Title: A Fourth Industrial Revolution approach to total quality management on innovation performance: evidence from South Africa

Authors: Sugandren Naidoo; Veruska Govender

Addresses: Department of Operations Management, College of Economic and Management Sciences, University of South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa ' Graduate School of Business Leadership, University of South Africa, Midrand, South Africa

Abstract: Although many studies on the relationship of TQM practices and innovation performance within manufacturing have been conducted, extant literature from a research perspective is very much lacking. Currently, the Fourth Industrial Revolution (FIR) will continue to drive the strategic research, development and business focus towards strategic investment, geared in the direction of the building of innovation capacities and organisation performance, whilst utilising effective quality management practices. The aim is to examine the impact of total quality management (TQM) practices on innovation performance in a research organisation from a South African context. A multi-collinearity test was used to assess the data collected. The results indicate that TQM practices; namely: leadership, customer focus, people management, and strategy display a significant and positive relationship with innovation performance. A distinct benefit is a renewed customer-centric approach which will enable the development, sustainability and enhance organisational strategy for the commercialisation of products and processes.

Keywords: total quality management; TQM; research organisation; leadership; innovation; performance; strategy; multi-collinearity; South Africa.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBEX.2023.128256

International Journal of Business Excellence, 2023 Vol.29 No.1, pp.61 - 79

Received: 06 Jan 2020
Accepted: 04 Jun 2020
Published online: 16 Jan 2023 *