Creating the right environment for improvement : How to close the gap between what you have and what you need

Purpose – Explains the importance of organizational environment and reveals how to align it with organizational success. Design/methodology/approach – Defines organizational environment, explains how it can fail to match the environment the organization actually needs, provides examples of what happens when the two are not synchronized, and shows how to align them. Findings – Highlights the importance of: linking actions and improvements to what really matters; making quality improvement everyone's responsibility; being responsive and flexible; communicating well, and adapting to changing circumstances. Practical implications – Argues that creating the right organizational environment can be a long process. Social implications – Reveals a way in which most organizations can be made to perform better. Originality/value – Contains interesting examples of what happens when the organizational environment is not aligned with organizational success.