Total quality management, investors in people and higher education

Abstract

This article argues that the UK 'Investor in People' programme has advantages for universities and other higher education institutions over other quality improvement schemes. It offers the opportunity to make total-quality-management (TQM) initiatives more meaningful within the current higher education context. Many total-quality-management programmes have not been that successful because they are excessively top down and have little or nothing to do with the everyday experience of the vast majority of staff. The Investors in People initiative can be endorsed as an opposite vehicle for developing internal mechanisms and processes of a transforming nature rather than the more commonly held 'business' definitions of TQM with the associated 'inappropriateness' of the TQM language. The article concludes that the Investors in People standard integrates well with other processes of institutional change, is externally assessed and leads to a national standard, yet is flexible enough to be implemented meaningfully in a unique way within each institution. It can only be successful, however where it is seen as integral to the planning process and not 'just another initiative'.