Quality of work and performance in a production organisation The impact of QMS and organisational structure

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2021-08-31
Language
en
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Abstract
The use of technology and the organisational structure must be linked together. When technology and the organisational structure fit well together, the quality of work and performance will increase. However, the embedding of technology in the organisational structure is often forgotten in organisational studies. Besides, it can be assumed that using technology requires a different approach to the work that has to be performed, which changes the organisational structure. However, relatively little scientific research has been conducted into what exactly changes the content of the work. The quality management system (QMS) is used as a technological system in this research, whereby the introduction of self-managing teams (squads) includes the organisational structure. This research focuses on bottlenecks and strengths that QMS and self-managing teams (squads) create. Thereby, it is investigated how the use of QMS and the new organisational structure affects the quality of work and performance. This research question was answered by a case study about the Belgian organisation STAS. This organisation uses QMS and works with self-managing teams, where the term ‘squads’ (or self-managing teams) refer to the new organisational structure. Experiences and feelings of the employees were examined to determine the impact on the quality of work and performance. Sixteen employees from different organisational layers were interviewed to get insight into this. A white paper and excel files that were available within STAS were also consulted to validate the results of the interviews. This study found that both QMS and squads ensured that the quality of work and performance at the case organisation increased. Furthermore, QMS and squads were not separate but complemented each other. In other words, only their joint use can ensure that the quality of work and performance remains high.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen