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Article: Schools of thought in and against total quality. (total quality management)
- Article from:
- Journal of Managerial Issues
- Article date:
- June 22, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 Pittsburg State University - Department of Economics. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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In the early 1980s, a new concept entered managerial discourse: Total Quality Management (TQM). Later called "Total Quality" (TQ), TQM was heralded by governments, major corporations and the business media as the most effective and elegant way out of the economic crisis and into the global market. It should be noted, however, that the preoccupation with quality is by no means new. In a 1956 article, Feigenbaum describes the new stakes confronting corporate managers in the early 1960s as follows: "Customers - both industrial and consumer - have been increasing their quality requirements very sharply in recent years. This tendency is likely to be greatly amplified by the ...