Explores the role of trade unions in relation to team working. Asks the questions: are unions incompatible with team working and what are the implications for shop stewards of team working? Argues that moves towards team working are likely to be fragile because of political and power‐based...

This article presents a research framework that understands any management innovation, such as total quality management (TQM), as discursive knowledge that can have certain power effects. It may transform individuals into subjects that secure some sense of their own meaning and identity through...

Purpose – This paper aims to enhance understanding of organizational change by countering managerial and critical assumptions that it is possible to break with the past. Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative, case study approach involving interviews with 50 staff, ten supervisors,...

Any management discourse, such as Total Quality Management (TQM), has power effects that can transform individuals into subjects who secure some sense of their own identity through participating either as managers or employees in the practices it embraces. The central argument of this paper,...

This article examines a co-operative union-management approach towards Total Quality Management (TQM) by recourse to a case study from the auto components manufacturing sector. Its purpose is twofold; first, it suggests that in contrast to much critical thinking, under certain conditions TQM need...

Questions whether “quality” is having as much impact in the financial services sector as the evidence of use of quality management techniques in the UK suggests. Explores the context within which “quality” is finding a place in financial services, and presents the findings of a postal...

Presents the findings of a two‐year programme of questionnaire‐ and case study‐based research conducted during 1993‐1995. Argues that it is not enough for management to initiate problem solving, educate staff or attend quality steering committees in order to introduce quality initiatives...