. (6) The Baldrige Award criteria approach. In this model, an organization uses criteria for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award to identify areas of improvement. The criteria cover seven key components of TQM. In 1990s this approach is being used by hundreds of industrial companies. Other specific TQM models include those that have been implemented by various educational institutions. The TQM implementation model established by the Office of Quality Improvement at The University of Wisconsin-Madison is comprised of the following steps: (1) Identify their natural leadership team members, who then begin to learn about the concepts and methods and decides whether or not to implement. If they decide to move ahead, they develop the following, involving all staff at various steps. (2) Identify their mission or purpose of the unit, in support of the campus mission. (3) Identify their customers for whom do we do what we do? and their needs. (4) Develop a vision where do we want to head? (5) Identify critical processes what are the things we do that are critical to carrying out our mission? (6) Develop a plan for improvement, aimed at the vision, focused on critical customer needs and processes. (7) Pilot one or two improvement projects aimed at critical needs. (8) Provide training in the concepts and methods to all staff in a continuously learning process. (9) Develop a plan for continuous improvement and learning about customer needs (University of Wisconsin, 1994, p. 3). Babson College has defined a quality improvement process that consists of nine key steps: (1) Identify output. (2) Identify customers. (3) Identify customer requirements. (4) Translate requirements into supplier specifications.

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(5) Identify steps in work process. (6) Establish measurements. (7) Assess process capability. (Can it produce output? If yes, then exit to the work process and produce the output. If no, then proceed to the problemsolving process (PSP).) (8) Evaluate results. (Is there a problem? If yes, then proceed to the PSP. If no, then proceed to next step.) (9) Schedule periodic reviews (Babson College, 1994, p. 15). Fox Valley Technical College employed the Crosby 14 Steps to Quality Improvement Plan at their institution (Spanbauer, 1987): (1) Make it clear that management is committed to quality. (2) Form quality improvement teams with representatives from each department. (3) Establish measurement criteria for quality in the organization. (4) Evaluate the cost of quality and explain its use as a management tool. (5) Raise the quality awareness and personal concern of all employees. (6) Take actions to correct problems identified through previous steps. (7) Establish a committee for the zero defects programme. (8) Train employees actively to carry out their part of the quality improvement programme. (9) Hold a zero defects day to let all employees realize that there has been a change. (10) Establish and meet goals and tasks as a team. (11) Institute error-cause removal procedures. (12) Recognize and appreciate those who participate. (13) Establish quality councils to communicate on a regular basis. (14) Do it all over again to emphasize that the quality improvement programme never ends. Matthews (1993b) has developed his own version of a TQM model for higher education. His model consists of the following seven steps: (1) Identify the institutions primary stakeholders. (2) Develop a specific competitive quality based mission. (3) Establish internal measures for quality and excellence in specific and identified areas. (4) Determine who has to commit to the chosen standards. (5) Establish motivation for those unwilling to commit to quality and excellence.

(6) Form quality progress teams. (7) Report, recognize and reward success. Harvard University (Hubbard, 1994b) has been able to pare its quality process to six steps: (1) Management behaviours/actions includes components such as performance management, planning, financial management, staff meetings and so forth. (2) Education and training composed of LUTE (learn, use, teach, evaluate), competitive benchmarking, and keeping employees evergreen. (3) Communications covers listening for understanding, flow of information, consensus building, and consistency, among other areas. (4) Tools and measures consists of planning processes, reporting/reviews, and so on. (5) Transition teams deals with time and resource commitment, long-term plan commitment and other such items. (6) Recognition and reward focuses on matters such as meetings/letters, gifts/parties/trips, salary reviews, and thank you notes. Cornesky (1990) tailored Demings 14 points to higher education for use in quality improvement: (1) Constancy of purpose have a firmly established fundamental view of the institutions mission and adopt a long-range plan through research and innovation. (2) Adopt the new philosophy a graduate of a professional discipline must have, in addition to liberal education competences, skills necessary for employment. (3) Cease dependence on inspection drop SAT/ACT scores and use high school grades, references, essays, and personal interviews. Improve selecting, advising, counselling, mentoring and assessing students. (4) Long-term relationships each institution should work with its suppliers (K-12) so they will better provide materials (students) suitable for a desirable product (graduate). (5) Improve constantly regular five-year programme reviews and constant use of a department curriculum committee and an external advisory group will help. (6) Institute OJT (on-the-job training) seminars so that staff, faculty, and administration understand each others roles, their own roles and job duties, and the technology. (7) Adopt and institute leadership administration, faculty, and staff who are in tune with the institutions culture should be pinpointed and form a group to serve as problem solvers and to suggest new approaches.

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(8) Drive out fear establish an open communication system to disseminate information to all faculty and staff as it becomes available to management. Recommend using fishbone charts at various campus locations to elicit candid responses to problems. (9) Break down barriers between departments fundraising, pooling resources, flow of information (to include everyone), service between units. (10) Eliminate slogans the immediate or short-term effect of slogans, etc., may be improved quality and productivity, but without leadership and interaction, the improvements will cease and regress. (11) Eliminate quotas, MBO the cost per student hour may be important in setting up the initial resource allocation procedure, but the quality of the graduate is most important in maintaining the programme. (12) Abolish annual ratings PWPA (professional work plan agreement) with each faculty member, with results linked to a professional and personal development process not to dismissal/fear objectives, are targets for improvement by which we can measure progress. Management by policy deployment. (13) Education and self-improvement should establish professional and personal development committees for faculty and staff to identify the continuing education needs of the constituency. (14) Involve everyone in the transformation everyone must be involved identifying a problem and finding a solution become activities that merit praise (group celebration!). Finally, Oregon State University has developed its own model, which consists of nine steps. The model is a combination of the Hoshin planning model and the Baldrige award criteria as depicted in Figure 1. Based on these criteria, the basic TQM model proposed by this paper consists of eight basic steps (see Figure 2): (1) Define the customer the most time consuming and thought provoking of the eight steps in the model. The customer is the first priority in any business in any industry, so this step is of utmost importance. The institution must define specifically each branch of its customer base. There are internal and external customers in every institution and they must be defined in order to ensure that the mission/vision statement in step (2) can be accurately described to satisfy those customers. (2) Define mission/vision statement consists of forming a statement of what the overall mission of the institution is, in relation to its customer base. A mission statement should include who the institution serves and the purpose of its being. The vision statement details what the college or university expects to accomplish in the future, as well as its goals and strategies. (3) Drive out fear based on step 8 of Demings 14 points (Cornesky, 1990; Deming, 1993). This step involves empowering employees to feel they

have the authority and capability of changing what needs to be changed and of being listened to when they have suggestions to improve quality. Communication is important and management must lead the way. Top management must sell the programme to the employees via their actions and words in support of the TQM programme. Rules and regulations that may stifle employee creativity must be eliminated and adequate time, resources, and training must be provided for the employees to be confident and excited about the TQM programme. (4) Develop pilot teams focuses on finding the programme in which to implement TQM and selecting the team members to implement the programme. The pilot team must include a representative for everyone

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Presidents cabinet... 1 Explores TQM 4 Cabinet develops vision, breakthrough planning and 5-year plan Cabinet decides to implement TQM 5 Divisions and colleges do breakthrough planning and 5-year plan 6 Daily management teams and systems are established to improve processes and to hold gains 9 Cross-functional management teams operate and systems are established to hold gains

3 Defines customer needs through QFD

2 Initiates a functional pilot team

8 Rewards and recognition system developed

7 Cross-functional pilot teams initiated

Review progress

Revise 5-year plan

Figure 1. The OSU total quality management implementation model

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Define the customer

Define mission/vision statement with the customer in mind

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Drive out fear Empower employees

Develop pilot teams

Training

Develop measurement criteria

Recognize/reward successes

Figure 2. Proposed TQM model

Improve constantly Review progress

from the management down to the employees and the pilot team should be focused on an area in the administrative side of the institution first. (5) Training this is self-explanatory. Without adequate training, employees will not be motivated or empowered to pursue TQM fullforce, and the programme will flounder. The pilot team must be fully enlightened as to the elements of TQM, its implementation, and the goals it is intended to achieve. Benchmarking and research on TQM philosophies are important tools in understanding the different facets of TQM. Teamwork skills should also be learned and understood before proceeding forward with implementation. (6) Develop measurement criteria this is important. In order to prove success, an institution must have defined objectives and measurements for proving the attainment of those objectives. These measurements could include, for example, a statistical measure of the decrease in turnaround time for callbacks to financial aid students. It could also

include the reduction in dollar amounts of spending on administrative jobs due to the downsizing after TQM implementation. (7) Recognize/reward success this is necessary in order to maintain employee morale and to bolster other departments interest in pursuing TQM. It is important to acknowledge the achievements and contributions made by employees on a constant basis. These acknowledgments could be a mention in the TQM newsletter or a block party for the pilot team. Thank you notes are a great way to let employees know they are appreciated. (8) Improve constantly this is another take-off of Demings programme (Cornesky, 1990; Deming, 1993). TQM is a continuous, unending process of improvement. The TQM programme should be reviewed and evaluated on a regular basis to ensure goals are still focused and objectives are being met. Recommendations When implementing a TQM plan, there are many things that one can do in order to improve the chances of success. Conversely, there are also a number of things to avoid so that the plan will not end in failure. After reviewing many articles and reports (Babson College, 1994; Brigham, 1993; Coate, 1990b, 1992; Fam and Camp, 1995; Godbey, 1993; Haas, 1993; Hittman, 1993; Motwani, 1995; Seymour, 1993b; Shaw, 1993; Sherr and Teeter, 1991) and studying TQM philosophies, this paper proposes the following list of things to do and problems to look for when implementing a TQM project. Do: (1) Survey customers regularly. Customers are the focal point of any service. (2) Look at the customer carefully. Define all customer groups thoroughly but prioritize their needs and focus on the main customer to be served. (3) Allocate sufficient time and resources. (4) Teach by example and direct involvement. Top leadership is the key to any TQM programme and the driving force behind success or failure. In most cases, the president of the institution must be the initiator and the programme leader in all aspects. (5) Sell the TQM programme. Do not force the programme on employees. Leadership must make the programme attractive and necessary to employees; they have to accept it and be willing to follow it wholeheartedly or the programme will fail. Empower the employees and make participation a voluntary thing. (6) Simplify everything; eliminate rules and regulations that may stifle/flatten the hierarchy and reduce costs wherever possible. (7) Start with administration. Most of the major leaders in the higher education TQM movement, with the exception of Northwest Missouri State University, began with a unit of their administrative area.

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Academia is much more difficult to penetrate and motivate. They will follow more easily once success is garnered in administration. (8) Do things right the first time. Plan carefully and fully but do not study TQM to death. (9) Use examples; benchmarking and research on TQM philosophies and programmes can only enhance the chances for success. (10) Tailor the TQM programme to suit the individual institution. No model is perfect for every university. The basic model previously proposed, however, is a good starting point. (11) Use the power of communication. Newsletters and reports are a good way to disseminate information to the community to keep them informed and to get them involved in the institutions successes. (12) Provide lots of training for management and staff. Ensure that they have the necessary skills in teamworking and thoroughly understand the tenets of a TQM programme. Problems to look for: (1) Impatience and disappointment: it takes at least five years to implement a TQM programme but most people want a quick fix. (2) Top leaders who do not walk the walk and talk the talk. (3) Unwillingness of top leaders to relinquish authority in order to empower employees. (4) Failure to adapt business principles correctly to an academic setting. Faculty can be unaccepting and sceptical of redefining the way higher education operates. (5) Organization structure can make it hard to focus on a shared mission or common goal. This can include environments where it is administration vs. academics, where there is intense divisionalization, and where there is fragmented leadership. (6) Cultural differences: some colleges and universities feel they are unique and exempt from assessment and evaluation of other social institutions (because they seek knowledge unendingly, they practice quality inherently). (7) Inadequate resources: an assessment of the resources necessary needs to be conducted in order to allow for enough capital and time to be available for the TQM plan. (8) Lack of sufficient training and knowledge. (9) No change in management behaviour. TQM can be the saving grace for institutions which find themselves in need of streamlining. With the increased pressure from the cuts in state funding and dwindling public support, the need for downsizing in higher education will become increasingly more necessary. TQM, however, works well when an

institution merely wishes to increase its efficiency and its commitment to its customers. TQM must be a total commitment from the top down and must encompass the entire organization for it to have staying power and to produce the successes defined by the institution. TQM is a philosophy as well as a set of tools. The definition of customer and the TQM model proposed in this paper should serve as a basic foundation for colleges and universities to follow when implementing TQM at their respective institutions. As stated earlier, the model should be tailored to suit the individual entity, its different colleges, departments, and cultures.
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