Review of current literatures
History of TQM
Mehra and Ranganathan (2008) reported that in 1979, Crosby gave 14 steps for quality improvement his work was supported by the work of another researcher, Ishikawa who stated that training, problem solving, and quality circles are very crucial ways of achieving continuous improvement. The researchers also spoke about the work of Deming with his contribution of giving 14principles that has become the foundation of TQM and acknowledged Juran for identifying the three basic functions of a quality management process which are planning, organization, and control. To Juran these functions of quality management process are different levels in any programs for quality improvement.
TQM and customer orientation
It has been observe that only those business organizations that pay attention to the need of their customers and make efforts to meet those needs become successful. Naturally, customers have their perceived expectations of quality of products or service they want from businesses they patronize and when they get satisfied they stay, else they leave for somewhere else. This is traceable to why customer satisfaction receives much attention and emphasis in the field of marketing. Researchers studied the profit of 472 restaurants and their results showed that data collected about customer satisfaction rate at a time has a direct impact on the profit margin of an organization nine months thereafter and concluded that quality as perceived by customer is what determines return on investment of any company( Mehra and Ranganathan 2008). It is therefore very important for organizations to focus on customer satisfaction so as to build a long lasting relationship with them. Customer satisfaction was not given much emphasis in the past but these days with intense competition in the global market, Organizations have come to realize its importance