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1 Introduction
During the past four decades, organizational leaders have been striving to adopt strategies that would aid in facing the intensified competition ([6] Bitzenis, 2004; [29] Motohashi, 2007). It is interesting to note that quality gurus like Deming, Juran, Ishikawa and Crosby foresaw this kind of intensification of competition in the world as early as 1950s ([43] Thandapani et al. , 2010). These quality gurus brought out continuous quality improvement models to face competition under the titles like "Total quality control", "Quality trilogy", "Companywide quality control" and "Quality without tears" ([26] Logothetis, 1997; [5] Besterfield et al. , 2004). The world began to truly witness the intensification of competition from 1970s when Japanese products invaded global market ([26] Logothetis, 1997; [29] Motohashi, 2007). Afterwards, researchers and practitioners began to adopt the models evolved by quality gurus to face the onslaught of Japanese-based global competition.
At one pint of time, the world consolidated all continuous quality improvement models under the title "Total quality management" (TQM) ([21] Klefsjo et al. , 2006). In order to support TQM, several approaches, standards, techniques and tools were evolved. Some of them include ISO 9001 certification, quality function deployment, failure mode effect and analysis (FMEA), seven quality control tools, new quality tools and Theoria Reshneyva Isobretatelskehuh Zadach ([5] Besterfield et al. , 2004). A study of these approaches, techniques and tools would indicate that they are highly suitable only under certain situations. Presumably due to this reason, they had been both appreciated and criticized. For example, many papers are available in literature to appreciate the benefits of ISO 9001 certifications ([34] Psomas and Fotopoulos, 2009; [37] Sampaio et al. , 2009; [27] Magd, 2008; [7] Brad, 2008). However, few papers point out the drawbacks of ISO 9001 certifications ([2] Balague, 2009; [33] Pfeifer et al. , 2004; [12] Dick et al. , 2008).
As attempts to overcome the criticisms, researchers and practitioners began to extend the features of the approaches, techniques and tools evolved for achieving continuous quality improvement. The most promising among all is the extension of TQM itself. This extension is revealed through the origination of Six Sigma concept at Motorola in the year 1986 ([4] Bendell, 2006; [1] Arnheiter and Maleyeff, 2005). Another remarkable extension of...