Total Quality Management Dianne Schofield University of Phoenix Management 449 Instructor James Cooke March 24, 2009 Total Quality Management, or TQM, is a management strategy that was first referenced in America by Alexander Hamilton in 1791 in his report to the U.S. House of Representatives. Hamilton was one of the first Americans to understand the importance to “improve the quality and preserve the character of the national manufactures” (Harrison & Stephens & Godfrey, 2002). Since then many strides have been made to improve the first developments of quality management. Benefiting from these improvements is quality on a global scale, traditional management styles and quality-focused management, and the overall TQM at my organization Comcast. In the past 60 years, the world has experienced tremendous growth in the globalization of trade. Production of goods and services has soared to new heights. This coupled with information technology such as television, radio, and the Internet, consumers are armed with endless amounts of “data about prices, quality levels and product availability” (Godfrey, 2000). This information has helped pave the way for programs such as ISO 9000, Six Sigma, and The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA) (Burrill & Ledolter, 1999). The International Organization for Standardization (ISO)introduced a series of standards in 1987. “Since then, these standards have become universal and are now the most widely sold standards published by the ISO” (Burrill & Ledolter, 1999). Several branches of the ISO 9000 have been created since 1987. These new editions are industry specific and nurture quality management necessary to their industries (Burrill & Ledolter, 1999). According to the company General Electric, Six Sigma is the process of “developing and delivering near-perfect products and services” (2009). Sigma is a “statistical term that measures how far a given process deviates from perfection” (2009). In 1986, an employee of...