TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT PRACTICES AND PERFORMANCE OF SAVANNAH CEMENT LIMITED, KENYA
Kennedy Mwei Kipngetich - Masters of Business Administration (Strategic Management), Kenyatta University, Kenya
Shadrack Bett - Department of Business Administration, Kenyatta University, Kenya
ABSTRACT
A firm’s performance is a function of how well managers use quality management practices to improve the quality of products and services. In today’s global environment, organizations are constantly looking for ways to expand and improve their businesses in terms of quality to enhance performance. Quality management practices have been used by manufacturing firms in Kenya to improve on performance. However, customers are still complaining that the quality of manufactured products has been compromised. Quality management practices contribute greatly to business improvement as a whole through making awareness in each and every part of an organization in order to remove errors and minimize waste. Manufacturing industries have thus resulted in making use of various total quality aspects to ensure profitability. The main objective of the study was to establish the effect of total quality management practices on financial performance of Savannah Cement Limited, Kenya. The specific objectives were to establish how product continual improvement, customer focus, employee empowerment and top management commitment influence performance of Savannah Cement Limited Cement in Kenya. The study will be guided by Resource based view theory, quality improvement theory and the total quality management theory. This research study used the descriptive research design. The target population composed of 150 management staffs employed by Savannah Cement Limited in Kenya. The staffs were drawn from the three main departments which include manufacturing, administration and sales, marketing and distribution. The study employed a census on all the population elements. This is because the population was relatively small to carry out sampling. The study used a semi-structured questionnaire administered using a drop and pick later method. Data collected was purely quantitative and it was analyzed by descriptive analysis. The descriptive statistical tools such as Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS Version 21.0) and MS Excel was used to extract frequencies, percentages, means and other central tendencies. Tables and figures were used to summarize responses for further analysis and facilitate comparison. A multiple regression analysis was conducted to show the strength of the relationship between the variables. The study established that customer focus (β=0.480, p=0.000) had significant influence on performance. Top management commitment (β=0.304, p=0.001) had direct and significant effect on performance. Continuous improvement (β=0.141, p=0.039) had positive and significant effect on performance. Employee involvement (β=0.663, p=0.000) had significant effect on performance. The study concludes that customer focus had significant influence on performance. Top management commitment had direct and significant effect on performance. Continuous improvement had positive and significant effect on performance. Employee involvement had significant effect on performance. The study recommends that the top management team of Savannah Cement need to increase customer focus by valuing both internal and external customers to the firm. The top management team of all other cement producing companies with operations in Kenya should show their commitment towards TQM policies and principles so as to significantly influence performance of their firms. The top management team of all cement producing companies should have continuous improvement in all the operations and activities undertaken. The management of Savannah Cement Ltd should put in place measures to improve on performance appraisal and feedback given to employees.
