Assessing the Total Quality Management Implementation in Machine Tool Manufacturing Companies

In the current era of globalization, organizations are adopting various new tools and techniques to produce products and services and survive in the market and to retain the customers. The role of Quality Management (QM) processes of the organization plays a vital role to have competitive advantage. The Machine tool industry is considered as the Mother Industry for all the Engineering Industries. The Machine Tools industry in India dates back to the Second World War. The Indian machine tools industry manufactures almost the complete range of metal-cutting and metal-forming machine tools. However, the domestic manufacturers account for about 45% of the total Indian machine tool market and the remaining proportion is imported from different countries. To look beyond the auto industry, a survey has been conducted to identify the status of TQM practices in the machine tool industry in the state of Karnataka, India, which is the second biggest producer of machine tool in India next to the state of Maharashtra. A Questionnaire tool was developed and validated. The feedback was collected through the survey from the different machine tool manufacturing companies and analyzed. The results show that the status of TQM practices in the Karnataka based machine tool industry is still in its nascent stage.