Question

Find a topic from this module/week’s Reading & Study materials that interests you. Declare your topic to the class by posting a thread in the related Discussion Board Forum and titling it with the topic you selected. This reserves your topic so that other students cannot use it. You must declare your topic by 11:59 p.m. (ET) on Friday of Module/Week 1, to ensure no duplicate topics are chosen. Each student must cover a different topic; no duplication of articles or topics is allowed.

Conduct an Internet search to find and read at least 3 recent articles that relate to the topic you selected. Articles may be found on any reputable website that focuses on business, such as Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, or the Economist. Another good source of information is EBSCOhost, accessible through Liberty University’s online library. Websites like “about.com,” “britanica.com,” “Wikipedia,” etc. do not constitute scholarly, academic articles and references.

Of the 3 articles you have read, select the article that you wish to discuss, and write a review of it. In addition, you must post all 3 (or more) recent articles — even though you review only 1 of them. You may provide additional references, but references do not replace the 3 articles that relate to your topic. Actually reference the article you review within the article review. Your review must include the following sections (each section must be structured by a heading for each section):

• A definition of the topic: this does not count in the 250-word minimum requirement.
• A summary, in your own words, of the selected article.
• A discussion, in your own words, of how the article relates to the selected chapter and topic.
• The complete citation, in current APA format, of each of the 3 articles read and any other additional references; these do not count in the 250-word requirement.
• All references must be annotated.

1. Write your thread in a Word document and attach it to the forum as a new thread. Click “Submit” to publish your thread for the class.

Answer 1

The Economist. (2009). Total quality management. The Economist. Retrieved 4 July 2017,

This article discusses the whole idea about Total Quality Management (TQM) in terms of who controls quality and its essence to an organization. The Economist, the author of the article documents that total quality management should be geared towards enhancing organizational quality as a process meant to meet effectively the customers’ requirements. The article was instrumental to me since it gives fundamental insights on my key term (Total Quality Management). The article also expounds on some of the key characteristics of total quality management with some brief history on when it was adopted.

Definition of the key term

Total Quality Management (TQM) refers to a holistic approach to the overall improvement of all aspects of an organization through collective involvement of all entities towards improving quality and performance of an organization (The Economist, 2009). TQM normally looks into enhancing all quality related processes of an organization aimed at achieving success.

Summary

The article argues that total quality management is a responsibility for the whole organization and should not be solely the responsibility of the quality controller. Total Quality Management is regarded as a process that is geared towards enhancing quality meant to meet the customers’ requirements (The Economist, 2009). The Japanese firms were among the early adopters of total quality management, a strategy that gave them competitive edge over other global firms but the strategy was later adopted widely across the United States (The Economist, 2009). Nonetheless, in the 1990s, TQM had its own implication that made it receive a lot of backlash from employees who claimed that it entailed a lot of paperwork. The backlash against TQM made the American firms such as Florida Power & Light to suspend its TQM strategy.

Discussion

The above article was monumental in expounding more about my key term (total quality management) on a broader perspective. The article also resonates well with my selected chapter on how firms can utilize total quality management as a strategy towards enhancing their quality in all spheres of production and distribution of goods and services. Personally, I learned that any organization should involve everyone in the total quality management process in order to realize maximum benefits of such strategy. Total quality management should essentially entail a continuous process of improving all aspects of a business through involvement of all personnel. Additionally, total quality management should be market-oriented meant to create reliable relationships with suppliers and customers.