Quality improvement as mediating role of the TQM practices's effecton organizational performance: An empirical study of SMEs in Thailand

This study conducts a comprehensive review of the literature and develops a framework that links among TQM practices, quality improvement, and organizational performance. The paper provides empirical support for direct and indirect effects of TQM practices on quality improvement and organizational performance. The purpose of this research is to empirically investigate the impact of TQM practices on quality improvement and organizational performanceon SMEs which amounted to 3,446,589.2 million baht representing 37.9 percent of Thai GDP. The number accounts for 99.8 percent of approximately 2,000,000 SMEs businesses and generates employment for 9.7 million people, or almost 80 percent of all jobs in Thailand. The study utilized primary data obtained from a questionnaire method. 456 SMEs in the various export-oriented manufacturing industries were surveyed in Thailand. Four hypotheses have been developed through literature review and tested using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) by AMOS and SPSS 18.00 software. Data analysis shows that TQM practices has significant effect on organizational performance and quality improvement directly, TQM practices has significant effect on organizational performancethroughquality improvement, quality improvement has significant effect on organizational performance,organizational performance is more influenced by quality improvement than TQM practices.