Total quality management practices in Turkish primary schools

Total quality managementpractices in Turkish primary

schoolsFatih Toremen and Mehmet Karakus

Fırat University, Elazig, Turkey, and

Tezcan YasanPrimary School of Milli Egitim Vakfı, Malatya, Turkey

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to determine the extent of total quality management (TQM)practices in primary schools based on teachers’ perceptions, and how their perceptions are related todifferent variables.

Design/methodology/approach – In this study, a survey based descriptive scanning model wasused. This study was carried out in Malatya city centre on teachers working at primary schools. Usingstratified sampling method, 21 schools and 420 teachers working in these schools were selectedrandomly. A total of 396 of the questionnaires were validated and evaluated. A total ofsix-dimensioned and a 60-itemed questionnaire was administered to these teachers. Data wereanalysed by SPSS program.

Findings – In the perceptions of teachers, there were some problems with the indicators of TQMpractices, especially on the dimension of change management. There were significant differencesamong teachers’ perceptions on TQM practices depending upon the variables of branch, level ofeducation and tenure, while there were no meaningful differences according to the gender variable.

Practical implications – The findings reveal the need for an effective change management,educating staff and utilizing human resources to attain a system-wide quality improvement, toimplement the principles of TQM.

Originality/value – Quality improvement is a continual process that should be taken up from theoperational level to senior management. Primary schools, as the basic subsystem of educationalsuper-system, affect upper level schools with their outcomes. So TQM efforts at primary schools arefundamentally important to achieve a high quality education system. This paper sheds light on how toimprove quality at this basic level.

Keywords Total quality management, Primary schools, Teachers, Turkey

Paper type Research paper

IntroductionOrganizations are the structures which have been created to achieve defined objectives.To attain their objectives, organizations need to interact with many environmentalfactors. For this reason, they cannot be thought of as separate from the outside world.To maintain their existence, organizations should monitor the changes and adaptthemselves to the developments in the environment. Technological advancements havebrought about the removal of barriers all over the world and it has become necessaryfor organizations to improve performance to compete with the rest of the world. To thisend, total quality management (TQM) is an essential tool for organizations to improvethemselves and to keep up with the changes.

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at

www.emeraldinsight.com/0968-4883.htm

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Received 16 November 2007Revised 1 September 2008Accepted 20 September2008

Quality Assurance in EducationVol. 17 No. 1, 2009pp. 30-44q Emerald Group Publishing Limited0968-4883DOI 10.1108/09684880910929917

The “total quality management” conceptTQM is a management process and a set of disciplines that are co-ordinated to ensurethat the organization consistently meets and exceeds customer requirements. TQMengages all divisions, departments and levels of the organization. Senior managementorganizes all of its strategy and operations around customer needs and develops aculture with high employee participation. Companies with TQM are focused on thesystematic management of data in all processes and practices to eliminate waste, andpursue continuous improvement (Capezio and Morehouse, 1993). In TQM, theresponsibility for quality is located in both the individuals and team through someevaluatory and developmental processes. This represents an approach to qualityassurance more congruent with the structures and ethos of educational organizationsthan many of the more mechanistic and hierarchical processes (McCulloch, 1993).

TQM is comprised of the following concepts:. Total: It expresses the integration or the participation of all the people who take

part together in the processes of production or service (Sisman and Turan, 2002).The “total” of TQM is underlining the continuous development enterpriseincluding everybody and everything in an organization (Sallis, 2002; Aksu,2002).

. Quality: In the context of TQM quality can be defined as “meeting the wishes andexpectations of customers in an ideal economical level and in a most suitablemanner” (Simsek, 2001) or as “a dynamic state that is meeting or exceedingcustomers’ requirements, needs, expectations and desires” (McNealy, 1993;Oakland, 1995; Croker et al., 1996; Goetsch and Davis, 1997). In TQM, the qualityimprovement process should begin and end with the customers (Senge, 1990).

. Management: As a more comprehensive concept, “management” contains theother two components. It may not be possible to have the desired quality withoutgood management and leadership (Sisman and Turan, 2002). As in the totalconcept, the concept of management in the TQM includes everybody, becauseeverybody is the manager of their responsibilities whatever their roles, positionsand status in the organization (Sallis, 2002). In TQM, the job of management isnot supervision, but leadership. Rather than focus on outcome (management bynumbers, work standards, meet specifications, zero defects, appraisal ofperformance), leadership should be put in place (Deming, 1986).

Components of total quality managementLeadership: The most difficult stage of TQM is to create a team spirit and to coordinateemployees’ efforts to a certain target. At this point, there is a need for a strongleadership (Simsek, 2001; Balcı, 2002; Imai, 1986; Ozevren, 2000; Sisman and Turan,2002; Ozden, 2002, p. 141; Ensari, 2002; Celik, 2003; Lee, 1995). The aim of leadershipshould be to improve the performance, to improve quality, to increase output, and tosimultaneously to bring pride of workmanship to people. Put in a negative way, theaim of leadership is not to find and record failures of men, but to remove the causes offailure: to help people do a better job with less effort (Deming, 1986). It is the managers’leadership ability that creates the greatest effect on the performance and commitmentof employees (Genc and Halis, 2006). Strong leadership and also organizational culturehave mutual influence on the development of TQM policies and behaviours (Waldman,

TQM in Turkishprimary schools

31

1993). TQM strategies are the best suited to educational purposes but there are deep,often conflicting, cultural processes that can frustrate its introduction (Newby, 1999).

Customer satisfaction: A customer can be any person or group that receives productsor services from another person or group (Johnson, 1993). In TQM, customer satisfactionis viewed as the criterion of quality. So, the needs of the customer should be determinedto achieve a high level of quality. All the stakeholders in the processes of service orproduction, or the ones that are affected by the results of these processes can beconsidered as customers (Weaver, 1995). There are internal and external customers inTQM. External customers are people and institutions outside school that receive, use orare affected by the outputs of the school system. Parents, community at large, colleges,vocational schools, businesses, government and industry can be deemed among theseexternal customers. Internal customers are within-school stakeholders such as teachersand students (Johnson, 1993; Schwartzman, 1995; Munoz, 1999). In a market orientedenvironment, and under the pressures of stakeholders, “delighting the customers” is arule for the survival of organizations in the long-run (Sahney et al., 2004).

Education: Education is an important component of TQM. As the quality leaders,educational administrators are responsible for educating their staff. They should act asa coach and teacher and provide their staff with necessary training and resources tocarry out their duties as the parts of the quality system (Deming, 1986; Lee, 1995). Also,the administrators themselves are the ones who should be trained at first (Kavrakoglu,1998; Imai, 1986; Halis, 2004; Weaver, 1995).

Continual improvement: This is among the main principles of quality. Continual(even small) improvements can amount collectively and steadily to considerable gainsin quality and reduction of costs (Deming, 1986). TQM notion emphasizes as to how toimprove each process of quality. Continual improvement requires well-defined targets,criteria and measurements (Aksu, 2002). The continual improvement principle of TQMis based on the idea that every new day should not be the same as the previous day. Acontinual change and improvement is the subject of TQM. Continual improvementprinciple views the human beings as dynamic organisms that are open to changes(Imai, 1986; Halis, 2004; Genc and Halis, 2006). Continual improvement concept, whichhas been described as kaizen by the Japanese (Johnson, 1993; Halis, 2004; Sallis, 2002),has transformed the static management understanding into an active state(Kavrakoglu, 1998).

Involvement: An organization should utilize the creative powers and mental abilitiesof all stakeholders and employees and they all should be involved in the qualityprocess. Organizations can produce total outcomes beyond what is the expected level,due to the synergistic power which comes out of the involvement of all stakeholders(Genc and Halis, 2006; Merter, 2006; Halis, 2004). Everyone’s involvement in TQM isimportant for quality improvement and motivation of employees (Yatkın, 2003; Ozden,2002).

Teamwork: High-level managers’ efforts are not enough to produce the best productor service. All working people have to cooperate with each other (Weaver, 1995; Petersand Waterman, 1995). For organizations to realize their objectives, to be strong andeffective, they should give importance to teamwork depending on harmony andcooperation among workers.

Data focused work: All the quality studies in TQM are based on the practicescontaining empirical data and statistical analysis. Gathering data and analysis is an

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inseparable part of the TQM (Kavrakoglu, 1998; Imai, 1986; Yatkın, 2003; Genc andHalis, 2006; Merter, 2006). Gathering and analysing data is not sufficient to be aneffective quality leader. A supervisor is an auditor of failure and an analyser of thenumerical data while a quality leader listens and learns, studies and understands andworks to improve the system (Deming, 1986).

Total quality management in educationAs a modern management approach, TQM can be used successfully in educationalorganizations that are mainly focused on raising the potentials of students to thehighest level (Croker et al., 1996; Winn and Green, 1998; Tribus, 1993; Munoz, 1999).Recent researches on TQM have brought a widely updated plan for educationalreforms and modernization of educational organizations. The TQM principles havebroad applications in educational organizations and have produced desirableoutcomes. With these applications, school improvement has become a continualprocess that has created an environment characterized by unity, change and trust(Terry, 1996). There is a considerable proximity between the principles of TQM and theprinciples of effective schools (Lezotte, 1992; Balcı, 2001). The practice of TQM atschools has provided us with a perspective to look at the handicaps facing effectiveschools, and with a tool to remove the obstacles in the way of effective schools. In thisaspect, the principles of TQM are appropriate for educational settings.

As a human focused approach, TQM can make important contributions to theincrease of quality of education and the improvement of educational organizations. As,both the inputs and outputs of the educational organizations are human beings, andhuman beings are the main actors at all levels and in all processes of theseorganizations, without the satisfaction of human beings (both as customers andproviders), it is very hard to ensure the effectiveness of educational organizations.

As the starting point of the education process, primary schools are important for thequality process and the effectiveness of the education system. At the primary schoollevel, the values are instilled that ensure socio-cultural identity and continuity, thefoundations of human development are laid that will affect an individuals’ whole life.Basic attitudes and behaviours are taught that will affect on a healthy social life. So,primary schools have a fundamental affect on the life quality of individuals andsocieties. Because of these reasons and the successive and continuous nature of theeducation process, primary schools deeply affect the upper level schools through theirproducts. Therefore, quality issue at this basic level should matter to us first, if wewant to attain a high quality education system.

In Turkish primary schools, some outstanding research studies have been made onTQM in the recent decade. According to these the primary school teachers adopt theTQM philosophy and support the attempts to implement its principles (Mutlu, 2001;Gunbayı and Cevik, 2004), although they have difficulty in adopting some of theseprinciples (such as student satisfaction) (Bostan, 2005). Both teachers (Yigit andBayrakdar, 2003) and managers (Cınar et al., 2003; Yıldız, 2006) are aware of their lackof knowledge and skills and the need for a change to implement TQM effectively.There are some psychological, educational, managerial, economical, cultural andsystematic problems in the way of successful TQM applications (Hamedoglu, 2002).But the primary schools have the necessary potential and determination to solve theseproblems (Aydın and Senturk, 2007).


33

Determining the problems and the obstacles in the way of successful TQMimplementations, and to take necessary measures to remove these obstacles areimportant factors for the effectiveness of primary schools and in general for the wholeeducation system. For this, it is necessary to continually check the quality process andcontrol the success of practices. In this context, it is aimed in this study to determinethe implementation level of TQM practices in Turkish primary schools based onteachers’ perceptions and according to some independent variables.

MethodologyIn this study, a survey based descriptive scanning model was used. After the relatedliterature was examined, the theoretical framework was postulated and thequestionnaire was drafted. As this questionnaire was being drafted, the researcherswere inspired by the TQM scale that Seake Harry Rampa (2004) used in his doctoralthesis. Before this draft was administered, the opinions of specialists and teachers weretaken about the content and the language of this questionnaire and necessaryimprovements were made.

After the questionnaire was initially administered, its validity and reliability wereanalysed. For Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy (KMO) was over 0,60(it was 0,928) and Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity was significant at the 0,01 level (it was0,00), it was considered that the data was appropriate for factor analysis. According tothe results of Principal Component Analysis, there were six factors that haveEigenvalues of over than 1.62 percent of the total variance was explained by these sixfactors. A total of eight items that had lower factor loadings were removed from thequestionnaire. So, the final version of the questionnaire had six dimensions and 60 items(see Appendix). The dimensions included in this scale were titled as: clarity of schoolprinciples, school management, school improvement, quality of school life, changemanagement and adoption of TQM philosophy. According to the results of ReliabilityStatistics, Cronbach Alpha Coefficient was 0.9468 for the overall questionnaire.

After the validity and reliability studies were completed, the final version of thequestionnaire was administered. The population of this study consists of primaryschool teachers who work in Malatya city centre (total 3,359 teachers who work at 163primary schools) in 2006-2007 academic year. Stratified sampling method was used inthis study. Overall, 21 schools (among these 163 primary schools) were selectedrandomly and then 20 teachers in each of these schools were also selected randomly toform the sample group of total 420 teachers. 396 teachers filled properly ourquestionnaires and their forms were analyzed.

Teachers were required to evaluate the indicators of TQM practices utilizing afive-point Likert scale of 1 to 5, where 1 is never, 2 is rarely, 3 is sometimes, 4 is usuallyand 5 is always. Data were analysed by Statistical Package for the Social SciencesSPSS programme, their standard deviations and means were computed and thetechniques of T-test (for the variables of gender, branch and level of education) andOne-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) (for the tenure variable) were used in order todetermine if there were any meaningful differences according to these independentvariables. In general, these analyses have been made on six dimensions. But whennecessary, item based analysis have been made to see on which items there aremeaningful differences. For the interpretation, means were graded as; never, 1.00-1.80;rarely, 1.81-2.60; sometimes, 2.61-3.40; usually, 3.41-4.20 and always, 4.21-5.00.

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The findings and interpretationsA general viewWhen we look generally at the findings (Table I) without taking the independentvariables into consideration we see that; in the dimension of “change management”,teachers evaluate that they “sometimes (X ¼ 3,37)” witness the indicators of TQMpractices at their schools. “However, in all the other dimensions, teachers evaluate (in amean range of 3,41-3,67) that they ‘usually’ witness the indicators of TQM practices.Teachers evaluate the TQM practices in the “change management” dimension at amoderate level and in all the other dimensions at a moderately high level. In the changemanagement dimension, we asked questions to teachers about these matters: to whatdegree were the necessary changes made to successfully implement the TQMprinciples in their schools and could their schools overcome resistance to change. So,this finding implies that the necessary changes for implementing TQM principles havenot been appropriately made in these schools, and there are some problems withovercoming resistance to change. Although there is not much difference between themeans of the TQM dimensions, we can say that there are some more problems with the“change management” dimension.

GenderAccording to the T-test (Table II) results (which has been made between malesN ¼ 243, 61.4 percent and females: N ¼ 153, 38.6 percent), there were no meaningfuldifferences between the ideas of men and women teachers (as it was found similarly at

Dimensions of TQM practices X SD

Clarity of school principles 3.54 0.69School management 3.66 0.79School improvement 3.41 0.68Quality of school life 3.67 0.48Change management 3.37 0.45Adoption of TQM philosophy 3.61 0.54

Notes: X : Mean; SD: standard deviation

Table I.General views of teachers

on the dimensions ofTQM practices

Female(N ¼ 153,38. 6, %)

Male(N ¼ 243, 61.4%)

Dimensions of TQM practices X sd X SD t p

Clarity of School Principles 3.54 0.69 3.55 0.69 0.11 0.90School management 3.64 0.78 3.67 0.80 0.31 0.75School improvement 3.33 0.68 3.46 0.67 1.87 0.06Quality of school life 3.66 0.51 3.68 0.46 0.31 0.75Change management 3.42 0.42 3.34 0.46 -1.65 0.09Adoption of TQM philosophy 3.65 0.54 3.58 0.54 -1.24 0.21

Notes: * p , 0.05 (two-tailed tests); n: Sample size, X : mean; sd: standard deviation; t: t-value at theindependent samples test; p: significance value

Table II.Teachers’ views

according to the gendervariable (T-test results)


35

Aksu’s (2003) research). This finding shows that the ideas of men and women teachersare alike about the practices of TQM at schools.

BranchIn Turkish education system, class teachers are the ones who educate students fromthe first to the fifth classes. Beginning from the sixth class, branch teachers (who arespecialists in a specific field) take over this responsibility. According to the T-test(Table III) results (which have been obtained for class teachers: N ¼ 222, 56.1 percentand branch teachers: N ¼ 174, percent 43.9), there are no meaningful differencesbetween teachers’ opinions except for the dimension of school improvement. In thedimension of “school improvement”, class teachers ( �X ¼ 3.48) have more positiveopinions about the TQM practices than branch teachers ( �X ¼ 3.33). The item basedanalysis show that class teachers have more positive perceptions than the branchteachers on these matters: “effective and constant communication in the schoolmotivate participants (item 21; 3,48 . 3,28)” and “right and positive attitudes ofparticipants contribute to the development of school culture (item 22; 3,54 . 3,28) andfacilitate learning for new staff (item 23; 3,38 . 3,16)”.

Class teachers spend more time in their schools and they are more involved inschool activities than branch teachers. Due to the time they have spent, they may havemore opportunities to observe the developments in their schools. Due to theirinvolvement in their schools’ activities, they may appreciate and internalize thedevelopmental progress as their own. So, these factors may have caused them to havemore positive perceptions.

Level of educationAccording to the T-test (Table IV) results (which distinguish between teachers witheducation levels of undergraduate: N ¼ 121, 30.6 percent and graduate: N ¼ 275, 69.4percent), there were some meaningful differences in the dimensions of “the clarity ofschool principles” and “school development”. In both dimensions, graduate levelteachers had more negative opinions about the TQM practices than the ones atundergraduate level.

As the item based analysis show, there were meaningful differences betweenteachers’ opinions in these items: in the dimension of “the clarity of school principles”:

Class teachers(N ¼ 222,% 56.1)

Branch teachers(N ¼ 174, 43.9%)

Dimensions of TQM practices X SD X SD t p

Clarity of school principles 3.59 0.71 3.48 0.66 1.48 0.13School management 3.68 0.79 3.63 0.80 0.61 0.54School Improvement 3.48 0.70 3.33 0.64 2.18 0.02 *

Quality of school life 3.69 0.49 3.66 0.47 0.67 0.50Change management 3.38 0.47 3.36 0.42 0.33 0.74Adoption of TQM philosophy 3.57 0.54 3.66 0.54 -1.63 0.10

Notes: * p , 0.05 (two-tailed tests); n: Sample size, X : mean; SD: standard deviation; t: t-value at theindependent samples test; p: significance value

Table III.Teachers’ viewsaccording to the branchvariable (T-test results)

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1 (viewing students as the most important customers), 2 (manager’s efforts to makeparticipants interact), 4 (participation in decision making), 5 (involvement ofparticipants in activities), 10 (teamwork) and in the dimension of “schoolimprovement”: 19 (manager’s strategic vision), 20 (stakeholders’ level ofempowerment for participation), 21 (motivative function of effective and constantcommunication), 22 (right and positive attitudes of stakeholders), 25 (effective workteams). Teachers at the graduate level have more negative opinions in all of theseitems.

Graduate level teachers’ negative perceptions may stem from their higher levels ofexpectation. Their higher levels of expectation may be a result of the quantity or thequality of education they have received. As it will be discussed in the tenure section,most of the teachers at the undergraduate level are among the more tenured ones. So,not only out of the higher level of education, but also from the modern quality ofeducation they have received, more educated teachers may have a wide and globalperspective towards the quality concept. That may have led them to set higherstandards that cause them to have higher levels of expectations.

TenureTeachers were divided into three tenure groups:

(1) 1-10 year, N ¼ 153;

(2) 11-20 year, N ¼ 141; and

(3) 21 year and above, N ¼ 102).

According to the one-way ANOVA (Table V) there were meaningful differences amongtenure groups except for the dimension of “adoption of TQM philosophy”. In thedimensions of “clarity of school principles”, “school management”, “schoolimprovement”, “quality of school life” and “change management”, less tenuredteachers had more negative opinions about TQM practices.

As results of t-test on “the level of education” variable showed, more educatedteachers have more negative opinions about TQM practices than less educated ones. Inour sample group, most of the less educated teachers are among the more tenuredteachers (because of the conditions of recruitment and selection while they entered thisprofession). Similarly, most of the more educated teachers are among the less tenured

Undergraduatelevel

(N ¼ 121, 30.6%)Graduate level

(N ¼ 275, 69.4%)Dimensions of TQM practices X SD X SD t p

Clarity of school principles 3.68 0.67 3.49 0.69 2.66 0.008 *

School management 3.76 0.77 3.61 0.79 1.78 0.075School improvement 3.58 0.69 3.34 0.66 3.30 0.001 *

Quality of school life 3.70 0.48 3.67 0.46 0.76 0.446Change management 3.43 0.54 3.35 0.40 1.48 0.139Adoption of TQM philosophy 3.60 0.61 3.62 0.51 0.17 0.862

Notes: * p , 0.05 (two-tailed tests); n: Sample size, X : mean; SD: standard deviation; t: t-value at theindependent samples test; p: significance value

Table IV.Teachers’ views

according to the theirlevel of education (t-test

results)


37

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Table V.Teachers’ viewsaccording to the tenurevariable (one-wayANOVA results)

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ones. This finding brings to mind the idea that both of the findings might share acommon variance. But there might be other reasons that have led more tenuredteachers to be more complacent and less tenured ones to be more discontented. Theseyoung teachers’ excitable, energetic, dynamic and vigorous nature may have causedthem to be dissatisfied from the current situation. Besides, more tenured ones mayhave got accustomed to the situations in which they work and hence they may havedeveloped retrospective rationality in time, which is leading them to be complacent.Also, these more tenured ones’ outside school responsibilities (family, child etc.) mayprevent them from making more investments (time or labour) in their schools, andhence may be restricting their vision on quality improvement in school.

Conclusion and discussionIn this research, we have studied how successfully the TQM concept is practiced inTurkish primary schools from the perspective of teachers. As the general findingsshow, although seminars have been conducted, and legal requirements have been madefor the past few years by the Turkish Ministry of Education on the implementation ofTQM at schools, there are still some problems with the practice of TQM at schools (asit was found similarly at Dogan’s (2002) and Oter’s (2006) researches). Findings showthat there are some more problems with the dimension of “change management”. Tosuccessfully implement TQM in schools, there is a need to accommodate change interms of making legal arrangements, improving social networks for teamwork andcooperation, educating people to effectively participate in this process and inducingthem to exert necessary effort for this process. Although numerous attempts have beendone by educational authorities, the necessary changes have not been instilledsufficiently into schools. As Besterfield et al. (1999) indicated, resistance to change isnatural when staff confronts shift to their paradigms and their habits, as it occurs inTQM practices. At this point, there is a need for school managers to displaytransformational leadership skills to successfully instil the TQM concept into theschool culture and to accommodate change for successful implementation of TQMprinciples. As Aksu’s (2002) research revealed, the school managers have notnecessarily been inclined to implement TQM principles. However, Cınar et al.’s (2003)research revealed that the school managers are aware of the need for a change tosuccessfully implement TQM. So, first, managers need to be trained to be changeagents and to pave the way towards a total quality concept.

There were meaningful differences among the teachers’ perceptions, on the level ofTQM practices at their schools, according to the variables of branch, level of educationand tenure, while there were no meaningful differences according to the gendervariable. Branch teachers evaluate more negatively, and appreciate to a lesser extentthan the class teachers, the developmental progress of their schools in certain aspectsof TQM practices. That maybe due to the branch teachers’ lesser involvement in theTQM practices. Hence, it can be said that teachers’ involvement in TQM practiceswould be beneficial for these practices to be appreciated and adopted.

Employees’ low levels of expectation and their short and dogmatic perspectives areamong the obstacles of successful implementation of TQM (Goetsch and Davis, 1997).As the findings on the level of education variable show; as teachers’ levels of educationrise, they develop higher standards and have higher levels of expectation. The drivingforce of these higher standards and higher levels of expectation would compel


39

managers to do their best to improve quality. Also, these educated teachers wouldcontrol the TQM practices and provide feedback with their high standards forimproving the quality system. These findings reveal the importance of education onthe success of TQM practices. As Yigit and Bayrakdar’s (2003) research revealed, theteachers are conscious of their need of education for effective TQM practices. In thiscontext, as Garbutt (1996) indicated, it is managers’ responsibility to identify teachers’training needs clearly and to arrange in-service training activities in this direction.

Education is an important component of TQM both in the terms of informing staffon TQM practices and raising their levels of competency to successfully implementTQM principles. If they are informed about these practices, they would easily adopt thenecessary changes without a resistance. Also, if they are instructed well, they would domore correctly the required jobs for achieving a “zero defect” quality system.

Our findings on the tenure variable imply that it would be beneficial for schoolleaders to utilize the dynamic nature of the young human resource. TQM is a dynamicprocess and demands a continuous change in an organization. So, for the success ofthese practices, there is a need for a dynamic and not complacent human resource thatis inclined to be easily adapted to necessary changes.

As the abovementioned findings show, to successfully implement TQM principles inschools; there is a need for an effective change management that makes all thestakeholders adopt these new practices, an effective in-service training for managers andstaff to adequately put these principles into practice and an effective utilization of humanresources to initialize and maintain the attempts to create a dynamic quality system.

References

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Appendix 1. Questionnaire designThe questionnaire used in this study had six dimensions and 60 items. The dimensions includedin this scale were titled as: clarity of school principles (items 1-10), school management (items11-18), school improvement (items 19-25), quality of school life (items 26-37), change management(items 38-51) and adoption of TQM philosophy (items 52-60). Participants were asked to respondto this questionnaire based on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from “strongly disagree” (1) to“strongly agree” (5). Sample items for each of the dimensions are included in follows.

Clarity of school principles

1. In this school, students are viewed as most important customers.

2. Our school manager efforts to make participants interact for the purpose of improvingquality.

3. Our school manager gives all the participants direction to improve quality.

4. In this school, all the stakeholders participate in decision-making process.

School management

11. TQM process is effectively and consistently managed in this school.

13. Services rendered in this school are improved continuously.

15. There is evidence of quality leadership in this school.

17. Our school manager strives to eliminate barriers for stakeholders to work efficientlyand cooperatively.

School improvement

20. In this school, stakeholders are empowered to participate in quality improvementprocess.

21. In this school, effective and constant communication motivates stakeholders.

22. Right and positive attitudes of stakeholders contribute to the development of schoolculture of continuous improvement.

25. Effective teams ensure commitment of stakeholders.

Quality of school life

30. There is a climate of respect, cooperation and trust in our school that motivate ourstakeholders.

31. All the stakeholders of our school are recognized as contributors in decision making.

32. Physical working conditions in our school motivate employees.

33. All the stakeholders in our school are being treated with respect and dignity.


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Change management

42. In this school, stakeholders are educated to understand the need for change.

44. In this school, fear for change is eliminated through participation of all stakeholders.

48. In this school, all stakeholders are involved in decisions about changes.

51. This school overcomes resistance to change through persuasion.

Adoption of TQM philosophy

53. In this school, TQM guides actions and processes.

58. TQM practices promote this school’s pride and passion.

59. In this school, TQM is viewed as the integral part of the planning processes.

60. In this school, good relationships are established among stakeholders.

Glossary

SPSS: Statistical package for the social sciences

TQM: Total quality management

Corresponding authorFatih Toremen can be contacted at: [email protected]

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Total quality management practices in Turkish primary schools