Abstract

[This abstract is based on the author's abstract.]

Although the actual terms total quality management and business process reengineering aren't heard much anymore, many organizations still use these programs to make changes. Both embrace the same ideas and goals for organizational improvements and both encourage employee empowerment, teamwork, quality, change and focus on the customer. The main difference is in the means each program uses to achieve improvements. TQM aims at long-term continuous improvements in customer satisfaction and real costs, while BPR offers rapid and radical redesign of strategic processes to optimize the workflow and productivity. Instead of simply choosing one or the other of these approaches, quality advocates now suggest that the short-term changes achieved through BPR should be followed by TQM's long-term continuous improvements.