This paper investigates the extent of Total Quality Management (TQM) implementation in two California public higher education systems: the California State University (CSU) and the University of California (UC) systems. These two higher education systems include 32 statewide campuses with over half a million students and 27,000 faculty. A questionnaire was sent to all campuses in both the CSU and UC systems. Issues such as TQM implementation and the benefits and challenges of such implementation are surveyed, discussed and analyzed. This study reveals that more than half of the California public universities are implementing TQM in one form or another and the TQM implementation in the CSU system is much wider than that in the UC system. In general, the character of implementation is still limited to business‐type operations in universities, such as business finance and administrative services.

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For the last decade, American companies have beenplayingcatch-up in the area of quality andproductivity. Japanese companies and other foreign competitors have moved into markets that were once dominated by American companies, by producing higher quality products. The problem to date in the U S has obviously not been the lack of resources or documentation on quality and improvement programmes, but the misdirection of these programmes and the lack of total management commitment. Total Quality Management ( T Q M ) isseen as an effective method that wilIaccomplish the task of higher quality levels, andincreased productivity. The purpose of Total Quality Management is to implement a process that is long term and continuous improvement initiatives throughout the organization, beginning with their own function in the organization. T Q M integrates the fundamental techniques and principles of Quality Function Deployment, Taguchi Methods, Staristical Process control, Just-ln-Time, and existing management tools into a structured approach. The primary objective of this approach is to incorporate quality and integrity into all functions at all levels of the organization.This paper examines the TQMprocess, philosophy, concepts, attributes and how it can be used to develop a 'quality-bared' culture in which everyone in the organization is involved.

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Assesses the quality management systems of the maquiladoras in the Tijuana region of Mexico. Maquiladoras are manufacturing plants set up by foreign companies in the border zone of North Mexico to produce finished goods for export. Information was gathered by survey from companies representing the Pacific Rim, Europe, the USA and Mexico, and from different manufacturing sectors. The survey addressed quality management system certification, quality data collection and analysis, total quality management (TQM) and statistical process control (SPC) implementation, teamwork, communication and training practices, as well as suppliers certification requirements. The results showed that the majority of the responding maquiladoras generally have a decent quality management system, over half indicated that they have a certified quality system, and a large percentage reported utilizing teamwork for problem solving and many SPC charts such as Pareto and control charts. The maquiladoras are creating``quality culture'' in Mexico's manufacturing systems based on the principles TQM. This could be instrumental in transforming Mexico's manufacturing from being known as a``cheap labor'' provider into becoming a global manufacturing power.