Identification and modelling of barriers in the implementation of TQM

Total quality management (TQM) implementation has been an important aspect for improving organisational efficiency. Organisations work for TQM implementation, spend their resources on it and expect anticipated benefits of TQM in terms of profitability, customer satisfaction and quality of product. There are, however, certain barriers which inhibit the successful implementation of TQM. The main objective of this paper is to understand the mutual interaction of these barriers and identify the 'driving barriers' (i.e. which influence the other barriers) and the 'dependent barriers' (i.e. which are influenced by others). In the present work, these barriers have been identified through the literature, their ranking is done by a questionnaire‐based survey and interpretive structural modelling (ISM) approach has been utilised in analysing their mutual interaction. An ISM model has been prepared to identify some key barriers and their managerial implications in the implementation of TQM.