Investigating organizational quality management maturity: an instrument validation study

Reports an initial study to validate a brief instrument which could be useful as a tool to permit researchers to gain insight into a construct termed QM maturity – the quality of an organization’s adoption of (QM) programs. Notes that investigators have frequently confounded the length of time an organization reports that it has “been on” QM with the quality of its QM adoption. Yet it is entirely possible that an organization that reports that it has had quality programs in place for a considerable period of time may have adopted those programs poorly and superficially. The researchers were aware that a significant research stream was in place and investigating these issues, but were concerned that the available instruments tended to be extremely lengthy, aimed at top management rather than the workforce as a whole, or oriented toward a manufacturing rather than service environment. Reports initial work to validate a brief instrument that is potentially useful at all organizational levels and in both service and manufacturing. Suggests that the findings indicate that the instrument is consistent with an instrument from the existing research stream and that it also shows relationships to worker perceptions of organizational culture, Baldrige criteria, and job enrichment in directions that would be expected in the quality environment.