Linking quality assurance to human resource management:a study of SMEs in Malaysia

摘要

Purpose - As organizations try to provide quality assurance from ISO certification, the importanceof people management through better HR management assumes greater significance. This paper aimsto examine this issue. It seeks to compare selected ISO certified SMEs with non-ISO certified SMEs onseveral HR practices.Design/methodology/approach-A sample of 292 employees drawn from ten SMEs, five of themISO certified, responded to a questionnaire which measured the adequacy of the following HRMsystems: career system (manpower planning and recruitment, potential assessment, career planning),work system (role analysis, contextual analysis, performance appraisal), development system (trainingand learning, performance guidance, knowledge sharing, other means of competency development),self-renewal system (role efficacy, OD practices, action-oriented research), and HRD system (HRDclimate, organizational values, quality orientation, reward and recognition).Findings-The results indicated a moderate rating for most of the HRM systems in all theorganizations including those with ISO certifications. However, ISO certified companies wereperceived to be doing better on managing career system, conducting contextual analysis for goalsetting and quality orientation. In the rest of the cases the differences were not significant.Practical implications-The findings suggest that organizations need to go beyond qualityassurance to organization-wide quality management through improvement in HR systems andpractices.Originality/value-The paper provides empirical knowledge on HR systems and practices and therelationship of these factors with organizational quest for quality in a developing economy.