Assessment of the impact of total quality management principles on the quality of constructed project in Ebonyi state Nigeria

Construction organisations in developing countries like Nigeria are challenged by many managerial related issues. The collapse of buildings and other infrastructural facilities across the length and breadth of Nigeria has risen to alarming dimension and has raised serious concerns over the quality of constructed projects. The dissatisfaction of the clients/users on the delivered project not meeting the specified requirements has also been a major cause for patronage and unsustainability of constructing organisations and the preference of organisations with improved track record of quality deliverables. Total quality management is a companywide drive led by top management to obtain the involvement of all employees in the continuous improvement of the performance of all activities in the company so as to meet the needs and satisfaction of the customer. The purpose of this study is assess the impact of TQM principles on the quality of constructed facilities. Data were collected from industry professional using a well-structured questionnaire and purposive sampling technique in Ebonyi State, Nigeria. The collected data were analysed using frequency, percentages and relative index methods. Diminishing reworks and reduction in resource wastages (0.831), improving quality of products and services (0.815), providing a disciplined means of producing goods and services (0.782) were found as top the benefits of implementing TQM. The study reveals inadequate top management commitment to TQM (0.802), poor organisational attitude towards TQM (0.787), insufficient cross functional cooperation between stakeholders (0.774), fragmented nature of the construction industry (0.760), amongst barriers/limitations to TQM implementation. Furthermore, top management commitment and leadership (0.887), Continuous improvement (0.846), employee’s involvement in TQM (0.831) are top TQM principles that impact on the constructed projects. The study therefore recommends that the organisations top management should take the lead and drive the employees towards high quality project delivery.