The individual effects of total quality management on customers, people and society results and quality performance in SMEs

The aim of this paper is to test the individual effects of total quality management (TQM) on customer results, people results, society results and quality performance in a small‐ and medium‐sized enterprise (SME) context. The research is based on information from 85 ISO 9000 certified SMEs in Spain. A number of regression analyses are applied in order to examine the impact of TQM on these four results and identify which factors of TQM have the greatest effect. After analysing the survey data, 10 SMEs were randomly selected for individual visits, in order to check the results. The results show that TQM may improve customer results, people results, society results and quality performance. TQM factors related to training and specialist training are showed to be the most significant predictors of quality outcomes. The contribution of this paper is to study this association in SMEs in Spain.